Ryan Buxton
Junior Games Programmer
CONNECT-4
A relatively simple program:
Connect-4 utilises object-oriented programming principles in Python as to compartmentalise each entity's functionality.
Bit-wise operations have been used in order to calculate whether a token is placed at a certain location, whether a token can be placed in a selected column and if any of the players have won.
GALLERY
DESCRIPTION
The board is represented by a single array of unsigned 8-bit integer values and each column is an element of this array. The value contains switched bits which denote token positions and when a player places a token in a column, the the first least-significant bit that is off is the next available token position. N is the element of the array and 2^X is the state bit-position X where X is between 1 and 6.
N
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2^X
With regards to the checking the winner becomes a little more complex but for each direction there is an algorithm that checks for each possible win-state.
For example, a horizontal win requires 2^X to be on for each N where X can be 1-6 and initial N value can be anything 1-4.
