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Home > J2ME Tutorial, Part 3: Exploring the Game API of MIDP 2.0

J2ME Tutorial, Part 3: Exploring the

Game API of MIDP 2.0
In part three of this J2ME tutorial, you will use the mobile gaming package to
develop a simple game, which uses all of the classes of this package, as a
learning tool.
Games with MIDP 2.0
Thu, 2005-07-07
Vikram Goyal [1]
In part three of this J2ME tutorial, you will use the mobile gaming package to
develop a simple game, which uses all of the classes of this package, as a
learning tool.

J2ME is a popular platform

for developing games for
wireless devices. With MIDP Contents
2.0, a new package has
been introduced that J2ME Gaming API: An Overview [2]

provides several gaming A Very Short Primer on Game Building [3]

constructs that would only
have been possible in MIDP Building a J2ME Game: Start with the GameCanvas [4]

1.0 with a great deal of Defining Game Characteristics [5]

repetitive code. In this part
of this tutorial series, I will Building a J2ME Game: Creating Backgrounds
introduce you to this Using the TiledLayer class [6]
gaming package and help Building a J2ME Game: Sprites and LayerManager [7]
you develop a simple game
that uses all of the classes Managing Layers Using the LayerManager [8]

of this package as a Adding More Sprites and Detecting Collisions [9]

learning tool. The package
is called Conclusion [10]

javax.microedition.lcdui.game,

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and it builds upon the

concepts that you learned
in the previous installments in this series.

J2ME Gaming API: An Overview

There are only five classes in the javax.microedition.lcdui.game package: GameCanvas,
Layer, Sprite, TiledLayer, and LayerManager. These five classes are enough to provide a
platform for the development of games with a wide range of capabilities.

The Layer class is the superclass of the Sprite and TiledLayer classes. This class
abstracts the behavior of a visual element in a game. This element can be a
sprite, which represents an independent graphic (or a collection of graphics for
animation) that can be moved around the game screen, or a tiled layer, which
represents a graphic that can be used to create vast game backgrounds with
only a handful of images. You use the Layer classes for positioning and visibility.
The subclasses override the paint(Graphics g) method, which has the task of
rendering the elements on the screen.

The LayerManager class provides a convenient mechanism to manage the various

visual elements of a game (sprites and tiled layers) by rendering the proper
layer in the proper order.

The GameCanvas class is made useful by extending the functionality of the Canvas
class (from the previous article [11] ). It provides an off-screen buffer, to which all
rendering operations are done before flushing them on the device screen. It
also provides an easy-to-use mechanism to query the current keys being
pressed by the user.

The best way to introduce you to these classes is with the help of a working
game example, which we will build from the ground up, explaining the various
facets of a game. This is helpful whether or not you have programmed a game
before, if you are looking to learn how to do it for the wireless devices using
J2ME's gaming API. After a quick introduction to game building (for those who
have never created a game), the remaining sections introduce each of the
classes from the javax.microedition.lcdui.game package, with the help of a concise
but complete game.

A Very Short Primer on Game Building

A game or animation is built according to the principle of repetitively executing
a piece of code. This piece of code tracks the value of instance variables and
updates the game state accordingly. Based on the game state, the code then

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draws/paints/repaints the game screen with the elements that make up the
game. The values of the instance variables may change because of either user
interaction or internal game behavior.

The repetitive execution is effected by putting the repetitive code in an infinite

loop. Before entering the loop, an instance variable may be checked to see if
the game should still be running, and if not, the loop may be exited. The code
in the loop should allow the current thread of execution to sleep every few
milliseconds to control the rate at which the update to the instance variables is
done (in effect, how fast the game screen should be refreshed).

To put it in coding terms:

// main class
public MainClass {
private GameCanvas canvas = new MyGameCanvas();

public MainClass() {
// start a thread that will run infinitely
canvas.start();
}

// rest of the code

}

// the actual drawing class

public MyGameCanvas extends GameCanvas implements Runnable {

public MyGameCanvas() {
// instantiation code
}

public void start() {

// do initialization

// and then start a thread

Thread runner = new Thread(this);
runner.start();
}

private void run() {

// or while(keeprunning = true)
// where keeprunning is an instance variable

while(true) {

// checks if the game has reached

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// some boundary states or special conditions

verifyGameState();

// gets input from user and

// updates instance variables
// that describe the games elements

checkUserInput();

// paints elements on screen to reflect

// the current game state using the current
// graphics object

updateGameScreen(getGraphics());

// control the rate at which screen updates are done

Thread.sleep(milliseconds);
}
}
}

We will use this structure to develop a game in the following sections.

Building a J2ME Game: Start with the GameCanvas

A GameCanvas class is a specialized subclass of the Canvas class that you

encountered in the previous installment [12] of this series. GameCanvas is optimized
for gaming because it provides a special off-screen buffer in which all painting
operations are done. When all painting on this buffer is complete, the buffer is
rendered on the device screen by calling the flushGraphics() method. This double
buffering has the advantage of producing smooth transitions of moving
elements on a screen to counter the flickering that might happen if no
buffering were provided. The size of the buffer is equal to the size of the device
screen, and there is only one buffer per GameCanvas instance.

The GameCanvas class provides a storage mechanism for the state of game keys,
which is a useful way to query user interaction with the game. This provides a
simple way of keeping track of the number of times the user has pressed a
particular key. Calling the method getKeyStates() returns a bitwise representation
of all of the physical game keys, expressed as 1 for pressed and 0 for
unpressed, since the last time the method was called . Only the following game
states are identified, which is what you would expect, keeping in mind the
game keys defined by the Canvas [11] class: DOWN_PRESSED, UP_PRESSED, RIGHT_PRESSED,
LEFT_PRESSED, FIRE_PRESSED, GAME_A_PRESSED, GAME_B_PRESSED, GAME_C_PRESSED, and GAME_D_PRESSED.

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Let's build a game canvas by extending the GameCanvas class. Listing 1 shows the
first attempt, while Listing 2 shows the MIDlet that will be used to run the
examples.

Please follow the instructions given in part one [13] of this series, which explain
how to create, test, and run a MIDlet using the Wireless toolkit.
package com.j2me.part3;

import javax.microedition.lcdui.Image;
import javax.microedition.lcdui.Graphics;
import javax.microedition.lcdui.game.GameCanvas;

import java.io.IOException;

public class MyGameCanvas

extends GameCanvas implements Runnable {

public MyGameCanvas() {
super(true);
}

public void start() {

try {

// create and load the couple image

// and then center it on screen when
// the MIDlet starts
coupleImg = Image.createImage("/couple.gif");
coupleX = CENTER_X;
coupleY = CENTER_Y;

} catch(IOException ioex) { System.err.println(ioex); }

Thread runner = new Thread(this);

runner.start();

public void run() {

// the graphics object for this canvas

Graphics g = getGraphics();

while(true) { // infinite loop

// based on the structure

// first verify game state

verifyGameState();

// check user's input

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checkUserInput();

// update screen
updateGameScreen(getGraphics());

// and sleep, this controls

// how fast refresh is done
try {
Thread.currentThread().sleep(30);
} catch(Exception e) {}

private void verifyGameState() {

// doesn't do anything yet
}

private void checkUserInput() {

// get the state of keys

int keyState = getKeyStates();

// calculate the position for x axis

calculateCoupleX(keyState);

private void updateGameScreen(Graphics g) {

// the next two lines clear the background

g.setColor(0xffffff);
g.fillRect(0, 0, getWidth(), getHeight());

// draws the couple image according to current

// desired positions
g.drawImage(
coupleImg, coupleX,
coupleY, Graphics.HCENTER | Graphics.BOTTOM);

// this call paints off screen buffer to screen

flushGraphics();

private void calculateCoupleX(int keyState) {

// determines which way to move and changes the

// x coordinate accordingly
if((keyState & LEFT_PRESSED) != 0) {
coupleX -= dx;
}
else if((keyState & RIGHT_PRESSED) != 0) {
coupleX += dx;

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// the couple image

private Image coupleImg;

// the couple image coordinates

private int coupleX;
private int coupleY;

// the distance to move in the x axis

private int dx = 1;

// the center of the screen

public final int CENTER_X = getWidth()/2;
public final int CENTER_Y = getHeight()/2;

Listing 1. MyGameCanvas: A first attempt at building a gaming canvas

Listing 2 shows the MIDlet that will use this gaming canvas:

package com.j2me.part3;

import javax.microedition.midlet.MIDlet;
import javax.microedition.lcdui.Display;

public class GameMIDlet extends MIDlet {

MyGameCanvas gCanvas;

public GameMIDlet() {
gCanvas = new MyGameCanvas();
}

public void startApp() {

Display display = Display.getDisplay(this);
gCanvas.start();
display.setCurrent(gCanvas);
}

public void pauseApp() {

}

public void destroyApp(boolean unconditional) {

}
}

Listing 2. MIDlet class to run the game examples

Using both of these classes, create a project with your Toolkit (I have called
this project "Part 3 Game Examples") and then build and run the project. You

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will need this image file: , named couple.gif [14] , in the res folder of your
project, or you can use a similar-sized image. Figure 1 shows the expected
output.

Figure 1. Building a game: using GameCanvas

The solitary image in the middle of the screen can be moved left and right with
the help of the left and right game keys, respectively. In the code shown in
Listing 1, this is achieved by querying the game states in the checkUserInput()
method and then calling the calculateCoupleX() method with this game state. As
you can see, by bit-wise ORing the state with the supplied Constants in the
GameCanvas class, you can easily determine which key the user has pressed and
act accordingly. The x axis position of the image is moved left or right of the
current position by adding or subtracting delta x ( dx) from it.

The image is rendered on the screen in the updateGameScreen() method. This

method is passed the current Graphics object. This object is created for you by
the GameCanvas class, and there is only one such object per GameCanvas. The method
clears this graphics buffer of any previous renderings, draws the couple image
based on the current coupleX variable (and the currently unchanging coupleY
variable) and then flushes this buffer on the device screen.

The infinite loop in the run() method follows the game structure that I
described in the sidebar earlier. This loop sleeps for 30 milliseconds before

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going on another cycle to determine the user input and refresh the buffer. You
can experiment with this value to slow down or speed up the refresh rate.

Finally, notice that the MyGameCanvas constructor calls its superclass GameCanvas's
constructor with a parameter value of true. This indicates that the normal key
event mechanism, inherited from the Canvas class, should be suppressed, as this
code does not require these notifications. The game state is adequately
handled by the key state information, which is fetched from the getKeyStates()
method. By suppressing the notification mechanism for "key pressed," "key
released," and "key repeated," the game performance is improved.

Defining Game Characteristics

A game where all you have to do is to move the central character left and right
is not very fun. Let's make some modifications to the game skeleton in Listing
1 to define this game a little better. To start with, specify a boundary for your
game. It is essential to do this, because it helps to make your game
consistently sized across different devices. To do this, start by defining some
constants that are shown in the code here:

// the game boundary

public static final int GAME_WIDTH = 160;
public static final int GAME_HEIGHT = 160;

// the shifted x,y origin of the game

public final int GAME_ORIGIN_X = (getWidth() - GAME_WIDTH)/2;
public final int GAME_ORIGIN_Y = (getHeight() - GAME_HEIGHT)/2;

// the height of sections below and above the couple

public final int SECTION_HEIGHT = 64;

// the base on which the couple will move

public final int BASE = GAME_ORIGIN_Y + GAME_HEIGHT - SECTION_HEIGHT;

// the max height the couples can jump

public final int MAX_HEIGHT = 32;

(Note that I have introduced a game characteristic that indicates that this
couple may soon be jumping on the screen, with the help of the MAX_HEIGHT
constant.) On the screen, these constants help define the boundary of the
game and its sole element (the couple), as shown in Figure 2.

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Figure 2. Defining the game boundaries using the game constants

Of course, now you need to modify the rest of the code to use these constants.
Add a new method to Listing 1 called buildGameScreen(Graphics g), as shown in code
here:

private void buildGameScreen(Graphics g) {

// set the drawing color to black

g.setColor(0x000000);

// draw the surrounding rectangle

g.drawRect(GAME_ORIGIN_X, GAME_ORIGIN_Y, GAME_WIDTH, GAME_HEIGHT);

// draw the base line

g.drawLine(GAME_ORIGIN_X, BASE, GAME_ORIGIN_X + GAME_WIDTH, BASE);

// draw the maximum line to where the couple can jump to

g.drawLine(GAME_ORIGIN_X, BASE - MAX_HEIGHT,
GAME_ORIGIN_X + GAME_WIDTH, BASE - MAX_HEIGHT);

Also add a call to this method in the updateGameScreen() method, before the couple
image is drawn. The game boundaries have been defined and the only thing
left to do is to make the starting position for the couple image as the BASE and
not CENTER_Y. Change this in the start() method by setting coupleY = BASE;.

The couple image can move left and right with the left and right game keys,

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but now we ensure that it does not move past the game boundary. This was a
problem in Listing 1, too, but in that case, the image simply vanished off the
screen, as the boundary was the edge of the screen. It will look very odd if the
image went past the boundaries now. Therefore, modify the left and right
press actions in the calculateCoupleX() method to restrict movement beyond the
boundaries. This modified method is listed here:

private void calculateCoupleX(int keyState) {

// determines which way to move and changes the

// x coordinate accordingly
if((keyState & LEFT_PRESSED) != 0) {
coupleX =
Math.max(
GAME_ORIGIN_X + coupleImg.getWidth()/2,
coupleX - dx);
}
else if((keyState & RIGHT_PRESSED) != 0) {
coupleX =
Math.min(
GAME_ORIGIN_X + GAME_WIDTH - coupleImg.getWidth()/2,
coupleX + dx);;
}

This method now uses Math.max() and Math.min() methods to restrict the couple
image within the game boundaries. Notice that it also incorporates the width
the of the image in these calculations.

I spoke earlier about making the couple image jump around on the screen.
Let's see how this can be achieved by adding a method to move the image
along the Y axis, independently of the user playing the game.

Add three new instance variables to Listing 1, called up, jumpHeight, and random,
as shown here:

// a flag to indicate which direction the couple are moving

private Boolean up = true;

// indicates the random jump height, calculated for every jump

private int jumpHeight = MAX_HEIGHT;

// random number generator

public Random random = new Random();

As you can see, jumpHeight is initialized to MAX_HEIGHT. This jumpHeight variable will be
calculated for each jump that the couple make and it will be set to a random
value each time. This is shown in the calculateCoupleY() method shown here:

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private void calculateCoupleY(int keyState) {

// check if the couple were on the way up

if(up) {

// if yes, see if they have reached the current jump height

if((coupleY > (BASE - jumpHeight + coupleImg.getHeight()))) {

// if not, continue moving them up

coupleY -= dy;
} else if(coupleY == (BASE - jumpHeight + coupleImg.getHeight())) {

// if yes, start moving them down

coupleY += dy;

// and change the flag

up = false;

} else {

// the couple are on their way down, have they reached base?
if(coupleY < BASE) {

// no, so keep moving them down

coupleY += dy;

} else if(coupleY == BASE) {

// have reached base, so calculate a new

// jump height which is not more than MAX_HEIGHT
int hyper = random.nextInt(MAX_HEIGHT + 1);

// but make sure that this it is atleast greater than the image height
if(hyper > coupleImg.getHeight()) jumpHeight = hyper;

// move the image up

coupleY -= dy;

// and reset the flag

up = true;

}
}
}

Note that since this method doesn't depend on the user pressing the up or
down game keys, it has no use for the keyState information. But this value is
passed to it nonetheless, in order to maintain conformity with the
calculateCoupleX() method. This method starts moving the couple image by
changing the coupleY variable in the upwards direction until it reaches the
current jump height (which is the MAX_HEIGHT at starting). Once it reaches this

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jump height, it starts moving it in the opposite direction until it reaches BASE. At
this point, a new jump height value, between the MAX_HEIGHT and couple image
heights, is randomly calculated and the couple start jumping again.

The overall effect is of a randomly jumping couple who can be moved left and
right by the user playing the game. A snapshot is shown in Figure 3.

Figure 3. Game snapshot

Building a J2ME Game: Creating Backgrounds

Using the TiledLayer Class
In this section, you will add some color to the game by providing a background
using the TiledLayer class. The game is divided into three sections: the top
section can be thought of as the sky, the middle section in which the couple
jump is the earth, and the bottom section is the sea. These three sections can
be filled easily using three colored images of the size 32 by 32 pixels each, one
for each section. However, each section is bigger than 32 by 32 pixels, and the
TiledLayer class is used to define large areas like these with small images.

To start, divide the game screen into squares of 32 by 32 each and number
each row and column, starting with an index of 0. This is shown in Figure 4
and results in a 5-by-5-cell background.

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Figure 4. Divide the game screen into individual cells

Thus, cells (0, 0) to (1, 4) are to painted with a sky image; cells (2, 0) to (2, 4)
are to be painted with an earth image, and cells (3, 0) to (4, 4) are to be
painted with a sea image. You will do this with the image shown in Figure 5.

Figure 5. Background image

The first 32 by 32 cell represents the earth image, the second represents the
sea, and the last represents the sky. When you use the TiledLayer class, these
images are numbered starting from index 1 (not 0; therefore, earth is 1, sea is
2, and sky is 3). The TiledLayer class will take this one image and divide it into
three separate images used for rendering the game background. In our case,
we want the TiledLayer class to render a 5-by-5-cell background using cells of 32
by 32 pixels each. This is achieved by the following code:

// load the image

backgroundImg = Image.createImage("/tiledLayer1.gif");

// create the tiledlayer background

background = new TiledLayer(5, 5, backgroundImg, 32, 32);

As you can see, the first two parameters to the TiledLayer constructor represent
the total background size, the next parameter represents the image, and the
last two parameters represents the size of each cell. This size will be used by
the TiledLayer class to carve the image into its individual background cells.

All that is now left is to set each cell with its respective image. The full code to
create the background is listed below in a method called createBackground(). You
will need to add a call to this method from the start() method of the MyGameCanvas
class. Once this is done, add a call to paint this background using

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background.paint(g) at the end of the buildGameScreen() method, which will render it to

screen.

// creates the background using TiledLayer

private void createBackground() throws IOException {

// load the image

backgroundImg = Image.createImage("/tiledlayer1.gif");

// create the tiledlayer background

background = new TiledLayer(5, 5, backgroundImg, 32, 32);

// array that specifies what image goes where

int[] cells = {
3, 3, 3, 3, 3, // sky
3, 3, 3, 3, 3, // sky
1, 1, 1, 1, 1, // earth
2, 2, 2, 2, 2, // sea
2, 2, 2, 2, 2 // sea
};

// set the background with the images

for (int i = 0; i < cells.length; i++) {
int column = i % 5;
int row = (i - column)/5;
background.setCell(column, row, cells[i]);
}

// set the location of the background

background.setPosition(GAME_ORIGIN_X, GAME_ORIGIN_Y);

The final result will look like Figure 6.

Figure 6. Game with a background added

Building a J2ME Game: Sprites and LayerManager

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So far, I have used an image of a jumping couple to showcase a game

element. This element is currently rendered as an image; but it makes sense to
render it as a sprite instead. A sprite is a term in gaming parlance that refers
to any visual element, usually an animated image, that can be moved around
the screen independently of the other elements. The Sprite class is used to
represent sprites in the MIDP 2.0 gaming API. This class provides methods to
animate the sprite based on a handful of images, similar to the way
backgrounds are created using the TiledLayer class. More importantly, it
provides methods to check collisions with other game elements, including
images, sprites, or tiled layers.

Let's start by converting the existing couple image into a sprite. To showcase
animation, I will use the image showed in Figure 7, which is the couple image
duplicated over with a different color into two different frames, each 10 by 10
pixels each.

Figure 7. Frames for couple Sprite animation

Similar to the TiledLayer class, the Sprite class requires that the size of each
frame be passed in to its constructor. This is shown here:

coupleSprite = new Sprite(coupleImg, 10, 10);

This code, added after the creation of the couple image in the start() method,
creates a couple sprite with two frames of 10 by 10 pixels each, numbered
from 0 onwards. Thus, to alternate between the sprite images, you can call the
nextFrame() method, which gets the next image in the current sequence. Since
there are only two images in this sprite sequence, they will be shown one after
another. If you want to make a particular frame/image the current displayable
image for a sprite in a longer frame sequence, you can do so by using the
method setFrame(int sequenceNo). In this case, add coupleSprite.nextFrame() in the
updateGameScreen() method.

You now don't want the couple image to be painted on the screen. Before the
couple sprite can be painted on the screen, you need to define a reference
pixel for it. Think of this as an origin around which all painting operations are
done. By default, a sprite is painted with its upper left corner as its origin.
Similar to the way you set the reference of the couple image using the
Graphics.HCENTER | Graphics.BOTTOM code, you need to define a reference pixel for the
sprite. This is shown here:

coupleSprite.defineReferencePixel(coupleSprite.getWidth()/2, coupleSprite.getHeight());

Add this snippet after the creation of the sprite as described earlier. Now,
instead of positioning the sprite based on its original origin, you will position it

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based on this reference pixel as, shown here:

coupleSprite.setRefPixelPosition(coupleX, coupleY);
coupleSprite.paint(g);

The last line in this code snippet paints the sprite on the graphics object that is
passed to it. As expected, you will need to insert these lines in the
updateGameScreen() method in lieu of the lines that painted the couple image. The
final result will look exactly the same as before, except the jumping couple will
be replaced with a flickering jumping couple!

Before going forward, make sure that you change all references to the coupleImg
variable to coupleSprite in thecalculateX() and calculateY() methods.

Managing Layers Using the LayerManager

Recall that both the Sprite and TiledLayer classes extend the Layer class. A game
may contain at least one TiledLayer and several Sprite classes. With so many
layers to control, the LayerManager class comes in handy. This class provides
methods to add, remove, or insert layers from a game, and also provides a
single method to paint all of these layers to the underlying Graphics object. This
means that you don't need to individually call the paint() method of each of the
layers of a game.

An instance of LayerManager is created using its no-args constructor. Layers are

then added, removed, or inserted into it by using the methods append(Layer
layer), remove(Layer layer), and insert(Layer l, int index), respectively. The order in
which layers are added is important, because this order determines which
layer is painted first, as this becomes the z-order index. The layer at index 0 is
painted on top of all the other layers, and hence, is closest to the user, and so
on.

In our game, the start() method now needs to be modified, as shown here:
// creates the layermanager
manager = new LayerManager();

// and adds layers to it

manager.append(coupleSprite);

// creates the game background

createBackground();

manager.append(background);

As you can see, the coupleSprite layer will be closest to the user and the background
layer will be farthest back, based on their indices. The buildGameScreen() method

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now does not need to paint the background (as the LayerManager will paint the
background now), and therefore the background.paint(g) line needs to be removed
from this method. Finally, in the previous section, you used the coupleSprite to
paint it on the screen instead of the coupleImage. Now even that is not required,
as the LayerManager will do this for you. Remove coupleSprite.paint(g) from the
updateGameScreen() method and replace it with manager.paint(g, 0, 0). As you can see,
all calls to individual layers' paint() methods have been replaced with a single
call to the LayerManager's paint() method. The last two parameters represent the
location at which the manager should paint. Since the background and carSprite
are responsible for their own positioning, you can leave these parameters as is
(that is, paint from the device origin).

Listing 3 shows the revised updateGameScreen(). The lines that are to be removed
are retained as comments to make it easy to locate the changes.

private void updateGameScreen(Graphics g) {

// the next two lines clear the background

g.setColor(0xffffff);
g.fillRect(0, 0, getWidth(), getHeight());

// creates the game borders

buildGameScreen(g);

// draws the couple image according to current

// desired positions
/*g.drawImage(
coupleImg, coupleX,
coupleY, Graphics.HCENTER | Graphics.BOTTOM);*/

// animates the sprite

coupleSprite.nextFrame();

// moves the sprite based on its reference pixel

coupleSprite.setRefPixelPosition(coupleX, coupleY);

// paints it on the buffer

// coupleSprite.paint(g);

// the manager paints all the layers

manager.paint(g, 0, 0);

// this call paints off screen buffer to screen

flushGraphics();

Listing 3. Updated updateGameScreen() method

Adding More Sprites and Detecting Collisions

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What fun is a single lonely sprite jumping around for no obvious purpose? It's
time to introduce another sprite, in the form a car sprite that will randomly
appear at several locations across the game screen. The jumping/shining
couple will need to bump into these evil car manifestations to defeat them!
The more cars that are hit by the couple in a fixed time, the higher the score.

With the game objectives now clear, let's first create a class that will keep
track of the time so that the game can be stopped once the time has expired.
Listing 4 shows the code for the Clock class.

package com.j2me.part3;

import java.util.TimerTask;

public class Clock extends TimerTask {

int timeLeft;

public Clock(int maxTime) {

timeLeft = maxTime;
}

public void run() {

timeLeft--;
}

public int getTimeLeft() { return this.timeLeft; }

}

Listing 4. The Clock class that will keep track of the game time

The Clock class extends the TimerTask class, whose run() method gets executed
after a predefined time. Here, it reduces the maxTime variable every second,
which helps us keep track of the time. To use the Clock class, create and start it
just before the infinite loop inside of the run() method of the MyGameCanvas class is
executed, as shown here:

// before going in the loop, start the timer clock with a

// 30 seconds countdown
clock = new Clock(30);
new Timer().schedule(clock, 0, 1000);

Of course, now the infinite loop must be preempted with a flag that stops the
loop from running when the time has expired. To do this, define a Boolean flag
called stop, as shown here:

// the flag that tells the game to stop

private Boolean stop = false;

Use it in the while loop as while(!stop) and enter the first lines of code in the

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verifyGameState() method:

private void verifyGameState() {

if(clock.getTimeLeft() == 0) {
stop = true;
return;
}
}

Finally, the user needs to be informed of the time left in the game. To do this,
add a method called showTimeLeft(Graphics g), as shown here:

private void showTimeLeft(Graphics g) {

// what does the clock say

int timeLeft = clock.getTimeLeft();

// if less than 6 seconds left

// flicker time with red and black
if(timeLeft < 6) {
if((timeLeft % 2) == 0)
g.setColor(0xff0000);
else
g.setColor(0x000000);
}

// draw the time left string

g.drawString("Time Left: " + timeLeft + " seconds", 0, 0, 0);

// reset the color

g.setColor(0x000000);

This is called at the end of the buildGameScreen() method. Figure 8 shows a

snapshot of the game as it looks now.

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Figure 8. Game with time left showing

It is time to add a new (actually several new) sprites into this game. Listing 5
shows the code for the car sprite in a separate class called CarSprite. This code
uses the image of a car shown in Figure 9.

Figure 9. Image for car sprite

package com.j2me.part3;

import java.util.Random;
import javax.microedition.lcdui.Image;
import javax.microedition.lcdui.game.Sprite;
import javax.microedition.lcdui.game.LayerManager;

public class CarSprite implements Runnable {

public CarSprite(MyGameCanvas parent) {

this.parent = parent;
this.manager = parent.getManager();

public void start() {

// first load the car image

try {
carImage = Image.createImage("/car.gif");
} catch(Exception e) { System.err.println(e); return; }

// next start the thread that will display cars

// are random locations
runner = new Thread(this);

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runner.start();
}

public void run() {

try {
while(true) {

// create a random car

randomCar();

// wait before creating another one

Thread.currentThread()Sleep(500);
}
} catch(Exception e) { System.err.println(e); }
}

// creates and displays a car at a random location

private void randomCar() {

// if maximum cars are being shown return

if(currentCars == MAX_CARS) return;

// create a new car sprite

carSprite = new Sprite(carImage, 10, 10);

// generate the random places where cars may appear

int randomCarX = parent.getRandom().nextInt(parent.GAME_WIDTH);
int randomCarY =
(parent.BASE -
parent.getRandom().nextInt(parent.MAX_HEIGHT + 1) -
carSprite.getHeight());

// make sure that these places are within bounds

if(randomCarX < parent.GAME_ORIGIN_X) randomCarX = parent.CENTER_X;
if(randomCarY < (parent.BASE - parent.MAX_HEIGHT))
randomCarY = parent.CENTER_Y;

// set this newly created car sprite in its random position

carSprite.setPosition(randomCarX, randomCarY);

// add it to the manager at index 0

manager.insert(carSprite, 0);

// increase the no of cars created

currentCars++;

public void checkForCollision() {

// if there are no cars being shown (only background and couple)

if(manager.getSize() == 2) return;

// iterate through the layers, remember don't worry about

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// the last two because they are the couple and background
for(int i = 0; i < (manager.getSize() - 2); i++) {

// if collision occurs
if(parent.getCoupleSprite().collidesWith(
(Sprite)manager.getLayerAt(i), true)) {

// remove the offending car

manager.remove(manager.getLayerAt(i));

// reduce the no of cars on display

currentCars--;

// and increase the no of cars hit

carsHit++;

}
}
}

// the no of cars hit

public int getCarsHit() {
return carsHit;
}

// the car sprite

private Sprite carSprite;

// the car image

private Image carImage;

// the no of current cars in display

private int currentCars;

// the parent canvas

private MyGameCanvas parent;

// the parent canvas's layer manager

private LayerManager manager;

// runner
private Thread runner;

// tracks the no of cars hit

private int carsHit;

// the maximum no of cars to create

private static final int MAX_CARS = 20;

Listing 5. Code to create several car sprites

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The CarSprite class implements Runnable, as it needs to spawn several new car
sprites every half a second. The run() method calls the randomCar() method after
sleeping for 500 milliseconds. The randomCar() method checks if the number of
existing car sprites hasn't exceeded the limit, then creates a new sprite using
the car image loaded earlier. It then calculates a random position for this sprite
to appear at, making sure that this random position is within the game
bounds. It sets this newly created sprite in this random position and adds the
sprite to the LayerManager at index 0, so that it becomes the most recent (and
closest to the user) sprite.

This class also provides a method to check for collision of the couple with the
random cars. The checkForCollision() method iterates through the current car
sprites being shown by the LayerManager, and uses the collidesWith() method of the
Sprite class to check for collision. This method returns a Boolean true when
collision has occurred, and accepts a layer, an image, or another with which
sprite to check collision. It also accepts a flag to indicate if collision detection
should take into account the transparent pixels around an image, or only
opaque pixels. When a collision is detected, the number of cars hit is
incremented and the number of cars visible is decremented.

To use the CarSprite class, append the following lines of code at the end of the
start() method of the MyGameCanvas class.

// create the car sprite thread and start it

carSprite = new CarSprite(this);
carSprite.start();

Also add the following line of code at the end of the verifyGameState() method.

carSprite.checkForCollision();

Thus, the CarSprite thread starts spawning new cars, up to a maximum number
of cars. Once the user hits a car by moving the jumping/shining couple with an
unpredictable bounce, the car disappears. This is checked in the
verifyGameState() method by calling the checkForCollision() method on the CarSprite
thread. More cars keep appearing till the time runs out. Figure 10 shows a
typical game in progress.

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Figure 10. A typical game in progress after adding the car sprites

All that is left now is to inform the user about the number of cars that he has
hit. After the while() loop has exited, add a call to a new method called
showGameScore(getGraphics()), and add this new method as shown here:

// at the end of the game show the score

private void showGameScore(Graphics g) {

// create a base rectangle

g.setColor(0xffffff);
g.fillRect(0, CENTER_Y - 20, getWidth(), 40);

g.setColor(0x000000);

// and show the score

g.drawString("You hit " +
carSprite.getCarsHit() + " cars.",
CENTER_X, CENTER_Y,
Graphics.HCENTER | Graphics.BASELINE);

flushGraphics();
}

This draws a small rectangle in the middle of the screen at the end of the
game showing the number of cars hit by the player. A typical game ending is
shown in Figure 11.

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Figure 11. A typical game ending and the message displayed

You can, of course, display this information in any format or location that you
want.

Conclusion
This part of the J2ME tutorial series was a long-winded but comprehensive look
at the gaming API of MIDP 2.0. You learned how to use the classes of this API
using a full-fledged example and built a game successfully. You also learned
the basics of game building through this example.

In the next few parts of this tutorial, you will learn how to add multimedia to
your MIDlets, something that can be very useful in J2ME games. You will also
learn how to use the record-store management API to consistently store
information permanently. In the meantime, you can download and experiment
with the game that you built in this article by downloading the full source code
[12] . You can also play with the final game by downloading the JAD [15] and JAR

[16] files.

Vikram Goyal [1] is the author of Pro Java ME MMAPI.

Source URL: http://www.java.net/article/2005/06/20/j2me-tutorial-part-3-exploring-game-api-

midp-20

Links:
[1] http://www.java.net/author/vikram-goyal

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[2] http://www.java.net/article/2005/06/20/j2me-tutorial-part-3-exploring-game-api-
midp-20#overview
[3] http://www.java.net/article/2005/06/20/j2me-tutorial-part-3-exploring-game-api-
midp-20#primer
[4] http://www.java.net/pub/a/today/2005/07/07/j2me3.html?page=2#gamecanvas
[5] http://www.java.net/pub/a/today/2005/07/07/j2me3.html?page=3#characteristics
[6] http://www.java.net/pub/a/today/2005/07/07/j2me3.html?page=4#backgrounds
[7] http://www.java.net/pub/a/today/2005/07/07/j2me3.html?page=5#sprites
[8] http://www.java.net/pub/a/today/2005/07/07/j2me3.html?page=5#layermanager
[9] http://www.java.net/pub/a/today/2005/07/07/j2me3.html?page=6#adding_sprites
[10] http://www.java.net/pub/a/today/2005/07/07/j2me3.html?page=6#conclusion
[11] http://www.java.net/pub/a/today/2005/05/03/midletUI.html
[12] http://www.java.net/%3Ccs_comment
[13] http://www.java.net/pub/a/today/2005/02/09/j2me1.html
[14] http://www.java.net/images/2005/07/couple.gif
[15] http://www.java.net/today/2005/07/07/part3_game_examples.jad
[16] http://www.java.net/today/2005/07/07/part3_game_examples.jar

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