The Best of Creative Computing Volume 1 (published 1976)
Depth Charge (BASIC computer game, submarines, Battleship)
A new computer game from CREATIVE COMPUTING Magazine. . .
DEPTH CHARGE
DESCRIPTION
In this program, you are captain of the destroyer, USS Digital. An enemy
submarine has been causing trouble
and your mission is to destroy it. You may select the size of the "cube" of
water you wish to search in. The computer then determines how many depth charges
you get to destroy the submarine.
Each depth charge is exploded by you specifying a trio of numbers; the first two
are the surface coordinates, the third is the depth. After each depth charge,
your sonar observer will tell you where the explosion was relative to the
submarine.
PROGRAM AUTHOR .
Dana Noftle (Age 18)
37 Mohawk Drive
Acton, MA 01720
USING THE PROGRAM
1. Type in the DEPTH CHARGE program on your computer. Convert it, if necessary,
to your dialect of BASIC.
2. Divide into teams of 2 or 3 players and play the game. Try to come up with
an optimal guessing strategy for a search area with a dimension of 10, of 100,
of 1000.
3. Statement 30 sets the maximum number of trials allowed for search areas with
different dimensions. Make a table like this:
SEARCH AREA SIZE: 1 2 ...100
TRIALS ALLOWED:
What does this tell you?
4. Modify the program to allow the submarine to move one grid point in any
direction on each trial. It makes a
more exciting game, but you'll have to allow additional trials to find the
submarine. In this game, make
TRIALS N a quantity to be input.
[image] "That destroyer has only one more depth charge and then we zap him."
"The ship is on gridpoint 2,4,0"
