Inspiration
We loved the idea of promoting research into STEM subjects and sustainability together, as we know just how relevant they are today. We pondered on the idea of a game involving a series of maths questions to help students work towards goals with game levels and prizes, and initiate their love for STEM. However, we feel incredibly connected to protecting our planet for future generations, and also wanted to educate on all aspects of STEM, so we expanded on our idea. From previous classwork we were inspired to look into green energy production facilities. This included learning about hydro-electric dams, and wind farms and our own research into solar panel farms and wave power. Over these four sites we included questions on sciences, technology and engineering. We decided to create an exciting game based on the idea of the user owning a green-energy umbrella company, where the user can unlock different production facilities to expand their company.
What it does
Our game has multiple tabs including a map, to show the users progress in unlocking different sites. The other tabs are levels, are each of the green energy production sites which the user can unlock. The levels each have a diagram depicting a different facility, with number labels on different areas and corresponding buttons for each label. There is also a box containing additional information about the advantages and disadvantages of these sites. When the buttons are clicked a box of information about the step pops up, once next is clicked a quiz question comes up to check the user read the information. If they get it right, their progress stored in a bar in the bottom corner increases, if not the answer is locked and the user must restart the level. When the user restarts the level, the progress bar returns to empty and the questions are reset. When all the questions are answered correctly for that level, the progress bar will be full and that green energy production facility will appear on the map, showing that the user has completed the level. Once all the levels have been completed and the map is full, some text will appear to tell the user well done for having completed the game.
How we built it
We built our game in Java, using the IDE Apache NetBeans 18. We used buttons, labels and text fields from the Swing Container in our Palette. This allowed us to write code about each specific object in different sections of our source code. We also imported a lot of diagrams, to help the user visualise the process, which we adapted or made ourselves, using research to understand the workings of the facilities, to ensure accuracy in our diagrams. We then used sites such a W3 Schools, Stack OverFlow and various YouTube videos to help us learn about the different commands to use in our code. Once we had a basic understanding and had programmed the first level, we were able to use many similar processes in the other levels, meaning we were much more independent when coding these sections.
Challenges we ran into
When creating diagrams for the different levels, to import the diagram we needed to create a label and insert an icon. Initially when adding the diagram, the image size was completely off and it was very hard to format it the size of the diagram as a jFrame. Therefore we had to ensure that we had the right size before adding the photo to the label, which we did by resizing the diagrams on word and taking a screenshot. We also struggled to move a lot of the objects around on our interface, such as layering pop-ups and making sure that the right things are visible at the right times and in the right places. To get around this we got used to working with Layered Panes, which allowed us to place the objects where we wanted to them to be, including layering some of the pop up menus.
Accomplishments that we're proud of
We are so proud to have been so independent with this project, from discovering it online to developing our entry and working well together throughout the process. We have also worked on an earlier deadline to ensure that we could finish our project before our school holidays, while also finding the time to work on the project and balance our busy schedules around each other.
What we learned
We learnt how to coordinate well with each other in a team, brainstorming together and then finding our preferred tasks so we could also complete small parts individually and then bring them back together. We learnt so much about coding syntax and Java methods, especially as we embarked on this project with only a foundation knowledge in Java, and so taught ourselves the majority of the programming skills and we learnt a lot in researching the energy production sites. We also learnt lots of methods to deconstruct problems. We solved many smaller logical problems within this project, as we figured out how to cause certain actions following certain conditions or events, and we are both confident that it has developed our coding abilities and mathematical computation skills.
What's next for My Green Energy
We hope to inspire many others with our game, and potentially find a way to make a more user-friendly interface by exploring different programming methods, and one day make our game more accessible to young people.
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