Grinder

A gamification wrapper around Python, inspired by vigil

Overview

Grinder is a gamified version of Python, in which you have to incrementally unlock the usage of various modules. Grinder does this by checking your code against a recorded statistics file, and preventing it from running if there are any imports that you have not unlocked. Unlocking imports costs Gold, and Gold is earned by running programs successfully - programs which have unhandled exceptions cost you Gold!

This program/language/toy is an entry in the February 2013 PLTGames Competition

License

WTFPL.

Requirements

• Python 2.7
• A command line of some sort
• A deranged personality that likes grinding

Usage

Running grinder without any parameters shows you usage:

$ ./grinder

Grinder is used as follows
  ./grinder myprogram.py
    -> runs myprogram.py if all the imports are unlocked
  ./grinder stats
    -> prints your Gold and unlocked imports
  ./grinder shop
    -> opens up the shop to spend your Gold on unlocking imports
  ./grinder cheat
    -> allows you to cheat - gives you 1000 Gold
  ./grinder help
    -> prints this help info
  ./grinder about
    -> prints some version and author info

Here's some example output, checking stats:

$ ./grinder stats
Your grinder stats:
Gold: 362
Unlocked modules:
  os
  sys
  re

Here's a program with a bunch of failing modules:

$ ./grinder test.py
Error! Module one not unlocked!
Error! Module two not unlocked!
Error! Module three not unlocked!
Error! Module four not unlocked!
Error! Module five not unlocked!
Error! Module six not unlocked!
Error! Module seven not unlocked!
Error! Module eight not unlocked!
Error! Module nine not unlocked!
Error! Module ten not unlocked!
Error! Module eleven not unlocked!
Error! Module twelve not unlocked!
Error! Module thirteen not unlocked!

Here's a user unlocking the modules needed to run a program (yes, I cheated.):

$ ./grinder test2.py
Error! Module sys not unlocked!

$ ./grinder shop
Welcome to the Grinder shop!
Your grinder stats:
Gold: 2000
Unlocked modules:
Commands that can be entered below:
  b modulename
    -> unlocks modulename -- costs 500 gold
  q
    -> quits shopping
command?> b sys
purchase module sys? (y/n)> y
purchased module sys
Your grinder stats:
Gold: 1500
Unlocked modules:
  sys
Commands that can be entered below:
  b modulename
    -> unlocks modulename -- costs 500 gold
  q
    -> quits shopping
command?> q
Bye!

$ ./grinder test2.py
cygwin

After this, you'll see that you've earned some Gold:

$ ./grinder stats
Your grinder stats:
Gold: 1530
Unlocked modules:
  sys

By uncommenting the last line, we see what happens when a program throws an exception:

$ ./grinder stats
Your grinder stats:
Gold: 1530
Unlocked modules:
  sys

$ ./grinder test2.py
cygwin
Error running program!

list index out of range

$ ./grinder stats
Your grinder stats:
Gold: 1461
Unlocked modules:
  sys

You lost Gold!