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I will make the base structure today with lots of comments so you will know where to add stuff. That should give you a good idea where to start.

To get the title screen done you will have to use jQuery to catch the click event. Well technically you dont HAVE to use jQuery but to keep all the event code the same you should.

For the main menu we can just place <a> links using relative positioning. Make sure the onclick event returns false so they dont cause you to leave the page though haha.

Also a lot of discussion and design is going on in the Google doc. So dont forget to check that out if haven't lately.

I will try and get a hello world version up on the repo soon so you can mess around in the title game state if you want.

Yep, resource scarcity should solve that issue. Walls are just cheaper towers that dont shoot back. We will have to do a lot of play testing to get the balance right.

If walls become too much of an issue we can do something like introduce flying units which are not affected by walls.

Walls being too cheap will make it too easy (slow build?) Walls being too costly will make them worthless as towers would block paths better. Perhaps some towers can only go on walls? Some towers are not blocking (they can walk between two next to each other.)

You are right, resource cost and time-to-build balancing is going to take a lot of work. Walls are going to have to be cheaper than towers... but no so cheap as to make it so you can fill the map up with them. Maybe a slow build time or perhaps a maximum limit on walls? Thoughts?

To make it less annoying for players I would consider having towers have a destroyed state which is passable by enemy units. They can repair the tower with a slightly lower cost of placing a new one and performing upgrades.having to do a whole bunch of extra work when a tower is destroyed would be less fun. Unless we are doing a rogue like/tower defense hybrid lol.

I think for simplicity's sake all units should be able to rotate and fire independent of their movement direction. Most real-life military units can do this. Whether they can fire while moving is a design decision I think we can determine on a per unit basis.

Utility units and other more unique units are definite phase 2  constructs. That will be the phase when we take a working game and try to make it more interesting.

Another good thing to be familiar with is jQuery. We'll be using it for handling user input because it is easy and cool.

On a gameplay note: For ease of uh... everything, how about having the units be able to shoot in a direction not related to their movement? The top half of the enemy would rotate allowing them to aim and shoot in 360°. This is the same behavior as units in Total Annihilation had.

For graphic assets this means that all the units (and towers) must be made up of two sprites: base and turret. You could reuse a lot of the sprite assets. A base with tank treads could be used on many different types of units with different turret pieces.

What do you guys think?

If you would like to learn more about the entity/component model here is a good article about it http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/MeganFox/20101208/88590/Game_Engines_101_The_EntityComponent_Model.php

Currently working on a Google presentation document I figure we can use for our design doc. It ahould allow us to draw stuff out as well as including any necessary text or pictures. Starting with program flow then going into each of the different screens, drawing out all the features and listing all of the possible user interactions.

I will edit this post in a few with a link to the document. Plus I will send an invite through gmail to everybody.

Went to the library today because their online catalog showed they had some books on arduino and robotics. I was really disappointed in the quality of the books. Of the ones available all of them were the type where they assume you will be purchasing a robot kit. They walk you through what all the parts in the kit are and very brief descriptions of how they work and then give instructions for assembling the kit. Not at all what I am looking for. Maybe some of the books that where currently checked out are better? But even the generic robot building books were all kit-based. One of them was basically a glorified kit catalog with prices and websites and not much else.

It looks like I am going to be using online resources only. A lot of those have the same problem too... Buy my $100+ robot kit! Not looking to rebuild the wheel here, but plugging together something somebody else designed just doesn't seem that much fun.

Where is a good place to get servos? I also received a USB servo controller (my Mom bought me a lot of vaguely related electronics stuff haha) but I dont have any servos to control yet.

I played a game this week that I think would be perfect to take on a camping trip. It is called Munchkin. Unlike board games it only requires a deck of cards and a single die.

The point of the game is to kill monsters, get treasure and backstab your friends. It is basically an RPG without all that roleplaying crap. Also it is humorous and easy to learn.

So I just got an arduino uno for Christmas. I guess this means it's time for the web controlled pi/arduino robot.

Just have to figure out how to use this thing first... Guess I will make some LEDs blink or something.

OK... hypothetically non-hypothetical question:

What would you call somebody like Indiana Jone's job title (not talking about the college professor part)? What I mean is, what do you call somebody how goes into dangerous situations (ruins filled with traps, ancient sewers under libraries, nazi germany) to recover valuable artifacts or whatever?

Artifact Recoverer?
Burglar?
Asset Retreiver?
Guy that goes and gets things?

What do you think?

Received my Pi and Camera in the mail today. Haven't had time to try it out yet due to having to write a job application for my own job but I can say that the camera is TINY.

That would be cool! You going to make it so we can control your house remotely? haha