Rocket Blaster: Build a Scratch Project

Educators & parents: You can do this Hour of Code Activity as a class or students can work on it independently. If you have any questions or need help, email info@codespeaklabs.com.

Special thanks to Darwin, the creator of this project and tutorial. Darwin was an inaugural member of the Abretech program for multilingual high school students.

Hi, I’m Darwin. I’m a High School Junior in the AbreTech program. I’m excited to teach you how to make your own Rocket Blaster game where the user is a hero defending the world from rockets.

We're going to be using a block-based programming language Scratch where the player controls the hero shooting fire blasts; if the fire blast touches a rocket, the rocket disappears. The more rockets the hero destroys, the more points are added to the scoreboard. To make the game harder, you can add things that the hero should NOT blast (like innocent birds!), that the player has to avoid.

Using the programming language Scratch, you will be able to create or import interactive elements/characters such as special abilities, game backgrounds, moving enemies to challenge players through the game, and variables whose value change based on events in game.

By the end of this tutorial, you will have a fully functional rocket blaster game that you can share with your friends and family.

Watch the videos below to get started, and follow along with me to build your own Rock Blaster Game.

Part 1: Set up your project

In coding, a sprite is a two dimensional bitmap that is integrated into a larger scene, most often in a 2D video game. You can make your own hero sprite, or find one here.

We'll be using variables in our project. In coding, a variable is a value that can change, depending on conditions or on information passed to the program.

Part 2: Code the Game

We'll be using a lot of fundamental coding concepts like:

• An "if then" block checks for a condition. IF the condition is fulfilled, THEN something will happen.
• A forever loop runs whatever code/script is inside the forever loop continuously. It has no end, unless you specify the game to stop the forever loop.
  

Part 3 & 4: Debugging

In coding, debugging is the process of finding and fixing errors or bugs in the source code of any software.

Congratulations on successfully completing the Rocket Blaster game! By creating this fun and educational game, you have learned more about game programming and also memorized the basic steps in order to create a Scratch project.

As a bonus challenge, you can take your game to the next level by suggesting other ideas for the game to not only be about spaceships and meteors.

Want to go beyond Hour of Code? Click here to learn to build a Build a Road Game in Scratch.

If you had fun, check out our YouTube channel for more free coding projects like these! Go to youtube.com/codespeaklabs.