[HN Gopher] Show HN: I made a mini golf in my lunch time
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       Show HN: I made a mini golf in my lunch time
        
       Author : heyarviind2
       Score  : 150 points
       Date   : 2025-01-18 08:16 UTC (3 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (paper-golf.netlify.app)
 (TXT) w3m dump (paper-golf.netlify.app)
        
       | jslakro wrote:
       | Great project. Makes me think on a digital version of this
       | https://gladdendesign.com/products/paper-apps-golf
        
         | heyarviind2 wrote:
         | Yes i am inspired from this :D
        
           | matt3D wrote:
           | It might be worth putting something on the page directing
           | people to Gladden's original.
        
         | jldugger wrote:
         | But neither seem to compare favorably to Golf Peaks[1]. Instead
         | of rolling dice you're given a hand of cards to play, making it
         | into a puzzle!
         | 
         | [1]: https://afterburn.itch.io/golf-peaks
        
           | dr_kiszonka wrote:
           | Gladden's is a physical game and great for face-to-face
           | multiplayer.
        
           | bestouff wrote:
           | The only negative point of Golf Peaks is that it's too short
           | !
        
       | dvh wrote:
       | I got generated hole in a tree.
        
         | heyarviind2 wrote:
         | yes fixing that bug
        
       | zenethian wrote:
       | It's neat but I soft locked because my roll had no valid moves.
        
         | bb88 wrote:
         | Hmmm... That seems like a valid move needs to exist for all
         | possibilities for every square.
         | 
         | Water should probably be allowed to hit over too, but not in.
        
           | stevage wrote:
           | how do you hit over water in mini-golf?
        
             | theOGognf wrote:
             | By hitting it sufficiently hard
        
       | coumbaya wrote:
       | Ah! I spent an hour today trying to recreate the golf course from
       | gladdendesign too (I ordered one of each of their games when I
       | saw it on youtube)! But I got sidetracked trying to fit perlin
       | noise into the solution, still not sure what algorithm to use to
       | generate similar terrains. Also I kind of assumed copying the
       | game exactly wouldn't be super fair or even legal so I planned on
       | keeping it private.
        
         | hombre_fatal wrote:
         | Heh, I also was inspired to implement the game with some major
         | changes once the video popped up on youtube. I got it working
         | but lost interest when it came to polishing the mapgen and
         | generating interesting maps with the slope mechanic.
        
         | nurettin wrote:
         | Sounds like a job for wave function collapse?
        
       | dave333 wrote:
       | This is fun. Strategy is to get in line with the hole so there's
       | a chance to hole out next shot. Would be more realistic if you
       | could hit any number of spaces up to the die roll. Maybe have
       | different clubs - driver = die roll +3, iron = die roll, putter
       | that can hole out at any distance up to 6 not necessarily in a
       | straight line if you roll that distance or more. So e.g. putter
       | can hole out with knights move if you roll 3 or higher.
        
         | janderson215 wrote:
         | I see what you're saying, but it's mini golf, so you only get
         | one club.
        
         | CommieBobDole wrote:
         | > be more realistic if you could hit any number of spaces
         | 
         | The docs say that's how it works, but clearly that's not how it
         | was implemented.
         | 
         | "Move straight or diagonally up to the dice value"
        
       | gus_massa wrote:
       | If the ball is at 3 squares from the hole and the dices get's a
       | 4, I'd allow to end the game. It's more fun to navigate the
       | obstacles than to try to get the exact number to finish.
        
         | heyarviind2 wrote:
         | I fixed it, if you are close to the hole, you will get exact
         | number to finish the game
        
           | gus_massa wrote:
           | :)
           | 
           | Scrolling is wrorking in a weird way in movile Chrome. I can
           | go down but not up.
        
             | gus_massa wrote:
             | Why I can't move over water???
        
               | dylan604 wrote:
               | I thought the same thing about trees and assumed the dev
               | based the game on my golf skills where going over trees
               | is impossible
               | 
               | Try thinking of it as mini golf/putt putt where the ball
               | only rolls
        
               | pavel_lishin wrote:
               | In the original game, you can only go over trees if
               | you're hitting from the fairway; OP may not have coded
               | that in.
               | 
               | You should be able to go over water at any point, as long
               | as you've got the distance for it.
        
               | dylan604 wrote:
               | it's mini golf. it's in the title of TFA as such. in mini
               | golf, the ball only rolls. the ball does not roll across
               | water. it does not roll over trees even from the fairway.
               | if your ball leaves the ground with a putter, something
               | is very very wrong
        
               | pavel_lishin wrote:
               | > _if your ball leaves the ground with a putter,
               | something is very very wrong_
               | 
               | Ugh, you sound just like the manager of the last
               | seventeen mini-golf places I've been kicked out of. I
               | shall not apologize for my athleticism!
               | 
               | Though I probably should have apologized to the parents
               | of those kids who they had to call an ambulance for.
        
               | gus_massa wrote:
               | I think it's more interesting if you have two kind of
               | obstacles, so there are more tricks and path to try (but
               | not as difficult as chess). This looks easy to implement.
               | 
               | Also, as an untested idea, it would be nice to have two
               | dices and be able to select one of them or the other or
               | the sum. Perhaps both dice then disappear, or perhaps the
               | unused dice goes to the next round like in scrabble. The
               | idea is to have more possibilities to think in each step
               | (like make a small jump and aim to a nice diagonal, or go
               | to the shore and hope a big hit next turn). This reduce
               | the nasty effect of getting a 1. But I'm not sure if any
               | of these variants are more fun, and all of them take a
               | while to be implemented.
        
               | em3rgent0rdr wrote:
               | > more interesting if you have two kind of obstacles
               | 
               | Yeah. As a general rule of game dev, if there is a
               | different icon, then its behavior should be different.
        
               | stevage wrote:
               | it's mini-golf
        
           | tromp wrote:
           | Ah, that explains why I thought I was getting very lucky to
           | be able to get a hole in 3, and shortly afterwards, even a
           | hole in 2. Is it possible to get a hole in 1, or are levels
           | constructed so as to prevent that?
        
       | tantalor wrote:
       | Doesn't work in Android Chrome. Clicking does nothing.
       | 
       | Edit: figured out what was wrong, I had bedtime mode turned on
       | which desaturated the screen, making the light yellow impossible
       | to see. Suggestion: make the highlight more visible/accessible
        
         | pimlottc wrote:
         | I couldn't see the highlights either on my first hole. Or maybe
         | there were no valid landing spots, I'm not sure.
         | 
         | I also thought the black circle was the hole, not the ball.
         | Golf balls are normally white, not black.
         | 
         | EDIT: it appears that the highlights (and trails) disappear if
         | you scroll up and down a few times (iOS mobile safari)
        
         | forgotoldacc wrote:
         | Or some sort of pulsing on the clickable areas. I reloaded the
         | page a few times before I realized the pale yellow spots were
         | supposed to be clicked. I assumed it was bugged, but I was
         | wrong.
        
       | hattar wrote:
       | I just got 13 rolls of 3 in a row. I think there may be an issue
       | with the RNG
        
         | gorgoiler wrote:
         | _"That's the problem with randomness: you never can be sure."_
         | 
         | https://imgur.com/gallery/dilbert-random-number-generator-uR...
        
         | gaoryrt wrote:
         | Ha, that's pretty random to me!
        
         | rockitect wrote:
         | I also got something like 12 rolls of 3 in a row. I would
         | definitely check the RNG routine to ensure that it is not
         | biased to the mean (i.e., verify that you are drawing from a
         | uniform, rather than normal, distribution).
        
       | janderson215 wrote:
       | I like that you can hear the club swing and contact on higher
       | rolls, but I NEED to hear the ball hit the bottom of the cup when
       | I sink the putt.
       | 
       | Also, maybe some optional crowd noise if you hit it past the hole
       | or hit it in the wrong direction due to an over-roll.
        
       | mproud wrote:
       | Hole in 48!
        
       | your_challenger wrote:
       | Awesome! I watched Gladden Design's video too and loved it. It's
       | great that you've made it accessible! Please consider giving
       | attribution to Gladden Design.
        
       | abraxas wrote:
       | I'd prefer if I had several moves to make after a single roll of
       | the dice.
       | 
       | Also I block html5 auto playback by default which you appear to
       | use for some animation stuff. It'd be great if the game could
       | work without it.
        
       | jbatch13 wrote:
       | Wow, someone just sent me this post because I also made a golf
       | game inspired by Gladden Design's this week! :D I made my own
       | twist on it a bit, making it use a hex grid because I didn't like
       | how diagonal moves were treated the same distance as orthogonal
       | moves and I added bonuses and skill shots to give the player a
       | reason to take a non-straight line path to the hole and made it a
       | daily game but having a wordle style share score button. I'm
       | surprised how many people saw that video and also all had the
       | same idea that "this would make a great digital game idea"
       | https://golf.jbat.ch/
        
         | ThomW wrote:
         | Hex tiles are a really smart improvement on the game. I do kind
         | of miss the little trees instead of just the dark green color
         | though. :D
         | 
         | I also wonder if the graphics wouldn't make playing easier for
         | color blind folks. :)
        
       | keepamovin wrote:
       | This is cool! Well done. Where did you get the sound from?
        
       | tubiwatcher wrote:
       | PSA: I needed to disable my "Disable HTML Autoplay" Chrome
       | extension in order for the game to work.
        
       | ivolimmen wrote:
       | Nice but I got stuck near the end. I kept rolling 3 and then the
       | button shakes and that is it.
        
       | extinctsion wrote:
       | The strokes does not get updated properly. It needs to be fixed
        
       | wingerlang wrote:
       | Highlighting the valid squares to shoot to would be nice
        
       | heyarviind2 wrote:
       | Anyone, if you like this game and you wanna improve it, please
       | consider giving your feedback here ->
       | https://huntlie.com/product/mini-golf?tab=feedback
       | 
       | I should do the following things first:
       | 
       | 1) Give credit to Paper's app in next update 2) Convert it to
       | mobile app
        
       | martypitt wrote:
       | Great stuff! Thanks for making this. Would love the ability to
       | turn off the sound, but that's a minor nitpick.
        
       | kylegalbraith wrote:
       | This is a lot of fun. Thank you for making this.
        
       | 2024user wrote:
       | A bit intuitive - the instructions should be on the screen next
       | to the map
        
       | zaik wrote:
       | Random flight lengths and double digit stroke counts for one
       | hole? Finally a realistic game that matches my experience on the
       | golf course.
        
       | maalber wrote:
       | Very nifty idea! And cute, simple visuals
        
       | lovegrenoble wrote:
       | funny enough
        
       | thih9 wrote:
       | In case anyone else has trouble:
       | 
       | 1. The black circle is the ball; you roll the dice to determine
       | the amount of moves
       | 
       | 2. after the dice roll, the allowed moves will be shown - as
       | yellow squares near the ball; this is a very faint yellow and
       | easy to miss
       | 
       | 3. to move the ball, roll the dice then click on the faint yellow
       | squares near the ball (or further away if you rolled a 6).
        
         | e_i_pi_2 wrote:
         | To add:
         | 
         | You might need to zoom out a bit to see the whole map, the hole
         | was hidden for me initially
        
         | diggan wrote:
         | Alternatively:
         | 
         | - Click barely noticeable hamburger menu in the top left
         | 
         | - Click "How to Play"
        
       | rtkwe wrote:
       | Is the roll determined by your position on the board at all? I
       | just ran into a seemingly endless chain of 3 rolls where I was
       | bouncing back and forth between two positions for 15+ rolls.
       | 
       | edit: I kept going for another 10 rolls before bailing out of the
       | loop for one iteration and got back into the cycle again
       | immediately on returning to the start point. ie: I went A-B-
       | A-B...A-C-A-B... where C was also 3 steps away from A and I
       | rolled a 3 on C too). Definitely seems like it's a partially
       | deterministic stroke roll.
        
         | bena wrote:
         | You have to move exactly the number of dots shown in the roll.
         | 
         | Trees block you. You can't finish your move on sand or water.
         | You also can't do "knight moves". So you're kind of stuck going
         | straight or at 45 degree angles.
        
           | rtkwe wrote:
           | I know that. I was going back and forth between two squares
           | rolling 3 every time for a statistically improbable number of
           | times. I could have chosen a different move but after going A
           | to B to A and rolling 3 AGAIN I was more interested in seeing
           | if that was a fluke or if it was something else happening.
           | 
           | Being able to do that 20+ times makes it really improbable
           | the rolls were truly random numbers hence my question.
        
         | mindtricks wrote:
         | Had the same issue, but finally gave up.
        
       | pavel_lishin wrote:
       | Hah! I've been emailing the creator of Paper Golf to ask if he
       | would be ok with me creating something like this! Looks like you
       | beat me to the punch :P
        
       | doodpants wrote:
       | How come after you roll but before you move, the Strokes value at
       | the top shows the current roll value instead of the stroke count?
       | Is this a bug?
        
       | tln wrote:
       | I can't hit over the water??
       | 
       | https://ibb.co/TRbGgVx
        
       | abetusk wrote:
       | This is super sweet!
       | 
       | My only gripe is that it doesn't seem to be very desktop
       | friendly. I'm on FF 192.0.2 (64bit) and I can't figure out how to
       | pan or zoom around the play field.
       | 
       | It would also be nice to see a "par" or statistical breakdown of
       | levels compared with other people. The randomness might make this
       | a bit tricky but things like Crypt of the Necrodancer use seeded
       | levels and, presumably, seeded RNGs for other elements of the
       | randomness in levels to make it consistent across players.
       | 
       | Super simple and super effective. Very nice.
        
       | chrisgd wrote:
       | Very cool thanks for building. Would echo some of the other
       | comments about how to play but I figured it out. Is a hole in 1
       | possible on any holes?
        
       | high_priest wrote:
       | Hole in 420 strokes! The only path to the target was through a
       | corner of width 1, so I had to get a very specific set of 1s or
       | 2s. But I kept rolling back & forth on 5s & 6s :D
       | 
       | The specificity of the result after such a long time gambling
       | without real reward is oddly satisfying.
        
       | dwallin wrote:
       | There's a nugget of something clever here but it's missing
       | something, there's too much luck and not quite enough skill for a
       | golf game.
       | 
       | My first thought was selecting from various dice with different
       | distributions to represent the various golf clubs.
       | 
       | My second was that a hex grid would offer a much better variety
       | of options. The square grid only has 1 or 2 useful directions
       | that can bring you closer. A hex grid would typically have 2 to 3
       | useful directions.a hex
       | 
       | Then I thought, this sounds like a good base for a board game,
       | did a search and turns out there already is one that uses that
       | formula! https://boardgamegeek.com/image/6370656/roll-in-one
        
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