Thread: Draw a grid using the following characters?

If you're making a bejeweled type game, you're going to need a function to check for sequences during the course of game play. You could use this same function during initialization to check for sequences after randomly determining the starting values. If any are found, change those spots to new characters. Repeat until there are no duplicates side by side.

This is an example of what I was suggesting - the setup function:

Code:

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <time.h>

#define R 5
#define C 5

void setup(char grid[R][C]);
void printIt(char grid[R][C]);

int main(void) {

   int r, c;
   char grid[R][C];

   srand(time(NULL));
   for(r=0;r<R;r++) {
      for(c=0;c<C;c++) {
         grid[r][c]=rand() % ('F'-'A') + 'A';
      }
      printf("\n");
   }
   printIt(grid); 
   
   setup(grid);
   printf("\n\n");
   printIt(grid); 

   return 0;
}
void setup(char grid[R][C]) {
   int row,col, change=0; 
   
   for(row=0;row<R;row++) {
      for(col=0;col<C-1;col++) {
         while(grid[row][col]==grid[row][col+1]) { 
            grid[row][(col+1)]++;
            change++;
            if(grid[row][col+1]>'E') {
               grid[row][col+1]='A';
            }
         }
      } 
   }   
   printf("\n\nchange: %d\n",change);
}
void printIt(char grid[R][C]) {
   int r,c;
   for(r=0;r<R;r++) {
      for(c=0;c<C;c++)
         printf("%c ",grid[r][c]);
      putchar('\n');
   }
}

Correction, the above is NOT what I was suggesting, but it was what seemed best, after I got to working on the problem a bit more. It does closely model what Matticus suggested above.

Hi again! Um, since it's a Bejeweled like game, do you have any suggestions on how to check for matches of 3, for, or 5 in a row?

There is a thing called greedy matching. Take the first thing you see as a possible match and visit the nearest neighbor in every direction for number 2. If you find it, you have to keep going in that direction to "collect" the match. So for example you find a yellow block going down, you keep going down looking for yellow; the idea is to match as many yellow things as you can in a line. It shouldn't be too hard to cover the entire board.