Console games and movement

I am developing my first "game" in console. I know how to move around using gotoxy(x, y); but how do I use X and Y keys? I have seen games like tic-tac-toe where you press LEFT and it moves left. How do I do this in console?

use these with getch() or getchar whenever you want to test for keys.

left arrow = 'K'
up arrow = 'H'
down arrow = 'P'
right arrow = 'M'

like

Code:

---


char ch;

//do stuff...
ch = getch();
if(ch == 'H')
    //do something for the UP arrow
ect...

---

How do I do it without having to press ENTER? I just want to make something move as soon as the key is pushed.

unfortunatly this is implementation dependant, usually people use getch() or getche() for this but it may not work with certain compilers.

This is what I do because I dont like getch() also its a lot more flexible though harder to learn.

You will need to use the <windows.h> header

first what I do is create standard input output handles something like

HANDLE hStdIn, hStdOut; //create them
//get the standard handles
hStdOut = GetStdHandle(STD_OUTPUT_HANDLE);
hStdIn = GetStdHandle(STD_INPUT_HANDLE);

//then I create a buffer for input
INPUT_RECORD inputBuffer;
DWORD dwInputEvents; //and a counter for events read

do //start a loop
{
//then i read an input event
ReadConsoleInput(hStdIn, &inputBuffer, 1, &dwInputEvents);

switch (inputBuffer.EventType){//put a switch in it for inputbuffer
case KEY_EVENT: //cout key info when button is down
if (inputBuffer.Event.KeyEvent.bKeyDown) {
cout<<" Key Down = " <<
inputBuffer.Event.KeyEvent.uChar.AsciiChar <<" Virtual code = "
<<inputBuffer.Event.KeyEvent.wVirtualKeyCode<<endl ;
}
break;
case MOUSE_EVENT: //cout a bunch of info about the moust
cout<<" Mouse: "<<(inputBuffer.Event.MouseEvent.dwEventFlags == MOUSE_MOVED ? "moved " : "clicked")<<" X = "<< inputBuffer.Event.MouseEvent.dwMousePosition.X<<" Y = "<< iputBuffer.Event.MouseEvent.dwMousePosition.Y<<" "<<"button state "<<inputBuffer.Event.MouseEvent.dwButtonState< <"
mouse state "<<inputBuffer.Event.MouseEvent.dwEventFlags
<<endl;
break;
}//end switch
// when we receive an esc down key, drop out of do loop
}while (!(inputBuffer.EventType == KEY_EVENT&&
inputBuffer.Event.KeyEvent.wVirtualKeyCode == VK_ESCAPE &&
inputBuffer.Event.KeyEvent.bKeyDown));


This should work.
I got it out of a Microsoft consol examples that came with MVC++6.0

Using this you can find the Key code and use and if statement for a specific button press such as up

A lot of this stuff is really weird and uses a lot of structures
It took me a long time to figure it out using all the help files and console function examples.

Oh dont worry about the different data types such as DWORD and HANDLE. Just remember that they need to be CAPS.

Arrow keys return 2 chars; this will work: (SORRY ABOUT THE WEIRD FORMATTING)

Code:

---

                    char input;
                    char arrow;
                    input = getch();
               
        if((int)input == -32)
        {
        arrow = getch();
        switch(arrow)
        {
        case 'H':
        {
        }break;
       
                    case 'P':
        {
        }break;
       
                    case 'K':
        {
        }break;
                               
                    case 'M':
        {
        }break;
        }

                    }

---

If you use getch and still have to press enter, this means that your header files succ. Don't use thses header files and they don't such any more.