Pong-Reloaded/README.md

🏓 Pong Reloaded

A classic arcade game rebuilt from the ground up using Modern C++ (C++20) and the Raylib library. Designed with performance, customization, and modularity in mind.

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🚀 About & Motivation

Pong Reloaded is an educational and exploratory game development project. Built as a student engineering activity, it serves as a personal challenge to push past standard university curricula and experiment with low-level graphic structures.

The key goals of this project:

• Master Raylib & Game Design: Experiment with 2D rendering pipelines, sound synthesis, custom sprites, and real-time game state management.
• Optimize for Low Resources: Implement performance-first programming in C++, minimizing memory overhead and achieving a highly optimized execution path that runs perfectly on low-end laptops.
• Challenge Knowledge Boundaries: Apply advanced Object-Oriented Programming (OOP) concepts, robust state machine architectures, and direct Win32 API integrations.

Note

This project is developed within the Helios Additional Activity initiative at the Technical University of Cluj-Napoca (UTCN) – Faculty of Electronics, Telecommunications and Information Technology (ETTI).

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🎮 Features

• 👾 Zero-Dependency Portability: The game compiles into a single, standalone executable. Textures, audio, and icon files are embedded directly into the binary's resource section (.rc) using Windows PE resources, ensuring it never breaks due to missing assets.
• ⚡ Highly Optimized Engine: Optimized game loops, zero-allocation physics updates in the hot-path, and efficient CPU sleeping patterns. Smooth frame rates on hardware with minimal system resources.
• 🤖 Dynamic AI Opponent: A singleplayer CPU opponent powered by adaptive movement algorithms with three difficulty settings: Easy, Normal, and Hard.
• 👥 Local Co-op Multiplayer: Local 1v1 couch-co-op mode featuring an interactive Multiplayer Lobby where both players toggle ready states before initiating the match.
• 🎨 Premium Settings & Theme Engine:
  • Screen Settings: Customizable resolutions (1280x800, 1600x900, 1920x1080) and Fullscreen / Windowed modes.
  • Framerate Controls: Selectable 60 FPS, 144 FPS, or VSync limits.
  • Score Limits: Custom thresholds (5, 11, 15, or 21 points).
  • Visual Themes: Toggleable background space themes (Default, Galaxy, Trap), custom ball skins, and paddle textures.
• 🛠️ Developer Console: Built-in console overlay toggled dynamically via F7 for real-time engine tracing and logging.

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📐 Architecture & System Design

To ensure modularity, high performance, and clear separation of concerns, Pong Reloaded is built around a decoupled Object-Oriented design.

Below is the UML class diagram outlining the relationships between the game entities, screen controllers, state management, and resource loaders:

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💾 Quick Install & Play

No installers, DLLs, or complex dependency installations are required!

1. Head over to the Latest Releases section.
2. Download the pong-reloaded.exe binary.
3. Double-click the .exe and start playing immediately!

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⌨️ Controls Reference

Context	Action / Key	Player 1 (Left Paddle)	Player 2 / Singleplayer (Right Paddle)
Menu Navigation	Up / Down	—	Arrow Up / Arrow Down
Menu Confirm	Enter	—	Enter
Lobby Ready Toggle	Ready State	W	Arrow Up
Gameplay Movement	Up / Down	W / S	Arrow Up / Arrow Down
Gameplay Actions	Pause / Resume	—	P
Gameplay Actions	Force Game Over / Reset	—	Space
Developer Tools	Toggle Dev Console	—	F7

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🛠️ Building From Source

Prerequisites

• Windows OS
• Visual Studio 2022 (with "Desktop development with C++" workload)
• Raylib library installed/configured

Steps

1. Clone this repository:

   git clone https://github.com/Dr20Ervin/Pong-Reloaded.git
   cd Pong-Reloaded
   

2. Open pong-reloaded.sln in Visual Studio.
3. Build the project under Release / x64 configuration to generate the optimized, standalone executable.

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📜 Credits & Attributions

Codebase Template

• Original Author: educ8s (Nick Koumaris)
• Original Repository: educ8s/Cpp-Pong-Game-Raylib
• This project adapts core architectural concepts and Raylib integrations from the original repository.

Asset Credits

The graphical and audio resources used in this game were curated from the open-source gaming community:

• Original Project: Moddable Pong
• Author/Creator: Endless OS Foundation & Endless Studios
• Website: endlessos.org
• Repository: endlessm/moddable-pong
• Notice: All assets are utilized strictly for academic research, non-commercial development, and validation milestones. All rights and copyrights belong to their respective owners.

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📄 License

This project is licensed under the MIT License.