I just installed CargoBot on our 12 iPads shared by our students (this is not a 1:1 iPad program). Is there a multiplayer feature for CargoBot so that several students could use the same iPad and each save their progress? Since I was just introducing it to a small group of students today and they did some of the activities in the tutorial, I deleted and reinstalled the app, but that is not an ideal solution. Once the students get further into the game, that will not work. Thoughts on using CargoBot in a shared environment? I am not a programmer; I am a teacher in a K-8 school for children with dyslexia.
Thank you.
marty
We (the people of the community) could extend the CargoBot code to allow multiple profiles (it shouldn’t be too hard) but to run our code you would need to install Codea on all the iPads which is probably not ideal.
@erickyamato I doubt if that would be legal because most of the code (and the original game, which is in the App Store for sale) is written by TLL. But in addition to that, it would require a $99-per-year Developer license.
If adding profiles to Cargo Bot isn’t too hard, I expect TLL (@simeon) would add it and then update the app in the App Store.
@SkyTheCoder, CargoBot wasn’t actually coded by TLL, it was coded by the incredible @ruilov and chosen to be the app used to showcase Codea’s new export / publishing capabilities. (Simeon made the art)
@jakattak: I know. I believe it wouldn’t be a problem if TLL provide such feature.
Btw, where is @ruilov anyway? He hasn’t been around for quite a while.
@bee, I don’t know, he disappeared not too long after CargoBot’s release.
Also, my comment wasn’t aimed at you, I’m sure TLL could add such a feature and they are the ones who have to push out an update anyways, it was aimed at Sky who said CargoBot “is written by TLL”
No offence to the original poster, but playing games in school time?
is that really wise considering most school leavers are borderline illiterate right now?
@Paul123, I’m interested in the fact that you say “most school leavers are borderline illiterate right now” Does school-leavers mean dropouts or graduates? What does borderline illiterate entail / What is the level of writing and reading ability? Where did you get this fact?
Thank you for your thoughts. I wrote to Simeon (he was the contact on the TLL website); I know he is the artist but thought he could pass along my request to the developers. I teach Scratch as part of my technology curriculum; learning programming teaches kids a lot of problem solving and design skills not found in the regular curriculum, such as logical reasoning, breaking complex problems into simpler parts, debugging problems, developing ideas from initial conception to completed project, and sustained focus and perseverance . The programming “games” I am putting on the iPads (Hopscotch, Tynker, CargoBot and Move the Turtle) are for a tech club we offer during homeroom. Our school is an independent K-8 school for kids with dyslexia; our curriculum provides a diverse range of multi-sensory methods of reading instruction that are proven by current research to be effective in teaching students with learning differences.
It’s worth noting that CargoBot is also one of the pre-packaged examples that comes with Codea. So if you could install Codea on every iPad (maybe there’s an educational discount, I don’t know) then it would be perfectly legal to copy the CargoBot into a new project and modify it to be multiplayer.
I don’t know what the necessary modifications would be, maybe the community can help out with that.
I guess the key question would be as to whether the information has to be transferable between iPads, or if it is enough to keep each user’s profile on the iPad which they were using.