Prehistoric Leap

A Flappy-Bird-style arcade game set in prehistoric times, built with Python and Pygame as part of the Codecademy AI Maker Bootcamp.

The Story of Tiny

Meet Tiny — a baby T-Rex with big dreams and even bigger teeth. When a volcanic eruption tears through his homeland, Tiny has no choice but to flee through the ancient caves beneath the earth. But the caves aren't empty. Jagged stone pillars block every turn, hungry velociraptors patrol the skies, and the only comfort along the way are the scattered gold coins left behind by civilizations long forgotten. Armed with nothing but his tiny arms and a whole lot of courage, Tiny leaps into the unknown. How far can you take him?

Features

• 🦖 Fly Tiny through procedurally generated stalactites & stalagmites
• 🦅 Dodge velociraptors flying in on unpredictable wave patterns
• 🪙 Collect gold coins that spawn between walls for bonus points
• 📈 5 levels that scale automatically — from Stone Age to Meteor Strike
• 🏆 Persistent high score saved to disk
• 🎵 Full sound design — background music, flap, enemy alert, coin pickup, game over
• ⚙️ Data-driven difficulty via levels.json — tweak everything without touching code

How to Play

Input	Action
SPACE	Flap
Left Click	Flap

Fly through wall gaps (+1 score each), collect coins, avoid everything else. The game gets harder as your score climbs. That's it — simple to learn, tough to master.

Levels

#	Name	Starts at	Speed	Coin Value
1	Stone Age	Score 0	Slow	1x
2	Jurassic Era	Score 5	Medium	1x
3	Cretaceous Period	Score 12	Fast	1x
4	Extinction Event	Score 22	Faster	2x
5	Meteor Strike	Score 35	Max	2x

Play Now (Web Version)

You can play Prehistoric Leap directly in your browser here: Play NOW

Note: Due to browser security policies, you must click the game screen once after loading to enable the background music and sound effects.

Installation & Local Play

1. Clone the repo

git clone <repository-url>
cd prehistoric-leap

2. Activate the virtual environment

Windows:

gaming\Scripts\activate

macOS/Linux:

source gaming/bin/activate

3. Install dependencies & run

pip install -r requirements.txt
python main.py

🏗️ Web Build Instructions

To build the web version locally: python -m pygbag --template static/index.html .

Configuration

Everything lives in levels.json: gravity, wall speed, gap size, enemy frequency, coin spawn chance, coin value, and more. Add levels, remove them, or rebalance the whole game from one file.

To reset your high score, edit highscore.json or just delete it.

Tech Stack

Tech	Role
Python 3.10+	Core logic and game state management.
Pygame CE	Rendering, 2D physics, and audio engine.
JSON	Level configuration and high-score persistence.
Pygbag	Runtime environment and WebAssembly (Wasm) compilation.
GitHub Actions	CI/CD pipeline for automated web builds on every push.
CSS3 & HTML5	Custom prehistoric-themed loading interface.

Project Context

Built as part of the Codecademy AI Maker Bootcamp, focusing on game design, procedural content generation, and data-driven architecture.

Credits & Tools

• Visual Assets: Character and Environment sprites generated via Gemini (Nano Banana model)
• Sound Design: Custom sound effects generated with Python synthesis tools (pydub & FFmpeg) using ChatGPT
• Built with: Pygame
• Deployed on GitHub Pages