This is a simple game I made for a Ludum Dare 48 hour game development competition back in 2004. In a Ludum Dare competition, the community picks a theme at the start of a weekend, and by the end of the weekend you make your game around that theme.
This time I saw:
"Theme: Infection: make a game involving the spread of something. A virus, coffee shops, etc"
So I made a game about spreading peanut butter.
It's about as fun as you would expect.
If you must, the download link is here: http://eecs.berkeley.edu/~jima/Peanut Butter Simulator.zip
Here is the User's Manual.
Peanut butter spreading, as experts world-wide must be aware, has two
primary phases. Initially, there is the dippage. Finally, there is the
spreadage. Both of these phases are critical to the process; while
flames have long burned on Usenet posting grounds debating which is the
most vital to excellent in peanut butter application, experts
worldwide will admit that both are so important that only a complete
madman would dare shirk the practice of either.
DIPPAGE
Background Information:
Since we assume that most users of "Peanut Butter: The Simulator" are
serious practitioners of the art, we represent dipping with only the
best, tournament grade interface: the simple, yet alluringly intricate
Dippage Meter (tm). This meter is an accurate replica of the very same
meter used by Morpheus in his home-cooking days to win the 17th
International Peanut Butter Spreading Championship, and is now
whole-heartedly endorsed by the International Butter Spreader's
Standards Committee (IBSSC). It is sold in supermarkets near you.
For those few poor souls who have not had the pure joy of utilizing an
official Dippage Meter (tm), we will take the liberty of explaining the
fundamentals of meter use. Be forewarned, however, that the intricacies
involved are far beyond the scope of this document, and indeed are the
subject of many thesis papers emerging from today's top universities;
true expertise can only be obtained with hours of daily practice.
Simulation Usage:
Hold space to dip the knife in the peanut butter -- the longer you dip,
the more butter you'll get for spreading, but the more time you'll
waste not spreading. A dilemma indeed, which has plagued practitioners
of the art for millennia. Though no conclusion has been reached
regarding the optimal dip time, we do know that those who dip
excessively play an dangerous game; reaching the dip danger zone has
been known to put undue strain on the peanut butter supply, and
repetition of this procedure could endanger the peanut as a species.
SPREADAGE
Background Information:
While we would like to pretend that fancy gadgetry and the
technological triumphs which may well lead to robots sufficiently
intelligent and self-aware to conquer all humanity would have some
application to this most difficult of conundrums, alas, it is not so.
Technological prowess has not yet been shown to triumph over the pure
finesse of a grandmaster in the art peanut butter spreading. In respect
of this deeply meaningful truth, "Peanut Butter: The Simulator"
requires that players hone their talents the old-fashioned way, with an
optimally fashioned butter knife. We have, however, allowed the player
one small concession to the benefit of technological enhancement -- the
pressure light. The featured UltraSense (tm) variable-intensity
feedback light uses advanced gamma-radio technology to communicate with
millions of pressure sensors strategically positioned about the knife's
blade, reporting variations in peanut-butter application pressure far
more minute than those which mere human hands could hope to detect. As
any serious butter-artist must already know, the UltraSense (tm) was
selected, by five major statistics collection agencies, as the primary
cause of the 50% rise in spreader efficiency just weeks after its
market release.
Purchasers of the Console version may also enjoy a rumble-pack
implementation of pressure feedback, which may greatly add to the realism of the spreading experience.
Simulation Usage:
Move the mouse up to move the knife toward the bread, down to move
away, and left-right to swipe the knife side to side. The up and down
arrow keys shift the knife outward and inward respectively, while
left-right key presses rotate the bread to allow the user to pick an
optimal angle of application. Excess pressure on the bread can lead to
bread tear, which removes peanut butter and thins the bread itself,
putting the very spread into jeopardy: if bread tear is detected in
Peanut Butter: The Simulator, the player will immediately lose and be
forced to discard the slice because, at the tournament level, no judge
in his or her right mind could accept such an atrocity for scoring.
Bread tear must be avoided at all costs.
OVERALL
In accordance with IBSSC regulations, peanut butter spreading is ranked
for duration and completeness of spread. A spreader is given as much or
as little time as they require for their task, and graded by a complex
heuristic which fairly considers a plethora of factors, including but
not limited to the following four primary factors:
(1) The minimization of bread tear, which is critical to a satisfying spread.
(2) The quantity of peanut butter applied: the more, the better.
(3) The fairness of peanut butter distribution, as if such is uneven
this can have enormous impact upon the quality of a spread, and
has been known to ruin sandwiches which may otherwise have been the
greatest ever conceived by mankind.
(4) The duration required to generate the spread, as, although we
accept that a masterpiece may take years to create, we recognize that
100 slightly inferior spreads will most likely have similar if not
greater commercial value.
To grade a spread at any time, press enter. Remember, however, that one
cannot continue the same spread once it has been graded, as tournament
rules recognize the importance of developing a talent for estimating
spread quality on one's own; in non-tournament situations the luxury of
an expert spread-judgment panel's feedback may not be available and so
reliance upon such would be unrealistic.