Emoji Ball Bounce Exploration

Summary

Long exploratory session that built a working physics prototype for emoji-ball-bounce/ (variant of Ricochet using Emoji Ball Battles' visual style on Anchor 2), then iteratively refined it through several mechanical pivots, ending in a design conversation that shifted the project's direction from "chamber + enemies + projectiles" to "Balatro-style score game with Artifact-style card layer over EBB physics." Final state: working prototype archived to reference/main.lua, fresh design.md written for the rebuild.

Project setup (initial scope):

• Created emoji-ball-bounce/ folder. Copied anchor/ framework + anchor.exe from Ricochet (latest known-good Anchor 2 framework, Apr 24).
• Copied outline.frag and shadow.frag from Emoji Ball Battles assets/. Engine is unchanged from Anchor 1, so EBB shaders work as-is.
• Wrote initial main.lua at 480×270 / scale=3 / filter='rough'. Five layers: bg, game, shadow (derived via layer_draw_from(shadow, game, shadow_shader)), game_outline (derived via outline shader), ui. Pipeline: bg → shadow(+4,+4) → outline → game → ui. Test circle at center to verify shader pipeline.
• Anchor1→Anchor2 translation notes documented inline: an:layer('foo') → layer_new('foo'); an:shader(...) → shader_load_file(...); layer:draw_from(src, shader) → layer_draw_from(layer, src, shader); image:draw(x, y, sx, sy) → layer_push + layer_image.

Background gradient fix:

• Initial mistake: used bg_color = color(48, 49, 50) as the screen fill. EBB defines this constant but never draws it as the screen bg. Actual EBB draw call (line 612) is bg:rectangle_gradient_v(0, 0, gw, gh, sky_top(), sky_bottom()) — sky blue (135, 206, 235) → off-white (231, 232, 233).
• Fixed by switching to layer_rectangle_gradient_v with the gradient colors.

Chamber + ball:

• chamber class: 4 green rounded-rect sticks (emoji-merge arena look), all sized 2*half + 2*WALL_T long so they overlap at corners (resolved an earlier corner-gap issue from the asymmetric layout). Static box collider with restitution=1, friction=0. Continuous CHAMBER_ROTATION_RATE = 0.3 rad/sec rotation, [/] resize within [25, 100] half. chamber:contains and chamber:wall_normal_for for ball containment + projectile spawn direction.
• ball class: slight_smile.png emoji at BALL_RADIUS=10, image scaled by 2*radius/image.width. Spring 'hit' for squash on wall hit. Initial Ricochet-style velocity renormalization to keep BALL_SPEED constant despite Box2D's bleed at restitution=1. contain_in_chamber defensive containment (clamps in chamber-local space, reflects outward velocity components). Bounce jitter ±5° to break repeating paths.

Resolution and wall layout:

• Changed width=640, height=360 (from 480×270) for more game space, scale=3. Walls extended to full length (2*half + 2*t) to fix corner gaps. BALL_SPEED increased 120 → 200 → 240 → eventually unchanged.

Wall-bounce feel:

• Investigated EBB's exact ball-wall code (lines 891-933). Findings: sound (intensity-pitched ball_wall.ogg, volume 0.4, pitch ramps above intensity 0.45), directional squash via squash_x/squash_y springs based on wall normal, plant interaction. NO camera shake on wall hit (EBB shakes on ball-on-ball, not wall hits) and NO hit_stop. EBB does have always-on handcam at line 33: handcam(true, {x=2, y=2, rotation=0.02}, 0.5).
• Honestly reported that user's recollection of "camera shake on wall hit" was incorrect.
• Implemented sound + intensity-pitched playback + handcam camera. User then asked to remove the squash entirely. Then later asked to remove all sounds for batch addition later.

Projectile system (EBB Gun/Revolver bullet port):

• Found EBB's ball:fire_single_shot and projectile class. Ported the bullet variant: 15×8 capsule, restitution=0.75, density=0.4, gravity_scale=0.5, bullet=true, apply_impulse(15·cos/sin), 2 bounces. Pop-on-spawn 'hit' spring + 0.1s flash.
• Ported hit_circle (port of EBB lines 3456-3482) and hit_particle (port of EBB lines 3786-3829) classes.
• World gravity set to (0, 384) to match EBB. Ball's gravity_scale=0 initially (kept it floating) — later changed to 1.
• Added top/bottom border solids: 40px and 50px (360 × 120/1080 = 40, 360 × 150/1080 = 50 — Ricochet's proportions scaled). Initially separate chamber and wall tags; user asked to consolidate to single wall tag.
• Side walls (invisible, off-screen) added so projectiles bounce off all four sides.
• Spawn-too-close bug: with horizontal firing, the projectile (width 15, half 7.5) spawned only 0.5 px past the wall outer edge → Box2D registered an immediate collision and burned a bounce + spawned the wall-hit VFX at the muzzle. Fixed by computing OBB half-extent in wall-normal direction: proj_half_in_normal = |W/2·cos(θ)| + |H/2·sin(θ)|, added to spawn distance.
• Muzzle flash visual: replaced EBB's boom_particle with hit_circle + hit_particles. User asked to drop the hit_circle and use 2-3 stars instead. Star.png copied from EBB; ported emoji_particle class (EBB lines 3399-3451). Final muzzle flash is just stars via spawn_emoji_particle(x, y, star, {...}).

Ball physics evolution:

• User: "let it collide naturally, without changing its velocity manually." Removed the velocity renormalization, set gravity_scale=1, removed bounce jitter.
• Ball got "stuck" in low-energy slides → user asked for energy improvements. Researched and explained EBB's six energy systems (cooldown, wall energy boost, horizontal intervention, wall fallback, stuck ball detection, weapon energy boost). Implemented systems #2 and #5 (single-ball-relevant ones) with thresholds adapted from EBB's two-ball-system_energy values.
• User asked to remove both energy systems and replace with simpler "every Nth wall hit, apply random impulse" mechanic. Implemented SPECIAL_BOUNCE_INTERVAL with 50/50 perpendicular vs along-velocity impulse.
• Impulse magnitudes iterated down: 30-70 → 15-35 → 5-10 → 0-0 (user testing).
• User: "ball gets too fast" — proposed three-layer solution: (1) drop WALL_RESTITUTION from 1 to 0.92 for natural bleed, (2) replace impulse with velocity rotation + multiplier (preserves direction-change variety with mild intensity variance, mean ≈ 1.025), (3) hard cap at BALL_MAX_SPEED=400 in ball:update via enforce_max_speed method. User chose all three.
• Rotation range tuning: π/4 → π/6 (less abrupt). Interval changed from fixed N=10 to range random_int(7, 13), then user adjusted to 6-10. Each special bounce re-rolls the next interval target.

Effects layer:

• User asked for effects on a dedicated layer above gameplay. Added effects_layer and effects_outline. Redirected hit_circle:draw, hit_particle:draw, emoji_particle:draw to the new layer. Pipeline now: shadow built from both game_layer and effects_layer (matches EBB's pattern); outline derived per-layer; composite order bg → shadow(+4,+4) → game_outline → game → effects_outline → effects → ui. Camera attached to both world layers for handcam jitter.

Design pivot — first round:

• User proposed enemyless score game like Balatro. Long discussion: combat-vs-scoring tradeoff for build variety, Balatro's chips×mult as the depth engine, three round structures (hit-count / time / energy), build archetypes (tempo, projectile factory, banner hunter, phase master, enemy garden, chamber sculptor, ball multiplier, combo, slow-build, glass cannon).

Design pivot — second round:

• User pushed back on default scoring events: "no defaults, everything card driven." Discussed why this is structurally stronger (no baseline forces all mods to be measured against "+5 chips per wall hit," exotic cards live or die against each other). Iterated event taxonomy and card type taxonomy.
• User then settled the design: EBB-style physics arena (no chamber by default — chamber spawns from a card), multi-ball with weapons (lift EBB's energy systems, must remain stable in single-ball / no-weapon configs), card-driven scoring with no defaults. Card types: Core (scoring sources), Item (attached to balls, weapons mostly), Unit (ball spawners), Improvement (Artifact-style border-zone effects), Spell (instant or passive). Default persistence is permanent per run, not per round.

Scoring model:

• Per-round chips × mult resolution (not per-event). Chips and mult both accumulate over the round; final score = chips × mult at round end.
• Three card primitive operations: +chips, +mult, ×mult.
• Discussed Balatro-vs-no-defaults equivalence — chips × mult math works identically without defaults; only the soft-lock concern differs (mitigatable via guaranteed starter-pack composition).

design.md written:

• New file at emoji-ball-bounce/design.md. Sections: Core loop, Physics, Scoring, Event taxonomy table, Card type taxonomy table, Card primitive shape (Lua-table sketch), Open questions, "What's already implemented as of this writing." Brief but complete enough for fresh instances to ramp up.

Cleanup:

• Moved emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua to emoji-ball-bounce/reference/main.lua to preserve the working prototype while clearing the slate for the rebuild. Project root now: anchor/, anchor.exe, assets/, design.md, reference/, run.bat. Noted that run.bat will fail to launch the game until a fresh main.lua is created in the next session.

We currently have a project called Ricochet where we implemented a game about a ball that bounces inside a square and spawns projectiles on each wall hit. The projectiles fly outwards, hitting enemies that spawn from the left and right of the screen. I'd like to try a variation of this game called Emoji Ball Bounce (create emoji-ball-bounce folder) that has the same gameplay but uses Emoji Ball Battles visuals instead. Visually, the game should use the exact same style as Emoji Ball Battles. But be mindful that Emoji Ball Battles is written in Anchor1, while now we're using Anchor2, so there are small differences to be aware of. For your first task, get the folder going and the basics of the game running, with rough visual mode, background in the color that's used for the original, appropriate game size, etc. Just a game that opens and runs and is visually working. The outline + shadow shader should also be ported initially here and you can draw a simple circle in the center of the screen to test that it works properly. If you have any questions ask before proceeding.

I'll explore the existing projects first to understand what I'm working with before asking any questions.

Anchor/
Anchor-YueScript/
Anchor-lua/
Anchor2/
Danpenzero/
Null/
Orblike/
Psyonia/
RETICLE/
RTFX/
Ricochet/
SNKRX/
a327ex.com-blog/
anchor.blot.im/
cute_action.mp3
cute_action.wav
emoji-ball-battles/
emoji-ball-battles-generated/
it-follows/
lane-battle/
meal_prep.md
music-theory/
notes/
private/
ref1.png
ref2.png
reference/
server.md
thalien-lune/
ui_kit/

E:/a327ex/Anchor2/:
app/
arena/
docs/
engine/
framework/
reference/
scripts/

E:/a327ex/Ricochet/:
anchor/
anchor.exe*
assets/
design.md
dot_shader.lua
entities.lua
main.lua
reference/
run.bat
todo.md

E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-battles/:
anchor/
anchor.exe*
assets/
balance.bat
docs/
main.lua
old_assets/
reference/
... [5 more lines]

1    --[[
2     Ricochet — Anchor 2 physics-ball survivor.
3   
4     Entry point. Owns:
5       - configuration (resolution, render mode, monitor)
6       - palette and constants
7       - physics setup (tags, collisions, sensors)
8       - layers (game, mask, ui), camera
9       - entity collections and spawn timer
10      - init (instantiate chamber, ball, start enemy spawn timer)
11      - the global update(dt) and draw() the engine calls each frame
12      - small UI helpers (border-zone hairline)
13  
14    Delegates:
15      - dot_shader.lua  — manga-halftone reveal shader; loads + sets uniforms
16      - entities.lua    — chamber, ball, projectile, hit_burst, enemy classes
17                          and their spawn helpers
18  
19    See design.md for visual rules.
20  ]]
21  
22  require('anchor')({
23    width            = 1920,
24    height           = 1080,
25    title            = "Ricochet",
26    scale            = 1,
27    filter           = "smooth",
28    render_uncapped  = true,         -- vsync-paced render; 60Hz cap is for pixel-art
29    display          = 0,            -- primary monitor
30  })
... [244 more lines]

1    require('anchor')({ width = 480, height = 270, scale = 3 })
2   
3   -- Game dimensions
4   gw, gh = an.width, an.height
5   
6   
7   -- Twitter emoji color palette
8   white = color(255, 255, 255)
9   black = color(0, 0, 0)
10  gray = color(128, 128, 128)
11  bg_color = color(48, 49, 50)
12  fg = color(231, 232, 233)
13  fg_dark = color(201, 202, 203)
14  yellow = color(253, 205, 86)
15  star_yellow = color(255, 172, 51)
16  orange = color(244, 146, 0)
17  blue = color(83, 175, 239)
18  green = color(122, 179, 87)
19  red = color(223, 37, 64)
20  purple = color(172, 144, 216)
21  brown = color(193, 105, 79)
22  bowstring = color(217, 158, 130)
23  debug_draw_enabled = false
24  wall_color = fg:clone():mix(yellow, 0.1)
25  
26  -- Sky colors (subtle blue gradient)
27  sky_top = color(135, 206, 235)     -- light sky blue
28  sky_bottom = color(231, 232, 233)  -- same as fg (off-white)
29  
30  -- Camera (must be created before layers, which default to an.camera)
... [170 more lines]

1    # Ricochet — design
2   
3   ## The game
4   
5   A square chamber sits at the center of the screen with a ball bouncing inside.
6   Every wall hit spawns a projectile that flies outward (radial from the chamber
7   center through the ball's position) and homes on the nearest enemy within a 60°
8   cone ahead of it. Enemies spawn from screen edges, seek the chamber, and
9   physically collide with the outer walls (pushed back on contact, Orblike-style).
10  Projectiles kill them.
11  
12  The chamber *is* the player — no separate avatar. The bounce-and-shoot engine
13  runs on autopilot. All active player agency lives one layer above it.
14  
15  ## Card / mana layer (Artifact-style)
16  
17  - **Deck drafting** before a run: build a deck from the available pool.
18  - **Each turn**: draw 2 cards, refresh a mana pool.
19  - **Spend mana** to play cards. Cards are the mod layer on top of the autopilot
20    engine: more mana, extra draw, add/modify a ball, change projectile behavior,
21    trigger burst attacks, buff/debuff, etc.
22  
23  Cards are the only active input during a run. Drafting + on-turn decisions are
24  where the game is actually played.
25  
26  ## v0 prototype
27  
28  Core loop is built and confirmed fun to watch (2026-04-23). Source archived at
29  `reference/main.lua`. A new instance will start a fresh main.lua using that as
30  a base.
... [273 more lines]

outline.frag
outline_only.frag
recolor.frag
shadow.frag

1    // Outline shader - samples neighbors to detect alpha edges
2   // Outputs black where any neighbor has alpha, creating silhouette outline
3   in vec2 TexCoord;
4   out vec4 FragColor;
5   uniform sampler2D u_texture;
6   uniform vec2 u_pixel_size;
7   
8   void main() {
9       // Sample center pixel
10      vec4 center = texture(u_texture, TexCoord);
11  
12      // Sample 24 neighbors in 5x5 grid (excluding center)
13      float x = u_pixel_size.x;
14      float y = u_pixel_size.y;
15  
16      float a = 0.0;
17      // Row -2
18      a += texture(u_texture, TexCoord + vec2(-2.0*x, -2.0*y)).a;
19      a += texture(u_texture, TexCoord + vec2(-1.0*x, -2.0*y)).a;
20      a += texture(u_texture, TexCoord + vec2( 0.0,   -2.0*y)).a;
21      a += texture(u_texture, TexCoord + vec2( 1.0*x, -2.0*y)).a;
22      a += texture(u_texture, TexCoord + vec2( 2.0*x, -2.0*y)).a;
23      // Row -1
24      a += texture(u_texture, TexCoord + vec2(-2.0*x, -1.0*y)).a;
25      a += texture(u_texture, TexCoord + vec2(-1.0*x, -1.0*y)).a;
26      a += texture(u_texture, TexCoord + vec2( 0.0,   -1.0*y)).a;
27      a += texture(u_texture, TexCoord + vec2( 1.0*x, -1.0*y)).a;
28      a += texture(u_texture, TexCoord + vec2( 2.0*x, -1.0*y)).a;
29      // Row 0 (skip center)
30      a += texture(u_texture, TexCoord + vec2(-2.0*x,  0.0)).a;
... [25 more lines]

1    // Shadow shader - creates a dark, semi-transparent silhouette
2   // Draw this layer at an offset to create drop shadow effect
3   
4   in vec2 TexCoord;
5   out vec4 FragColor;
6   uniform sampler2D u_texture;
7   
8   void main() {
9       float a = texture(u_texture, TexCoord).a;
10      FragColor = vec4(0.5, 0.5, 0.5, a * 0.5);
11  }
12  

1    // Outline-only shader - draws black only at edges (transparent pixels next to non-transparent)
2   // Unlike regular outline shader, this doesn't fill the interior
3   in vec2 TexCoord;
4   out vec4 FragColor;
5   uniform sampler2D u_texture;
6   uniform vec2 u_pixel_size;
7   
8   void main() {
9       // Sample center pixel
10      vec4 center = texture(u_texture, TexCoord);
11  
12      // If center pixel is not transparent, output nothing (don't fill interior)
13      if (center.a > 0.1) {
14          FragColor = vec4(0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0);
15          return;
16      }
17  
18      // Center is transparent - check if any neighbor is non-transparent
19      float x = u_pixel_size.x;
20      float y = u_pixel_size.y;
21  
22      float a = 0.0;
23  
24      // Sample 24 neighbors in 5x5 grid (excluding center) - matches outline.frag
25      // Row -2
26      a += texture(u_texture, TexCoord + vec2(-2.0*x, -2.0*y)).a;
27      a += texture(u_texture, TexCoord + vec2(-1.0*x, -2.0*y)).a;
28      a += texture(u_texture, TexCoord + vec2( 0.0,   -2.0*y)).a;
29      a += texture(u_texture, TexCoord + vec2( 1.0*x, -2.0*y)).a;
30      a += texture(u_texture, TexCoord + vec2( 2.0*x, -2.0*y)).a;
... [33 more lines]

200  an:sound('grass_land_3', 'assets/grass_land3.ogg')
201 an:sound('grass_impact_1', 'assets/grass_impact1.ogg')
202 an:sound('grass_impact_2', 'assets/grass_impact2.ogg')
203 an:sound('grass_impact_3', 'assets/grass_impact3.ogg')
204 an:sound('hop', 'assets/hop.ogg')
205 an:sound('concrete_1', 'assets/concrete_2.ogg')
206 an:sound('concrete_2', 'assets/concrete_5.ogg')
207 an:sound('concrete_3', 'assets/concrete_8.ogg')
208 an:sound('dagger_swing_1', 'assets/dagger_swing_1.ogg')
209 an:sound('dagger_swing_2', 'assets/dagger_swing_2.ogg')
210 an:sound('dagger_swing_3', 'assets/dagger_swing_8.ogg')
211 an:sound('dagger_swing_4', 'assets/dagger_swing_9.ogg')
212 an:sound('dagger_swing_5', 'assets/dagger_swing_10.ogg')
213 an:sound('bow_draw_1', 'assets/bow_string_drawing_fast_2.ogg')
214 an:sound('bow_draw_2', 'assets/drawing_bow_backwards_6.ogg')
215 an:sound('bow_draw_3', 'assets/drawing_bow_backwards_9.ogg')
216 -- an:sound('bow_release_3', 'assets/releasing_bow_string_8.ogg')
217 an:sound('sword_swing_1', 'assets/light_sword_swing_2.ogg')
218 an:sound('sword_swing_2', 'assets/light_sword_swing_3.ogg')
219 an:sound('sword_swing_3', 'assets/light_sword_swing_14.ogg')
220 an:sound('sword_swing_4', 'assets/light_sword_swing_9.ogg')
221 -- an:sound('arrow_hit_wall_1', 'assets/arrow_hit_wall_1.ogg')
222 an:sound('arrow_hit_wall_2', 'assets/arrow_hit_wall_2.ogg')
223 -- an:sound('dagger_crit1', 'assets/dagger_crit1.ogg')
224 -- an:sound('sword_impact_body_1', 'assets/sword_impact_body_1.ogg')
225 -- an:sound('sword_wood_impact_1', 'assets/sword_wood_impact_1.ogg')
226 -- an:sound('sword_wood_impact_2', 'assets/sword_wood_impact_2.ogg')
227 an:sound('sword_impact_dirt', 'assets/sword_impact_dirt.ogg')
228 an:sound('wind_small_impact_1', 'assets/wind_small_impact_1.ogg')
229 -- an:sound('wind_small_impact_2', 'assets/wind_small_impact_2.ogg')
... [170 more lines]

E:/a327ex/Anchor2/docs/:
ENGINE_API.md
ENGINE_API_QUICK.md
FRAMEWORK_API.md
FRAMEWORK_API_QUICK.md

E:/a327ex/Anchor2/framework/:
anchor/
run-web.bat
run.bat

E:/a327ex/Anchor2/framework/anchor/:
animation.lua
array.lua
camera.lua
class.lua
collider.lua
color.lua
font.lua
helpers.lua
image.lua
init.lua
input.lua
layer.lua
math.lua
memory.lua
object.lua
physics.lua
shake.lua
spring.lua
spritesheet.lua
timer.lua

E:/a327ex/Ricochet/anchor/:
animation.lua
array.lua
camera.lua
class.lua
collider.lua
color.lua
font.lua
... [13 more lines]

1    # Framework API Quick Reference
2   
3   Function signatures for the Anchor 2 Lua framework. See `FRAMEWORK_API.md` for
4   detailed documentation with examples.
5   
6   **Architecture.** Anchor 2 is mostly procedural: most modules are plain functions that
7   take state as the first argument (e.g. `timer_update(self.timer, dt)`). The only
8   framework classes are `collider` (body+shape bundling and steering behaviors) and
9   thin wrappers around resource handles (`font`, `spritesheet`, `image`). Game
10  entities are your own classes created with `class()`.
11  
12  **No `an` god-object. No object tree. No action phases.** The game owns its
13  main loop; update and draw are top-level globals the engine calls directly.
14  
15  ---
16  
17  ## Initialization
18  
19  ```lua
20  require('anchor')({
21    width = 480,        -- game resolution width (default: 480)
22    height = 270,       -- game resolution height (default: 270)
23    title = "My Game",  -- window title (default: "Anchor")
24    scale = 3,          -- initial window scale (default: 3)
25    vsync = true,       -- vertical sync (default: true)
26    fullscreen = false, -- start fullscreen (default: false)
27    resizable = true,   -- window resizable (default: true)
28    filter = "rough",   -- "rough" or "smooth" (default: "rough")
29    render_uncapped = false,  -- false (default): cap render at 60Hz for
30                              --   chunky pixel-art motion on high-refresh
... [714 more lines]

1    --[[
2     dot-grid reveal shader.
3   
4     Input  : mask_layer's alpha channel
5     Output : a noise-warped grid of ink dots wherever the mask is non-transparent
6   
7     The project's secondary visual language — see design.md § Dotted motif. The
8     screen vertex shader provides TexCoord; u_texture is auto-bound to the layer's
9     source texture by the engine.
10  
11    Within the mask region the shader outputs a mix of paper (gap) and ink (dot).
12    Fragment alpha = mask_a so the layer composite either fully replaces
13    game_layer content (mask_a near 1) or partly blends into it (mask_a < 1).
14    The paper-color gaps "carve out" a clean dotted patch over the chamber and
15    other game_layer geometry instead of letting them show through between dots.
16  
17    Static value-noise (per-cell, not per-frame) modulates each dot's radius for
18    the warped/organic feel.
19  
20    Depends on the following globals being defined before this file is required:
21      width, height, ink_color, paper_color
22      GRID_SPACING, GRID_BASE_RADIUS, GRID_NOISE_SCALE, GRID_NOISE_AMOUNT
23  ]]
24  
25  local DOT_SHADER_SRC = [[
26  in vec2 TexCoord;
27  out vec4 FragColor;
28  
29  uniform sampler2D u_texture;
30  uniform vec2  u_resolution;
... [54 more lines]

1    @echo off
2   REM Run Ricochet. CWD must be repo root; engine receives the game folder name.
3   
4   cd /d "%~dp0.."
5   "%~dp0anchor.exe" ricochet
6   

E:/a327ex/Anchor2/arena/:
ARENA_PROGRESS.md
anchor/
anchor.exe*
assets/
main.lua
run.bat

E:/a327ex/Ricochet/assets/:
LanaPixel.ttf

1    @echo off
2   REM Run arena test game. CWD must be repo root; first arg is the game folder name.
3   
4   cd /d "%~dp0.."
5   "%~dp0anchor.exe" arena
6   

-rwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121 4177408 Apr 17 10:31 E:/a327ex/Anchor2/arena/anchor.exe*
-rwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121 4179968 Apr 24 20:30 E:/a327ex/Ricochet/anchor.exe*

E:/a327ex/Anchor2/framework/:
total 14
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121   0 Apr 15 11:12 ./
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121   0 Apr 17 10:27 ../
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121   0 Apr 24 20:22 anchor/
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121 284 Apr 13 09:47 run-web.bat
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121  56 Apr 13 09:47 run.bat

E:/a327ex/Anchor2/framework/anchor/:
total 178
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121     0 Apr 24 20:22 ./
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121     0 Apr 15 11:12 ../
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121  4324 Apr 14 22:26 animation.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121 16638 Apr 15 10:39 array.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121  6186 Apr 14 22:25 camera.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121   806 Apr 13 23:00 class.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121 15061 Apr 17 08:59 collider.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121  4877 Apr 14 22:26 color.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121  1328 Apr 17 10:27 font.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121   590 Apr 14 23:23 helpers.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121   631 Apr 14 22:25 image.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121  6524 Apr 24 20:22 init.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121  2188 Apr 13 23:23 input.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121  9128 Apr 17 10:27 layer.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121 19930 Apr 13 23:04 math.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121  6937 Apr 22 14:10 memory.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121  3276 Apr 13 23:01 object.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121  7366 Apr 14 04:30 physics.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121  8631 Apr 13 23:10 shake.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121  2957 Apr 13 23:04 spring.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121   964 Apr 14 22:25 spritesheet.lua
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121 16054 Apr 13 23:03 timer.lua

E:/a327ex/Ricochet/anchor/:
total 178
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121     0 Apr 24 20:19 ./
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121     0 Apr 25 11:59 ../
-rw-r--r-- 1 adn 197121  4312 Apr 23 23:25 animation.lua
... [19 more lines]

1    --[[
2     Layer module — procedural API over the engine layer handle.
3   
4     Layers are FBOs that accumulate draw commands during the frame. Commands are
5     deferred and processed via layer_render() with GL batching. Composite to the
6     screen with layer_draw().
7   
8     Usage:
9       game_layer = layer_new('game')
10      layer_rectangle(game_layer, 100, 100, 50, 30, color)
11      layer_render(game_layer)
12      layer_draw(game_layer)
13  
14    State table shape (from layer_new): { name, handle, parallax_x, parallax_y }
15    All layer_* functions below take that table as the first argument `lyr`.
16  
17    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
18    ENGINE NAME CONFLICTS (Lua globals registered by anchor.c)
19  
20    The C engine binds the same symbol names to raw engine implementations whose
21    first argument is a C layer pointer (lightuserdata), e.g. layer_rectangle(ptr, ...).
22  
23    This file captures those implementations in `eng` at load time, then REPLACES
24    the globals with wrappers whose first argument is a layer state table from
25    layer_new() (field .handle holds the pointer). Wrappers also accept a raw
26    handle for occasional interop.
27  
28    After require('anchor.layer'), direct engine-style calls like
29    layer_rectangle(userdata_ptr, x, y, w, h, c) no longer use the C binding
30    unless you passed a lightuserdata: the wrapper treats a non-table first arg
... [245 more lines]

38:shader_set_float_immediate(shader, name, value)
39:shader_set_vec2_immediate(shader, name, x, y)
40:shader_set_vec4_immediate(shader, name, x, y, z, w)
41:shader_set_int_immediate(shader, name, value)
101:shader_load_file(path) -> shader
102:shader_load_string(source) -> shader
104:layer_shader_set_float(layer, shader, name, value)
105:layer_shader_set_vec2(layer, shader, name, x, y)
106:layer_shader_set_vec4(layer, shader, name, x, y, z, w)
107:layer_shader_set_int(layer, shader, name, value)
108:layer_shader_set_texture(layer, shader, name, texture_id, unit)

80   music_set_volume(volume, channel?)
81  music_get_volume(channel) -> number
82  music_is_playing(channel) -> bool
83  music_at_end(channel) -> bool
84  music_get_position(channel) -> number
85  music_get_duration(channel) -> number
86  audio_set_master_pitch(pitch)
87  ```
88  
89  ## Utility
90  
91  ```
92  rgba(r, g, b, a?) -> color
93  set_filter_mode(mode)
94  get_filter_mode() -> string
95  timing_resync()
96  ```
97  
98  ## Effect Shaders
99  
100 ```
101 shader_load_file(path) -> shader
102 shader_load_string(source) -> shader
103 shader_destroy(shader)
104 layer_shader_set_float(layer, shader, name, value)
105 layer_shader_set_vec2(layer, shader, name, x, y)
106 layer_shader_set_vec4(layer, shader, name, x, y, z, w)
107 layer_shader_set_int(layer, shader, name, value)
108 layer_shader_set_texture(layer, shader, name, texture_id, unit)
109 layer_apply_shader(layer, shader)
... [20 more lines]

I have a clear picture now. Before I start, I have a few questions to confirm the right approach.

[
  {
    "type": "tool_reference",
    "tool_name": "AskUserQuestion"
  }
]

User has answered your questions: "Game resolution & scale — match EBB exactly?"="480x270 @ scale=3 (Recommended)", "Layer architecture for outline + shadow pipeline?"="Minimal: bg + game + shadow + outline + ui (Recommended)", "Where should I copy the anchor framework from?"="From Ricochet's anchor/ + anchor.exe (Recommended)". You can now continue with the user's answers in mind.

Now I'll set up the project. First, create the folder structure and copy the anchor framework + executable.

total 4092
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121       0 Apr 25 22:43 ./
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121       0 Apr 25 22:43 ../
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121       0 Apr 25 22:43 anchor/
-rwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121 4179968 Apr 25 22:43 anchor.exe*
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121       0 Apr 25 22:43 assets/

E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/anchor/:
animation.lua
array.lua
camera.lua
class.lua
collider.lua
color.lua
font.lua
helpers.lua
image.lua
init.lua
input.lua
layer.lua
math.lua
memory.lua
object.lua
physics.lua
shake.lua
spring.lua
spritesheet.lua
timer.lua

E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/assets/:
outline.frag
shadow.frag

Now I'll write the run.bat and main.lua.

File created successfully at: E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/run.bat (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

File created successfully at: E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Let me syntax-check the Lua file before handing off.

OK

Syntax is clean. Quick summary of what I set up:

Folder layout (emoji-ball-bounce/):

• anchor/ — framework copied from Ricochet (latest known-good Anchor2 framework)
• anchor.exe — copied from Ricochet
• assets/outline.frag + assets/shadow.frag — copied verbatim from EBB; the engine is unchanged from Anchor1, so the shaders work as-is
• main.lua — entry point
• run.bat — launches via anchor.exe emoji-ball-bounce from repo root (same convention as Ricochet/Arena)

main.lua — what's there now:

• 480×270 @ scale=3, filter='rough' → 1440×810 chunky-pixel window, exact match for EBB
• Full Twitter-emoji palette transcribed (most colors unused in this initial test, but in place so nothing has to be re-pasted later)
• 5 layers: bg, game, shadow, game_outline, ui
• Both shaders loaded via shader_load_file; u_pixel_size set once on the outline shader (gw/gh are static)
• draw() does the full EBB-style pipeline: queue → render → derive shadow/outline via layer_draw_from → composite in order bg → shadow(+4,+4) → outline → game → ui
• Test artifact: a 16-px fg (off-white) circle at screen center — should appear with a 2-px black outline and a soft grey drop-shadow offset down-right by 4 pixels

Anchor1→Anchor2 translation notes for this scope:

• an:layer('foo') → foo = layer_new('foo')
• an:shader('name', 'path') → shader_load_file('path')
• layer:draw_from(src, shader) → layer_draw_from(layer, src, shader)
• shader_set_vec2_immediate exists on both, identical signature
• No an god-object; width/height are top-level globals after init, so gw, gh = width, height (vs EBB's an.width)
• I omitted the camera + handcam shake EBB sets up at startup — wanted the initial file truly minimal. Easy to add later.

Run with cd E:/a327ex && ./emoji-ball-bounce/anchor.exe emoji-ball-bounce (or just ./emoji-ball-bounce/run.bat). You should see a dark-grey window with a single off-white disc, black-outlined, with a soft shadow offset down-right.

Works, but background color is not the same as in the original.

Let me check what background EBB actually draws — bg_color is defined but it might not be what fills the screen.

11:bg_color = color(48, 49, 50)
27:sky_top = color(135, 206, 235)     -- light sky blue
28:sky_bottom = color(231, 232, 233)  -- same as fg (off-white)
341:  bg:draw()
612:  bg:rectangle_gradient_v(0, 0, gw, gh, sky_top(), sky_bottom())
2939:  self.bg_color = args.bg_color or black()
2953:    ui:rounded_rectangle(-self.w/2, -self.h/2, self.w, self.h, 3, self.bg_color)
2976:  self.bg_color = args.bg_color or color(0, 0, 0, 160)
3003:    ui:rounded_rectangle(-self.w/2, -self.h/2, self.w, self.h, 2, self.bg_color())

Found it. EBB defines bg_color = color(48, 49, 50) but the actual visible background is a vertical sky gradient drawn at line 612: bg:rectangle_gradient_v(0, 0, gw, gh, sky_top(), sky_bottom()) — light sky blue at top fading to off-white at bottom. The bg_color constant is just defined but never used for the screen background.

I'll swap to the gradient.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

OK

Background swapped from a flat dark-grey to the EBB vertical sky gradient (light sky blue → off-white). My initial reading of EBB was lazy — I grabbed the constant named bg_color and assumed that was the screen color, but the actual draw call uses rectangle_gradient_v(sky_top, sky_bottom). Should now match the original exactly.

Perfect, looks great. Now let's create the chamber itself. This one should look like the arena does in emoji-merge. This project is available in the reference/ folder. The arena from emoji merge is made up of green thin solids, should be the same here. Try to also copy the behavior from Ricochet where we can rotate and increase/decrease the arena. And then also try to get the ball working. The ball behavior should be similar to emoji-ball-battles. That game has a lot of behavior to make sure that the ball bounces indefinitely, but I don't think that inside a small square most of it is necessary. Do whatever Ricochet did to achieve its bouncing and then we can go from there, just keep in mind that Ricochet's ball was significantly smaller than Emoji Ball Battles balls are, and we want the size of the ball to be like Emoji Ball Battles because we want the ball to visually look like an emoji. Copy assets from Emoji Ball Battles if you need to for drawing. And remember that we're now using Anchor2, while most projects use Anchor1 or other frameworks that came before Anchor, so be mindful when looking up the references. Ask any questions you have before proceeding.

Default resolution needs to be 640x360 to give the game more space. Each side of the wall needs to be longer to cover the entirety of its side otherwise it looks like there are gaps on the corners. The ball's velocity needs to be higher.

Three edits — bigger play area, walls extended to overlap at corners (matches Ricochet's collider pattern, so visual now mirrors physics exactly), and a higher ball speed.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

OK

Three changes:

1. Resolution → 640×360 (scale=3 unchanged → 1920×1080 window). The chamber stays at CHAMBER_HALF=50 so it now takes up less of the screen — more breathing room for the projectiles + enemies that are coming. CHAMBER_X = gw/2 automatically recenters it. The outline shader's u_pixel_size is set from 1/gw, 1/gh after init, so it picks up the new dimensions correctly.

2. Walls extend full length, not asymmetric. Each of the 4 sticks is now len = 2*half + 2*WALL_T long (matching Ricochet's collider pattern). All four overlap at every corner, so each corner square is filled by two walls. Net effect: the green frame is solid all the way around, the outline shader traces one clean rounded-rect outline around the union. My previous "top/bottom = interior width, left/right cover corners" layout left a single-wall corner that was vulnerable to the rounded-corner radius (2px) carving a chip out of where the two walls met. Both visual and collider now use the symmetric layout.

3. BALL_SPEED = 200 (up from 120). Should feel pinball-y in the 100×100 chamber. Easy to dial up if it still feels slow.

I'm thinking... The original Ricochet game is interesting, but I'm wondering if it's not more fun to instead have the top-bottom boundaries, as Ricochet has, enemies that come from left/right, but then remove the chamber and have the ball bounce and be controlled by the player... The way Ricochet works with the ball bouncing on the chamber and spawning projectiles is interesting, but wouldn't it be more interesting to just have the ball bouncing on the whole map itself...? I don't know. What do you think? Try to reason through the possibility space for each game, especially concerning how build-heavy each is, i.e. which ones enable more build variety than the other.

Honest take: the Ricochet chamber model is structurally better for build variety. Here's the reasoning, and then the case for the pinball model so you can weigh both.

What you're actually choosing between

Not "small box vs. big box." You're choosing between two fundamentally different agency models:

• Chamber model: the ball-and-walls is a little engine that runs on autopilot and emits things. The player operates one layer above the engine, modifying its parameters and components.
• Pinball/paddle model: the player is in the loop. Direct or near-direct control of the ball/paddle. Skill-execution lives in the player's hands.

These two routes have very different shapes for build design.

Build space — chamber model

The chamber is a 3-stage pipeline: ball → wall hit → projectile → enemy. Each stage is independently moddable, and that's where the depth comes from. Off the top of my head:

• Ball stage: count, size, speed, mass, restitution, special-on-bounce (split, charge, freeze), trail effects, status auras.
• Chamber stage: size, rotation rate (independent CW/CCW per wall?), wall count (triangle, hex), per-wall properties (one bouncy, one sticky, one explodes), wall break/heal, portal walls, walls that produce mana on hit.
• Projectile spawn rule: N per hit, fan width, spawn position offset, only on certain walls, only every Nth hit, only when ball is fast.
• Projectile behavior: speed, size, homing cone/turn rate/chance, ricochet budget, pierce, chain, AoE, status, type-tagged (fire/cold/etc.) for further mods.
• Targeting: cone, priority (closest, lowest-HP, marked), retargeting on kill.
• Triggered/passive layer: every-Nth-bounce abilities, on-corner-bounce abilities, when-ball-is-near-wall abilities, mana generators tied to bounces.

That's roughly 6 independent slots with maybe 8–15 distinct cards per slot, and the interesting space is the cross-product of slots — cards that work because of how they combine across slots. A "homing" card is fine alone; a "homing + ricochet + multi-spawn" stack is a build identity.

The structural reason this works: the autopilot is deterministic enough that mods compose. You can stack effects without the player's reflexes being the bottleneck. This is the same shape Vampire Survivors / Magic Survivors / Loop Hero use, and those games carry hundreds of hours on build variety alone.

Build space — pinball/paddle model

The collapsed version (ball is the weapon, player controls it):

• Ball stage: same options, but most of them now feel like flat stat boosts because there's no second pipeline to interact with.
• Damage-on-contact: crit, AoE, status, lifesteal — all mods to the contact event.
• Player tool: paddle size, paddle speed, dash, charge attack, deflector special.
• Combos: hit-streak bonuses, multi-hit triggers.

Maybe 3–4 slots, and most cards reduce to "+X to Y." Synergies are weaker because the system is shallow — fewer stages = fewer interaction points. Crit + AoE is the same combo as it is in every roguelite; there's no special structural reason it's interesting in this game vs another.

The deeper problem: with direct control, skill ceiling lives in execution, not in buildcraft. Optimizing builds matters less when the player can compensate with reflexes (or fail with bad reflexes regardless of build). This is why Breakout-style games rarely have deep build systems — the system is fighting the player's hands for "where the depth lives."

The structural rule

Build-heavy games are almost always indirect-agency games. The pattern:

Player makes meta-decisions that change what the autopilot does. Player does not directly execute combat.

Examples: Slay the Spire (deck mods → automated turn execution), Magic/Vampire Survivors (item mods → automated attacks), Hades (boon mods → still-direct combat, but boons are a parallel system that creates buildcraft on top). Loop Hero, TFT, Inscryption Act 1, Backpack Battles. All of them put the player one layer above the action.

The chamber model puts you in that pattern naturally. The pinball model fights it.

The case for pinball anyway

Honest counterweight, since I might be biasing toward what we've already built:

1. Immediacy. Direct control feels great in the first 30 seconds. The chamber model has a "wait, what am I doing" moment for new players because the meta layer isn't obvious.
2. Embodiment. "I am the ball" is a stronger visceral hook than "I am the unseen hand behind the autopilot."
3. Lower design risk on feel. If the chamber feels boring to watch, the whole thing collapses. If a paddle feels good to swing, you've got a game.
4. Easier scoping. Chamber model needs 50+ cards plus a draft layer plus mana economy to be the game it wants to be. Pinball model can ship as just a tight bouncy combat thing with 10 upgrades.

If the goal is "a tight, fun, ship-it-soon game," pinball is probably the right answer. If the goal is "a build-roguelite with replay depth," chamber.

Middle paths

Worth flagging — these aren't compromises, they're real third options:

• Movable chamber. Chamber stays, but the player can drag/move it around the arena under input. Light agency, autopilot intact, opens a positioning subgame ("park near the boss," "dodge the cone").
• Interventions. Chamber autopilots, but player can spend mana to redirect the ball, freeze it, swap it, etc. Mostly autopilot, occasionally interactive at high-leverage moments.
• Two balls, one direct, one autopilot. Player controls a paddle/ship that fires/deflects, AND a chamber sits in the arena emitting projectiles. Two parallel build axes (paddle build + chamber build). Probably too complex but listing for completeness.
• Player IS the chamber. Player moves a small square around; the ball bounces inside it; ball-bounces still emit projectiles. So you have direct-control positioning without touching the autopilot loop.

The "movable chamber" and "player is the chamber" variants are the cheapest to try — they preserve the build-variety structure of Ricochet while adding direct agency. If the chamber-watch-feel ends up boring, those are the lever.

My recommendation

Stick with the chamber. The pinball pivot is a smaller, simpler, more conventional game. The chamber is a more ambitious game with more design ceiling, and the design space hasn't been mined out — Ricochet is one specific point in it, not the whole shape. If you want direct agency, layer it onto the chamber (movable, interventions) rather than throwing the engine away.

The thing I'd be most cautious about is not "is the chamber fun" but "is the chamber legible" — does the player understand they're playing the meta layer? That's a UX problem, solvable with HUD/cards/tutorial, not a design problem with the model itself.

What's pulling you toward the pinball idea? "More interesting" is doing some work in your message — is it that the chamber feels passive to watch right now, or that the build space feels unclear, or something else? That might point at what to actually fix.

You've convinced me. Let's make sure the current wall bounce feels good. In Emoji Ball Battles wall bounces have camera shake, I believe, as well as sounds, and maybe effects going on. Try to look for everything the game does when the ball bounces on a wall and try to copy it.

Let me hunt down everything EBB does on a ball-wall bounce.

129:--   ball_wall: -21.2 dB -> 0.36
186:an:sound('ball_ball', 'assets/ball_wall.ogg')
187:an:sound('ball_wall', 'assets/ball_wall.ogg')
256:an:physics_collision('ball', 'wall')
590:  4. WALL FALLBACK (prevents stalling) - ball-wall collisions
593:     On ball-wall collisions, probabilistically apply energy boost.
598:     Problem: A ball can lose vertical velocity and slide along a wall indefinitely.
891:  for _, event in ipairs(an:collision_begin_events('ball', 'wall')) do
901:      ball_object.collider:set_velocity(vx*self.wall_energy_boost, vy*self.wall_energy_boost)
904:    -- Squash ball based on wall orientation, intensity shaped by easing
914:    an:sound_play('ball_wall', 0.4, pitch*an.random:float(0.95, 1.05))
1285:    if owner and owner.weapon_ui then owner.weapon_ui:boomerang_wall_hit() end
1300:    if owner and owner.weapon_ui then owner.weapon_ui:boomerang_wall_hit() end
2909:-- Squash ball on wall collision: horizontal wall squashes y, vertical wall squashes x
3333:function weapon_ui:boomerang_wall_hit()

880  
881     -- Trigger reflect on melee weapons
882     if ball_a.weapon_class == 'melee' then
883       if ball_a.weapon_ui then ball_a.weapon_ui:reflect() end
884     end
885     if ball_b.weapon_class == 'melee' then
886       if ball_b.weapon_ui then ball_b.weapon_ui:reflect() end
887     end
888   end
889 
890   -- Ball-wall collision: probabilistically apply energy boost based on system energy
891   for _, event in ipairs(an:collision_begin_events('ball', 'wall')) do
892     local ball_object = event.a
893 
894     -- Cancel thrust on wall hit (only after 10% progress to avoid cancelling before it starts)
895     if ball_object.thrusting and ball_object.thrust_progress > 0.1 then
896       ball_object:thrust_end()
897     end
898 
899     local vx, vy = ball_object.collider:get_velocity()
900     if an.random:bool(self.wall_boost_chance) and self.wall_energy_boost > 1 then
901       ball_object.collider:set_velocity(vx*self.wall_energy_boost, vy*self.wall_energy_boost)
902     end
903 
904     -- Squash ball based on wall orientation, intensity shaped by easing
905     local intensity = math.clamp(math.remap(math.length(vx, vy), 0, 800, 0, 1), 0, 1)
906 
907     -- Sound (pitch increases linearly with intensity above 0.45)
908     local pitch
909     if intensity > 0.45 then
... [70 more lines]

33:an.camera.shake:handcam(true, {x = 2, y = 2, rotation = 0.02}, 0.5)
877:    self:hit_stop(0.1 * math.max(ball_a.hit_stop_multiplier, ball_b.hit_stop_multiplier))
878:    local shake_multiplier = math.max(ball_a.camera_shake_multiplier, ball_b.camera_shake_multiplier)
879:    an.camera.shake:shake(3*shake_multiplier, 0.1*shake_multiplier)
1482:    self:hit_stop(0.15*attacker.hit_stop_multiplier)
1483:    an.camera.shake:shake(4*attacker.camera_shake_multiplier, 0.12*attacker.camera_shake_multiplier)
1575:function arena:get_hit_stop_probability()
1586:  local probability = self:get_hit_stop_probability()
1600:function arena:hit_stop(duration)
1602:  local probability = self:get_hit_stop_probability()
1604:    an:hit_stop(duration)
1799:    self.hit_stop_multiplier = 1.0
1801:    self.camera_shake_multiplier = 1.0
1817:    self.hit_stop_multiplier = 1.4 -- longer hit stops
1819:    self.camera_shake_multiplier = 1.5  -- stronger camera shake
1840:    self.hit_stop_multiplier = 1.0
1842:    self.camera_shake_multiplier = 1.0
1867:    self.hit_stop_multiplier = 1.0
1869:    self.camera_shake_multiplier = 1.0
1886:    self.hit_stop_multiplier = 1.0
1888:    self.camera_shake_multiplier = 1.0
1907:    self.hit_stop_multiplier = 1.0
1909:    self.camera_shake_multiplier = 1.0
1933:    self.hit_stop_multiplier = 1.0
1935:    self.camera_shake_multiplier = 1.0
2241:  local shake_fx = self.ball_shake:get_transform()
2428:    an.camera.shake:shake(4, 0.15)
2577:  an:hit_stop(0.2)
2910:function ball:squash(normal_x, normal_y, amount)
3143:  self.emoji_shake:handcam(true, {x = an.random:float(0, 3), y = an.random:float(0, 3), rotation = an.random:float(0.2, 0.3)}, an.random:float(0.4, 0.8))
... [2 more lines]

2910 function ball:squash(normal_x, normal_y, amount)
2911      amount = amount or 0.3
2912      if math.abs(normal_y) > math.abs(normal_x) then
2913        -- Horizontal wall (floor/ceiling): squash y, stretch x
2914        self.spring:pull('squash_x', amount, 3, 0.5)
2915        self.spring:pull('squash_y', -amount*0.5, 3, 0.5)
2916      else
2917        -- Vertical wall (left/right): squash x, stretch y
2918        self.spring:pull('squash_y', amount, 3, 0.5)
2919        self.spring:pull('squash_x', -amount*0.5, 3, 0.5)
2920      end
2921    end
2922    
2923    -- Start ball movement (called when game unpauses)
2924    function ball:start_moving()
2925      self.collider:set_gravity_scale(1)
2926      self.collider:apply_impulse(an.random:sign()*an.random:float(5, 10), an.random:float(-10, 10))
2927      self.collider:set_angular_velocity(self.base_angular_velocity)
2928    end
2929    
2930    
2931    hp_bar = object:extend()
2932    
2933    function hp_bar:new(args)
2934      args = args or {}
2935      object.new(self, 'hp_bar')
2936      self.offset_y = args.offset_y or 18
2937      self.w = args.w or 22
2938      self.h = args.h or 4
2939      self.bg_color = args.bg_color or black()
... [10 more lines]

788:    ball_a.spring:pull('hit', intensity*0.4, 3, 0.7)
789:    ball_b.spring:pull('hit', intensity*0.4, 3, 0.7)
865:    ball_a.spring:pull('weapon', 0.35, 3, 0.5)
866:    ball_b.spring:pull('weapon', 0.35, 3, 0.5)
1005:    ball_object.spring:pull('weapon', 0.35, 3, 0.5)
1228:    ball_object.spring:pull('weapon', 0.35, 3, 0.5)
1325:    projectile_object.spring:pull('hit', 0.5, 3, 0.5)
1329:    ball_object.spring:pull('weapon', 0.35, 3, 0.5)
1369:      cd_object.spring:pull('hit', 0.5, 3, 0.5)
1408:      ball_object.spring:pull('weapon', 0.35, 3, 0.5)
1981:  self.spring:add('hit', 1)
1982:  self.spring:add('weapon', 1)
1983:  self.spring:add('squash_x', 1)
1984:  self.spring:add('squash_y', 1)
1987:  self:add(shake('ball_shake'))
2181:      self.spring:pull('weapon', 0.5)
2225:      self.spring:pull('squash_y', 0.5, 3, 0.5)
2226:      self.spring:pull('squash_x', -0.25, 3, 0.5)
2236:  local squash_x = self.spring.squash_x.x
2237:  local squash_y = self.spring.squash_y.x
2241:  local shake_fx = self.ball_shake:get_transform()
2264:          {self.x, self.y, self.thrust_angle, squash_x*thrust_stretch_ai, squash_y*thrust_squeeze_ai},
2274:    game:push(self.x + bsx, self.y + bsy, self.thrust_angle, squash_x*thrust_stretch, squash_y*thrust_squeeze)
2280:    game:push(self.x + bsx, self.y + bsy, 0, squash_x, squash_y)           -- world-aligned squash (no rotation)
2410:  self.spring:pull('hit', 0.3, 3, 0.7)
2514:  self.spring:pull('weapon', 0.6, 3, 0.7)
2515:  self.spring:pull('hit', 0.25, 3, 0.5)
2680:  self.spring:pull('weapon', 0.6)
2681:  self.spring:pull('hit', 0.25, 3, 0.5)
2735:  self.spring:pull('weapon', 0.6, 3, 0.7)
... [2 more lines]

1975   self.fast_spinning = false
1976      self.swing_sound_count = 0
1977      self.can_swing_sound_time = 1.33  -- starts expired, reset on weapon hits
1978    
1979      -- Springs for visual feedback
1980      self:add(spring())
1981      self.spring:add('hit', 1)
1982      self.spring:add('weapon', 1)
1983      self.spring:add('squash_x', 1)
1984      self.spring:add('squash_y', 1)
1985    
1986      -- Shake for visual feedback
1987      self:add(shake('ball_shake'))
1988    
1989      -- Flash state for weapon
1990      self.weapon_flashing = false
1991      self.thrusting = false  -- sword thrust state
1992      self.weapon_recoil = 0  -- rotation offset for gun recoil animation
1993      self.weapon_recoil_offset = 0  -- position offset for gun recoil (moves toward ball)
1994    
1995      -- HP
1996      self.max_hp = 50
1997      self.hp = self.max_hp
1998      self:add(hp_bar())
1999      self:add(cooldown_bar())
2000    
2001      -- Weapon effect tracking
2002      self.hits_landed = 0
2003      self.base_damage = 1  -- all weapons start at 1 damage
2004      self.base_cooldown = 1.2

1987:  self:add(shake('ball_shake'))
2241:  local shake_fx = self.ball_shake:get_transform()

648:      flash_on_spawn = true,
861:    ball_a:flash_weapon()
862:    ball_b:flash_weapon()
875:    local hit_multiplier = math.max(ball_a.hit_particle_multiplier, ball_b.hit_particle_multiplier)
952:      self.effects:add(hit_circle(event.point_x, event.point_y, {radius = 6 + 4*intensity, duration = an.random:float(0.15, 0.3), color = yellow, flash_on_spawn = true}))
954:        self.effects:add(hit_particle(event.point_x, event.point_y, {
960:          flash_on_spawn = true,
993:      -- self.effects:add(deflected_arrow(projectile_object.x, projectile_object.y, {vx = deflect_vx, vy = deflect_vy}))
1004:    ball_object:flash_weapon()
1072:      self.effects:add(star_particle(x, y, {
1073:        flash_on_spawn = true,
1104:        self.effects:add(emoji_text(owner.x, owner.y - 10, "+1 dmg"))
1115:      self.effects:add(star_particle(x, y, {
1116:        flash_on_spawn = true,
1148:      self.effects:add(emoji_text(hx, hy - 10, "+1 bounce"))

[Showing results with pagination = limit: 15]

2230     end
2231      else
2232        self.low_vy_time = 0
2233      end
2234    
2235      -- Draw ball
2236      local squash_x = self.spring.squash_x.x
2237      local squash_y = self.spring.squash_y.x
2238      local hit_scale = self.spring.hit.x
2239    
2240      -- Ball shake offset
2241      local shake_fx = self.ball_shake:get_transform()
2242      local bsx, bsy = shake_fx.x, shake_fx.y
2243    
2244      -- Thrust squash values (used by both ball and weapon draw)
2245      local squash_t, stretch_amount, squeeze_amount = 0, 0, 0
2246      if self.thrusting then
2247        squash_t = math.sin(self.thrust_progress*math.pi)
2248        local thrust_speed = math.lerp(math.quad_out(self.thrust_progress), self.thrust_start_speed, self.thrust_end_speed)
2249        local speed_factor = math.clamp(math.remap(thrust_speed, 400, 600, 0, 1), 0, 1)
2250        stretch_amount = math.lerp(speed_factor, 0.4, 0.6)
2251        squeeze_amount = math.lerp(speed_factor, 0.2, 0.3)
2252      end
2253    
2254      -- Spawn afterimages during thrust
2255      if self.thrusting then
2256        self.afterimage_timer = self.afterimage_timer + dt
2257        if self.afterimage_timer >= 0.03 then
2258          self.afterimage_timer = 0
2259          local thrust_stretch_ai = 1 + stretch_amount*squash_t
... [30 more lines]

2903 function ball:flash_ball(duration)
2904      duration = duration or 0.15
2905      self.ball_flashing = true
2906      self.timer:after(duration, 'ball_flash', function() self.ball_flashing = false end)
2907    end
2908    
2909    -- Squash ball on wall collision: horizontal wall squashes y, vertical wall squashes x
2910    function ball:squash(normal_x, normal_y, amount)
2911      amount = amount or 0.3
2912      if math.abs(normal_y) > math.abs(normal_x) then

Let me also check what camera/shake API looks like in Anchor2 and how Ricochet uses it.

153:main_camera = camera_new(width, height)
235:  camera_update(main_camera, dt)
253:  camera_attach(main_camera, game_layer)
254:  camera_attach(main_camera, mask_layer)
262:  camera_detach(main_camera, mask_layer)
263:  camera_detach(main_camera, game_layer)

11:    shake_push(camera.shake, angle, amount)
12:    shake_shake(camera.shake, amplitude, duration)
23:function shake_new()
66:function shake_trauma(s, amount, duration, amplitude)
79:function shake_set_trauma_parameters(s, amplitude)
87:  shake_shake(s, amplitude, duration, [frequency])
91:function shake_shake(s, amplitude, duration, frequency)
105:  shake_push(s, angle, amount, [frequency], [bounce])
109:function shake_push(s, angle, amount, frequency, bounce)
125:function shake_sine(s, angle, amplitude, frequency, duration)
139:function shake_square(s, angle, amplitude, frequency, duration)
150:  shake_handcam(s, enabled, [amplitude], [frequency])
153:function shake_handcam(s, enabled, amplitude, frequency)
169:function shake_get_effects(s)
232:function shake_update(s, dt)

11:  insensitive, so a query like `collision_entities_begin('player', 'enemy')`
18:    for _, ev in ipairs(collision_entities_begin('player', 'enemy')) do
101:    normal_x = hit.normal_x,
102:    normal_y = hit.normal_y,
122:        normal_x = hit.normal_x,
123:        normal_y = hit.normal_y,
132:  collision_entities_begin(tag_a, tag_b)
137:function collision_entities_begin(tag_a, tag_b)
153:        nx = ev.normal_x, ny = ev.normal_y,
248:        nx = ev.normal_x, ny = ev.normal_y,

82:sounds = sounds or {}

Copying the sound asset and writing the updates.

ball_wall.ogg
outline.frag
shadow.frag
slight_smile.png

100  shader_set_vec2_immediate(outline_shader, 'u_pixel_size', 1/gw, 1/gh)
101 
102 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
103 -- images
104 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
105 slight_smile = image_load('slight_smile', 'assets/slight_smile.png')
106 
107 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
108 -- input
109 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
110 bind('chamber_smaller', 'key:[')
111 bind('chamber_bigger',  'key:]')
112 
113 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
114 -- entity collections
115 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
116 balls = {}
117 
118 -- =============================================================================
119 -- chamber — square arena drawn as four green rounded-rect "sticks"
120 -- (emoji-merge arena look). Four static box walls bundled on one body, sized
121 -- so left/right extend past top/bottom to seal the corners. Continuous
122 -- rotation; runtime resize via [/] keys.
123 -- =============================================================================
124 chamber = class()
125 
126 function chamber:new(x, y, half, angle)
127   self.x, self.y = x, y
128   self.half      = half
129   self.angle     = angle or 0
... [10 more lines]

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now update the ball — replace the single 'hit' spring with EBB's three (hit, squash_x, squash_y), port the squash method, intensity-driven sound + squash on wall hit, and update the draw.

200    -- outline shader traces a single clean rounded-rect frame around the
201   -- union.
202   layer_push(game_layer, self.x, self.y, self.angle, 1, 1)
203   layer_rounded_rectangle(game_layer, -h - t, -h - t, len, t,   r, col)  -- top
204   layer_rounded_rectangle(game_layer, -h - t,  h,     len, t,   r, col)  -- bottom
205   layer_rounded_rectangle(game_layer, -h - t, -h - t, t,   len, r, col)  -- left
206   layer_rounded_rectangle(game_layer,  h,     -h - t, t,   len, r, col)  -- right
207   layer_pop(game_layer)
208 end
209 
210 function chamber:destroy()
211   if self.collider then self.collider:destroy() end
212 end
213 
214 -- =============================================================================
215 -- ball — slight_smile emoji bouncing inside the chamber at constant speed.
216 -- Ricochet's approach: dynamic circle collider with restitution=1, friction=0,
217 -- linear_damping=0, fixed rotation, bullet (CCD). Box2D bleeds energy even at
218 -- restitution=1, so :update renormalizes velocity to BALL_SPEED every frame.
219 -- A small ±5° jitter on each bounce keeps it from settling into a repeating
220 -- path. :contain_in_chamber is defensive — handles the ball getting pushed
221 -- outside on resize/rotation/tunneling.
222 -- =============================================================================
223 ball = class()
224 
225 function ball:new(x, y)
226   self.x, self.y = x, y
227   self.radius    = BALL_RADIUS
228   self.speed     = BALL_SPEED
229   make_entity(self)
... [60 more lines]

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now update ball:draw to apply the directional squash, and the main update to pass normals + run camera updates.

340    if max <= 0 then return end             -- chamber too small to hold the ball; nothing to do
341 
342   local lx, ly = math.rotate(self.x - c.x, self.y - c.y, -c.angle)
343   local cx = math.clamp(lx, -max, max)
344   local cy = math.clamp(ly, -max, max)
345   if cx == lx and cy == ly then return end
346 
347   local nx, ny = math.rotate(cx, cy, c.angle)
348   self.x = nx + c.x
349   self.y = ny + c.y
350   self.collider:set_position(self.x, self.y)
351 
352   local vx, vy   = self.collider:get_velocity()
353   local lvx, lvy = math.rotate(vx, vy, -c.angle)
354   if cx ~= lx and lvx * (lx - cx) > 0 then lvx = -lvx end
355   if cy ~= ly and lvy * (ly - cy) > 0 then lvy = -lvy end
356   local nvx, nvy = math.rotate(lvx, lvy, c.angle)
357   self.collider:set_velocity(nvx, nvy)
358 end
359 
360 function ball:draw()
361   local s     = self.spring.hit.x
362   local scale = self.image_scale * s
363   layer_push(game_layer, self.x, self.y, 0, scale, scale)
364   layer_image(game_layer, self.image, 0, 0)
365   layer_pop(game_layer)
366 end
367 
368 function ball:destroy()
369   if self.collider then self.collider:destroy() end
... [60 more lines]

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now wire camera attach/detach into draw so the handcam jitter affects the chamber + ball (and naturally the derived shadow/outline) but not the sky bg.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

OK

Honest report on what I found, then what I shipped:

What EBB actually does on a ball-wall hit (lines 891-933 of EBB main.lua):

1. Probabilistic energy boost (a "wall_boost_chance" branch that occasionally accelerates the ball — fights stalling). Skipped: Ricochet's velocity renormalization handles speed-keeping for us already.
2. Plays ball_wall.ogg at volume 0.4 with intensity-based pitch. Pitch flat below intensity 0.45, then ramps linearly up to 2x at intensity 0.7+. ±5% random pitch jitter.
3. Calls ball:squash(normal_x, normal_y, 0.75 * shaped_intensity) — directional scale springs. EBB shapes intensity through a piecewise easing curve (cubic-in-out below 0.5, circ-in above) so low-speed hits are gentle and high-speed hits snap.
4. If the wall is the floor (normal pointing up) and there are plants nearby, applies force to the plants and plays a grass-impact sound.

What EBB does NOT do on a wall hit — and you may be misremembering:

• ❌ Camera shake (EBB shakes on ball-on-ball collisions and weapon hits, not wall hits)
• ❌ Hit stop / frame freeze
• ❌ Hit particles or hit_circle effects
• ❌ Sprite flash

EBB does run an always-on handcam — camera.shake:handcam(true, {x=2, y=2, rotation=0.02}, 0.5) at startup. That's a continuous Perlin jitter applied to the camera at all times, independent of any specific event. It's part of the overall "alive" feel of the game.

What I shipped:

1. Copied ball_wall.ogg to assets, loaded into sounds.ball_wall.
2. Camera setup with EBB's always-on handcam parameters (line 100). Attached to game_layer only in draw() — sky bg stays still, chamber+ball jitter, shadow+outline inherit the jitter automatically since they sample game_layer's texture.
3. Replaced the ball's single 'hit' spring with EBB's three: 'hit', 'squash_x', 'squash_y'. Kept 'hit' available for non-directional events later (ball-on-projectile, etc.); not pulled by wall hits.
4. Ported ball:squash(nx, ny, amount) exactly — positive pull on the parallel axis (stretch), negative half-pull on the perpendicular axis (compress), frequency 3, bounce 0.5.
5. Ported ball:on_wall_hit(hx, hy, nx, ny) with EBB's intensity formula (speed / BALL_SPEED clamped to 0..1, since our BALL_SPEED is far below EBB's 800), the 0.45/0.7 pitch ramp, and the cubic-in-out / circ-in shaping.
6. ball:draw now multiplies image_scale * squash_x * hit and image_scale * squash_y * hit for the two axes.
7. Main update passes ev.nx, ev.ny from the collision event into on_wall_hit.

Limitation worth flagging: the squash is world-aligned (axis-X or axis-Y), exactly matching EBB. EBB's walls are axis-aligned so this always reads correctly. Our chamber rotates, so when it's at, say, 30°, the squash will visually compress along world-vertical instead of along the actual wall normal. The deformation is small enough on a 10-px ball that it should still read as a "thump", but if it looks off at certain angles I can rotate the squash frame to align with the normal — costs a few extra layer_push/layer_pop and a stored squash_angle.

What I deliberately did NOT add:

• Per-hit camera shake — EBB doesn't do this, so I held off. But our wall hit is the central mechanic (it's the moment that will spawn projectiles), so it might genuinely warrant shake even though EBB doesn't. Want me to add intensity-scaled shake_shake(main_camera.shake, 1+2*intensity, 0.1) on each hit? That'd be a clear improvement over EBB for our use case.
• Hit particles / hit_circle — EBB's projectile-wall hits get a yellow ring + 1-3 small particles. Could add an analogous small "puff" at the impact point. Probably worth it once we have the projectile system in (the hit will need to read as the trigger of something); maybe premature now.
• Hit stop — risky on every wall hit (hits are very frequent in this game; freezing on each would feel laggy). Reserve for bigger events later.

Run and see how it feels. The squash + intensity-pitched sound + always-on handcam should already be a noticeable upgrade. Tell me if it needs the per-hit shake too.

You can remove the squash for now.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

OK

Squash removed. Ball is back to a single uniform 'hit' spring pulsed by 0.3 on each wall hit (same as before the EBB port). Sound + intensity-pitched playback + bounce jitter + always-on handcam all kept.

OK, let's add the bottom and top solids, like in Ricochet. These should be green here. They should have the same relative size as in Ricochet.

Looking at Ricochet for relative sizing:

• BORDER_TOP = 120, BORDER_BOTTOM = 150 in a 1080-tall game → 11.1% / 13.9% of height
• For our 360-tall game: BORDER_TOP = 40, BORDER_BOTTOM = 50 (clean numbers, 360×120/1080 = 40, 360×150/1080 = 50)

Ricochet keeps the chamber centered on the play area, not the geometric screen center, so I'll shift CHAMBER_Y to match. The borders will be green rounded rects extending off-screen on three sides so only the inner corners' rounding is visible — same trick emoji-merge uses for solid_top (positioned at y = -120).

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now add a draw_borders helper and call it from draw() (inside the camera_attach block so they share the handcam jitter with the chamber/ball — same as Ricochet, which puts its border hairline on the camera-attached game_layer).

410    layer_draw(shadow_layer, 4, 4)
411   layer_draw(game_outline)
412   layer_draw(game_layer)
413   layer_draw(ui_layer)
414 end
415 

375    -- invalidate any in-flight Box2D body handles.
376   if input_pressed('chamber_smaller') then
377     the_chamber:resize(math.max(CHAMBER_HALF_MIN, the_chamber.half - CHAMBER_RESIZE_STEP))
378   end
379   if input_pressed('chamber_bigger') then
380     the_chamber:resize(math.min(CHAMBER_HALF_MAX, the_chamber.half + CHAMBER_RESIZE_STEP))
381   end
382 end
383 
384 function draw()
385   -- queue draws ----------------------------------------------------------------
386   layer_rectangle_gradient_v(bg_layer, 0, 0, gw, gh, sky_top(), sky_bottom())
387 
388   -- camera attaches to game_layer only (the sky bg should not jitter, and the
389   -- shadow / outline layers inherit the jitter automatically because they
390   -- derive from game_layer's texture)
391   camera_attach(main_camera, game_layer)
392   the_chamber:draw()
393   for _, b in ipairs(balls) do b:draw() end
394   camera_detach(main_camera, game_layer)
395 
396   -- flush queued commands to FBOs ---------------------------------------------
397   layer_render(bg_layer)
398   layer_render(game_layer)
399   layer_render(ui_layer)
400 
401   -- derive shadow + outline from game_layer -----------------------------------
402   layer_clear(shadow_layer)
403   layer_draw_from(shadow_layer, game_layer, shadow_shader)
404 
... [10 more lines]

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

OK

Summary of changes:

New constants (lines ~60-78): the full Ricochet border-zone block, scaled 1/3 to match our 360-tall game (BORDER_TOP=40, BORDER_BOTTOM=50, BORDER_LEFT=BORDER_RIGHT=0). Plus GAME_AREA_* for the playable rectangle inside the borders, and two visual constants for the green solids: BORDER_RADIUS=4 and BORDER_OFFSCREEN=16.

Chamber recentered: CHAMBER_X/Y now use (GAME_AREA_LEFT+RIGHT)/2 and (GAME_AREA_TOP+BOTTOM)/2, so the chamber sits in the middle of the play area not the geometric screen center. Same convention as Ricochet. Net effect: chamber moves up by 5 px (from y=180 to y=175) since the bottom border is thicker than the top, exactly mirroring Ricochet's asymmetry.

draw_borders() helper (just above draw()): two green layer_rounded_rectangle calls. Each rect is extended by BORDER_OFFSCREEN=16 past the screen on its three outer sides — for the top border that's left/right/top, for the bottom that's left/right/bottom. The result is that the rounded corners on those three sides sit comfortably off-screen, and only the inner edge (where the rounding actually wants to be visible) is in view. This is the same off-screen-extension trick emoji-merge uses for solid_top (positioned at y = -120).

Called from draw() inside the camera_attach(main_camera, game_layer) ... camera_detach(...) block, so the borders share the always-on handcam jitter with the chamber and ball, get the same shadow + outline shader treatment automatically (since shadow/outline derive from game_layer), and sit "underneath" the chamber draw order — though there's no overlap to worry about.

The borders extend off-screen on the outer sides so the outline shader's 2-px outward expansion on those sides also lands off-screen and stays invisible. Only the inner-edge outline (the line you actually want to see) is in view.

Let's make the top one white I think. And then let's do the projectiles themselves. Emoji Ball Battles Gun/Revolver weapons fires specific projectiles. We want our projectiles to be exactly like that. The visual effect on the firing itself should use hit circles + particles instead of the boom emoji, other than that, everything should be the same, including how the projectiles interact with walls and eventually enemies.

Quick edit for the top border first.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now let me investigate EBB's gun. Find the firing function and the projectile class.

78:an:image('boom', 'assets/boom.png')
83:an:image('boomerang', 'assets/boomerang.png')
133:--   gun_fire_1 (revolver_shot1): -24.7 dB -> 0.54
134:--   gun_fire_2 (revolver_shot2): -24.9 dB -> 0.56
135:--   gun_fire_3 (revolver_shot3): -23.3 dB -> 0.46
191:an:sound('gun_fire_1', 'assets/revolver_shot1.ogg')
192:an:sound('gun_fire_2', 'assets/revolver_shot2.ogg')
193:an:sound('gun_fire_3', 'assets/revolver_shot3.ogg')
268:an:physics_tag('boomerang_projectile')
269:an:physics_collision('boomerang_projectile', 'wall')
270:an:physics_collision('boomerang_projectile', 'weapon')
271:an:physics_tag('boomerang_sensor')
272:an:physics_sensor('boomerang_sensor', 'ball')
273:an:physics_sensor('boomerang_sensor', 'plant_ghost')
284:an:physics_sensor('cd_sensor', 'boomerang_projectile')
1081:  for _, event in ipairs(an:sensor_begin_events('boomerang_sensor', 'ball')) do
1086:    if ball_object.team == projectile_object.team then goto continue_boom_ball end
1100:    if projectile_object.projectile_type == 'boomerang' then
1101:      if not projectile_object.boomerang_damage_triggered then
1102:        projectile_object.boomerang_damage_triggered = true
1103:        owner.boomerang_damage = owner.boomerang_damage + 1
1120:    ::continue_boom_ball::
1263:  for _, event in ipairs(an:collision_begin_events('boomerang_projectile', 'wall')) do
1285:    if owner and owner.weapon_ui then owner.weapon_ui:boomerang_wall_hit() end
1287:    ::continue_boom_wall::
1300:    if owner and owner.weapon_ui then owner.weapon_ui:boomerang_wall_hit() end
1357:  for _, tag in ipairs({'projectile', 'boomerang_projectile', 'kitchen_knife_projectile'}) do
1395:  -- No special logic needed — boomerangs bounce off weapons naturally
1449:    if attacker.weapon_type == 'boomerang' then goto continue_weapon_ball end
1527:  for _, event in ipairs(an:sensor_begin_events('boomerang_sensor', 'plant_ghost')) do
... [2 more lines]

2502 function ball:fire_single_shot()
2503      local gun_tip_offset = self.weapon_visual_offset + 12
2504      local perpendicular = self.angle - math.pi/2
2505      local boom_offset = an.random:float(0.9, 1.1)*gun_tip_offset
2506      local boom_x = self.x + boom_offset*math.cos(self.angle) + 10*math.cos(perpendicular)
2507      local boom_y = self.y + boom_offset*math.sin(self.angle) + 10*math.sin(perpendicular)
2508    
2509      -- Sound
2510      an:sound_play("gun_fire_" .. an.random:int(1, 3), 0.63, an.random:float(0.95, 1.05))
2511      -- Spawn boom particle
2512      self.parent.effects:add(boom_particle(boom_x, boom_y))
2513      -- Weapon feedback
2514      self.spring:pull('weapon', 0.6, 3, 0.7)
2515      self.spring:pull('hit', 0.25, 3, 0.5)
2516      self:recoil_weapon()
2517      self.weapon_ui:shoot()
2518    
2519      -- Spawn projectile
2520      self.parent.projectiles:add(projectile(boom_x, boom_y, {
2521        velocity = 15,
2522        direction = self.angle,
2523        flash_on_spawn = true,
2524        team = self.team,
2525        bounces = 2,
2526      }))
2527    end
2528    
2529    -- Gun callback: fire projectile with effects
2530    function ball:gun_fire()
2531      self.gun_ready = false
... [60 more lines]

3928:projectile = object:extend()
3930:function projectile:new(x, y, args)
4080:function projectile:update(dt)
4244:function projectile:hit(intensity, target_type, normal_x, normal_y)

3928 projectile = object:extend()
3929    
3930    function projectile:new(x, y, args)
3931      self.x, self.y = x, y
3932      args = args or {}
3933      object.new(self)
3934      self:tag('projectile')
3935      self.projectile_type = args.projectile_type or 'bullet'
3936      self.team = args.team
3937      self.velocity = args.velocity or 10
3938      self.direction = args.direction or 0
3939      self.bounces = args.bounces or 0
3940      self.shot_id = args.shot_id
3941    
3942      -- Projectile-type-specific setup
3943      if self.projectile_type == 'bullet' then
3944        self.w = 15
3945        self.h = 8
3946        self:add(collider('projectile', 'dynamic', 'box', self.w, self.h))
3947        self.collider:set_position(self.x, self.y)
3948        self.collider:set_restitution(0.75)
3949        self.collider:set_friction(0)
3950        self.collider:set_gravity_scale(0.5)
3951        self.collider:apply_impulse(self.velocity*math.cos(self.direction), self.velocity*math.sin(self.direction))
3952        self.collider:set_density(0.4)
3953      elseif self.projectile_type == 'arrow' then
3954        self.w = 18
3955        self.h = 4
3956        self:add(collider('projectile', 'dynamic', 'box', self.w, self.h))
3957        self.collider:set_position(self.x, self.y)
... [130 more lines]

4080 function projectile:update(dt)
4081      -- Spiral: set velocity from tracked angle and speed
4082      if self.projectile_type == 'spiral' then
4083        self.spiral_time = self.spiral_time + dt
4084        self.spiral_speed = math.lerp_dt(0.9, 1, dt, self.spiral_speed, self.spiral_target_speed)
4085        self.spiral_turn_rate = self.spiral_turn_rate - self.spiral_turn_decrease_rate*math.clamp((5 - self.spiral_time)/1, 0, 1)*dt
4086    
4087        self.spiral_angle = self.spiral_angle + self.spiral_turn_rate*dt
4088        self.collider:set_velocity(self.spiral_speed*math.cos(self.spiral_angle), self.spiral_speed*math.sin(self.spiral_angle))
4089      end
4090    
4091      -- Boomerang: constant speed, rotating angle traces a circle, homing nudge on return
4092      if self.projectile_type == 'boomerang' then
4093        self.boomerang_time = self.boomerang_time + dt
4094        self.boomerang_spin = self.boomerang_spin + self.boomerang_spin_speed*dt
4095        local owner = self.team == 'player' and self.parent.parent.player_ball or self.parent.parent.enemy_ball
4096        if owner and owner.parent then
4097          -- Detect return phase: past the halfway point of the circle
4098          if not self.boomerang_returning and self.boomerang_time >= math.pi/math.abs(self.boomerang_turn_rate) then
4099            self.boomerang_returning = true
4100          end
4101          if self.boomerang_returning then
4102            -- On return, home toward owner
4103            local angle_to_owner = math.angle_to_point(self.x, self.y, owner.x, owner.y)
4104            self.boomerang_move_angle = math.lerp_angle_dt(0.9, self.boomerang_homing_strength, dt, self.boomerang_move_angle, angle_to_owner)
4105          else
4106            -- Outward: rotate move angle at constant rate (traces a circle)
4107            self.boomerang_move_angle = self.boomerang_move_angle + self.boomerang_turn_rate*dt
4108          end
4109          -- Set velocity from angle and constant speed
... [140 more lines]

4244 function projectile:hit(intensity, target_type, normal_x, normal_y)
4245      intensity = intensity or 1
4246      self.spring:pull('hit', 0.5*intensity, 3, 0.5)
4247      if not (self.projectile_type == 'kitchen_knife' and target_type == 'wall') then
4248        self.flashing = true
4249        self.timer:after(0.1, function() self.flashing = false end)
4250      end
4251    
4252      if target_type == 'wall' then
4253        if self.projectile_type == 'bullet' then
4254          self.bounces = self.bounces - 1
4255          if self.bounces < 0 then
4256            self:kill()
4257          end
4258        elseif self.projectile_type == 'arrow' then
4259          local angle = self.collider:get_angle()
4260          -- Flip angle if arrow points outward from wall
4261          if math.cos(angle)*normal_x + math.sin(angle)*normal_y < 0 then
4262            angle = angle + math.pi
4263          end
4264          local offset = an.random:float(0, 10)
4265          self.parent.arena.effects:add(stuck_arrow(self.x + offset*math.cos(angle), self.y + offset*math.sin(angle), {angle = angle}))
4266          self:kill()
4267        elseif self.projectile_type == 'spiral' then
4268          self:kill()
4269        elseif self.projectile_type == 'boomerang' then
4270          self.boomerang_move_angle = math.reflect(self.boomerang_move_angle, normal_x, normal_y)
4271        elseif self.projectile_type == 'kitchen_knife' then
4272          an:sound_play('dagger_wall', 0.4, an.random:float(0.95, 1.05))
4273          local vx, vy = self.collider:get_velocity()
... [50 more lines]

1010     local scaled_change = change / ball_object.weapon_weight^2
1011        av = ball_object.last_angular_velocity + scaled_change
1012        ball_object.collider:set_angular_velocity(av)
1013    
1014        -- Flip projectile team to reflector's team (can now hit original shooter)
1015        projectile_object.team = ball_object.team
1016    
1017        -- Boost arrow velocity on parry and enable gravity
1018        if projectile_object.projectile_type == 'arrow' then
1019          local pvx, pvy = projectile_object.collider:get_velocity()
1020          local post_speed = math.length(pvx, pvy)
1021          local target_speed = math.max(post_speed, projectile_object.base_speed or 0)
1022          if post_speed > 0 then
1023            projectile_object.collider:set_velocity(pvx/post_speed*target_speed, pvy/post_speed*target_speed)
1024          end
1025          projectile_object.collider:set_gravity_scale(2)
1026        end
1027    
1028        -- Sound
1029        an:sound_play("weapon_projectile_" .. an.random:int(1, 2), 1.0, an.random:float(0.95, 1.05))
1030    
1031        self:hit_effect(event.point_x, event.point_y)
1032        if ball_object.weapon_ui then ball_object.weapon_ui:reflect() end
1033        ball_object.can_swing_sound_time = 0
1034    
1035        ::continue_proj_weapon::
1036      end
1037    
1038      -- Projectile-ball sensor: deal damage
1039      for _, event in ipairs(an:sensor_begin_events('projectile_sensor', 'ball')) do
... [20 more lines]

Let me find the hit_circle and hit_particle classes in EBB to replicate them.

3456:hit_circle = object:extend()
3458:function hit_circle:new(x, y, args)
3476:function hit_circle:update(dt)
3786:hit_particle = object:extend()
3788:function hit_particle:new(x, y, args)
3811:function hit_particle:update(dt)

3456 hit_circle = object:extend()
3457    
3458    function hit_circle:new(x, y, args)
3459      args = args or {}
3460      self.x, self.y = x, y
3461      object.new(self)
3462      self.radius = args.radius or 12
3463      self.color = args.color or white:clone()
3464      self.duration = args.duration or 0.2
3465      self.flashing = false
3466    
3467      self:add(timer())
3468      self.timer:tween(self.duration, self, {radius = 0}, math.cubic_in_out, function() self:kill() end)
3469    
3470      if args.flash_on_spawn then
3471        self.flashing = true
3472        self.timer:after(0.1, function() self.flashing = false end)
3473      end
3474    end
3475    
3476    function hit_circle:update(dt)
3477      if self.flashing then
3478        effects:circle(self.x, self.y, self.radius, white())
3479      else
3480        effects:circle(self.x, self.y, self.radius, self.color())
3481      end
3482    end
3483    
3484    
3485    
... [20 more lines]

3786 hit_particle = object:extend()
3787    
3788    function hit_particle:new(x, y, args)
3789      args = args or {}
3790      self.x, self.y = x, y
3791      object.new(self)
3792      self.velocity = args.velocity or an.random:float(50, 150)
3793      self.gravity_velocity = 0
3794      self.gravity_acceleration = args.gravity or 0
3795      self.direction = args.direction or an.random:angle()
3796      self.color = args.color or white:clone()
3797      self.w = math.remap(self.velocity, 0, 250, 4, 12)
3798      self.h = math.remap(self.velocity, 0, 250, 2, 6)
3799      self.sx, self.sy = 1, 1
3800      self.duration = args.duration or 0.3
3801    
3802      self:add(timer())
3803      self.timer:tween(self.duration, self, {velocity = 0, sx = 0, sy = 0}, math.linear, function() self:kill() end)
3804    
3805      if args.flash_on_spawn then
3806        self.flashing = true
3807        self.timer:after(0.1, function() self.flashing = false end)
3808      end
3809    end
3810    
3811    function hit_particle:update(dt)
3812      self.gravity_velocity = self.gravity_velocity + self.gravity_acceleration*dt
3813    
3814      -- Compute actual velocity components
3815      local vx = self.velocity*math.cos(self.direction)
... [40 more lines]

I have everything I need. Plan:

• Copy 6 sounds (3 revolver shots, 3 concrete impacts).
• Add projectile, wall physics tags + collisions; static colliders on top/bottom borders.
• Bump world gravity to (0, 384) to match EBB. Ball already has gravity_scale=0 so it's unaffected.
• Add hit_circle and hit_particle classes ported from EBB.
• Add projectile class — EBB bullet variant only (15×8 yellow capsule, gravity_scale=0.5, restitution=0.75, density=0.4, bullet=true, 2 bounces).
• Spawn one projectile per ball-wall hit, fired outward along the wall normal. Replace EBB's boom_particle muzzle flash with hit_circle + particles + revolver sound at the muzzle point.

Copying sounds first.

ball_wall.ogg
concrete_2.ogg
concrete_5.ogg
concrete_8.ogg
outline.frag
revolver_shot1.ogg
revolver_shot2.ogg
revolver_shot3.ogg
shadow.frag
slight_smile.png

74   BORDER_OFFSCREEN  = 16              -- how far the border rects extend off-screen on their outer sides
75  
76  CHAMBER_X             = (GAME_AREA_LEFT + GAME_AREA_RIGHT) / 2
77  CHAMBER_Y             = (GAME_AREA_TOP + GAME_AREA_BOTTOM) / 2
78  CHAMBER_HALF          = 50          -- 100 × 100 interior
79  CHAMBER_HALF_MIN      = 25          -- runtime resize floor
80  CHAMBER_HALF_MAX      = 100         -- runtime resize cap
81  CHAMBER_RESIZE_STEP   = 5           -- px change per [ / ] press
82  WALL_T                = 4           -- visual + collider wall thickness
83  WALL_RADIUS           = 2           -- rounded corner radius on each stick
84  CHAMBER_ROTATION_RATE = 0.0         -- rad/sec; continuous rotation (set 0 to disable)
85  
86  BALL_RADIUS        = 10                  -- emoji-sized; matches EBB
87  BALL_SPEED         = 240                 -- pinball-y inside the small chamber
88  BALL_BOUNCE_JITTER = math.pi / 36        -- ±5°, applied to post-bounce velocity
89  
90  -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
91  -- physics
92  -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
93  physics_init()
94  physics_set_gravity(0, 0)
95  physics_register_tag('ball')
96  physics_register_tag('chamber')
97  physics_enable_collision('ball', 'chamber')
98  
99  -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
100 -- layers (minimal pipeline: bg + game + derived shadow/outline + ui)
101 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
102 bg_layer     = layer_new('bg')
103 game_layer   = layer_new('game')
... [30 more lines]

Adding constants for the projectile + bullet, the new physics tags, the new sound loads, and the firing-VFX parameters in one block.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now I need to look at the rest of the file to plan the entity additions. Let me see where to add the projectile/effect collections and classes, and where the borders need a collider build.

145  
146 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
147 -- sounds
148 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
149 sounds.ball_wall   = sound_load('assets/ball_wall.ogg')
150 sounds.gun_fire_1  = sound_load('assets/revolver_shot1.ogg')
151 sounds.gun_fire_2  = sound_load('assets/revolver_shot2.ogg')
152 sounds.gun_fire_3  = sound_load('assets/revolver_shot3.ogg')
153 sounds.concrete_1  = sound_load('assets/concrete_2.ogg')   -- EBB names: concrete_1/2/3 → files concrete_2/5/8
154 sounds.concrete_2  = sound_load('assets/concrete_5.ogg')
155 sounds.concrete_3  = sound_load('assets/concrete_8.ogg')
156 
157 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
158 -- camera (with EBB-style always-on handcam jitter)
159 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
160 main_camera = camera_new(gw, gh)
161 shake_handcam(main_camera.shake, true, { x = 2, y = 2, rotation = 0.02 }, 0.5)
162 
163 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
164 -- input
165 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
166 bind('chamber_smaller', 'key:[')
167 bind('chamber_bigger',  'key:]')
168 
169 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
170 -- entity collections
171 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
172 balls = {}
173 
174 -- =============================================================================
... [70 more lines]

Now adding the wall_normal_for method to the chamber, then adding all the new entity classes (wall, hit_circle, hit_particle, projectile) and the spawn helpers.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now I'll modify ball:on_wall_hit to spawn a projectile + muzzle-flash VFX, then add the new entity classes (wall, hit_circle, hit_particle, projectile) and spawn helpers right after the ball class.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now insert the new entity classes after the ball class. Let me find the exact insertion point.

390    self.collider:set_velocity(nvx, nvy)
391 end
392 
393 function ball:draw()
394   local s     = self.spring.hit.x
395   local scale = self.image_scale * s
396   layer_push(game_layer, self.x, self.y, 0, scale, scale)
397   layer_image(game_layer, self.image, 0, 0)
398   layer_pop(game_layer)
399 end
400 
401 function ball:destroy()
402   if self.collider then self.collider:destroy() end
403 end
404 
405 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
406 -- init
407 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
408 the_chamber       = chamber(CHAMBER_X, CHAMBER_Y, CHAMBER_HALF)
409 balls[#balls + 1] = ball(CHAMBER_X, CHAMBER_Y)
410 
411 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
412 -- main loop
413 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
414 function update(dt)
415   sync_engine_globals()
416 
417   the_chamber:update(dt)
418   collection_update(balls, dt)
419 
... [10 more lines]

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now wire up update + draw to advance projectiles/effects, drain projectile collisions, and render them.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now render the projectiles + effects in draw(). They should be inside the camera_attach block to inherit the handcam jitter and to feed into the outline + shadow shaders.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

OK

Let me verify self:kill() exists in the framework — Ricochet uses it but I want to be sure for Anchor2.

E:\a327ex\emoji-ball-bounce\anchor\object.lua:83:  entity_kill(e)
E:\a327ex\emoji-ball-bounce\anchor\object.lua:84:  Free function equivalent to e:kill(). Useful if you have a plain
E:\a327ex\emoji-ball-bounce\anchor\object.lua:87:function entity_kill(e)

60     that takes precedence.
61  ]]
62  local function default_kill(self)
63    if self._dying then return end
64    self._dying = true
65    destroy_queue[#destroy_queue + 1] = self
66  end
67  
68  --[[
69    make_entity(e)
70    Assigns e.id and registers e in the global entities table.
71    Also installs a default kill method if none exists.
72    Returns e for chaining.
73  ]]
74  function make_entity(e)
75    e.id = next_id
76    next_id = next_id + 1
77    entities[e.id] = e
78    if not e.kill then e.kill = default_kill end
79    return e
80  end
81  
82  --[[
83    entity_kill(e)
84    Free function equivalent to e:kill(). Useful if you have a plain
85    entity table and don't want to use method syntax.
86  ]]
87  function entity_kill(e)
88    default_kill(e)
89  end
... [10 more lines]

Let me look at the full ball draw + projectile area for one final sanity pass.

405  -- =============================================================================
406 -- wall — static rectangular collider for the top + bottom border solids.
407 -- Visual is drawn separately by draw_borders(); this entity only carries the
408 -- physics body so projectiles can collide and bounce off.
409 -- =============================================================================
410 wall = class()
411 
412 function wall:new(x, y, w, h)
413   self.x, self.y = x, y
414   self.w, self.h = w, h
415   make_entity(self)
416   self.collider = collider(self, 'wall', 'static', 'box', w, h)
417   self.collider:set_position(x, y)
418   self.collider:set_restitution(1)
419   self.collider:set_friction(0)
420 end
421 
422 function wall:destroy()
423   if self.collider then self.collider:destroy() end
424 end
425 
426 -- =============================================================================
427 -- hit_circle — small expanding/shrinking ring at an impact point. Tweens
428 -- radius from the spawn value down to 0 over `duration`, then dies. Drawn
429 -- as a filled circle on game_layer so it gets the outline + shadow.
430 -- Direct port of EBB's hit_circle, minus the parent/effects-layer wiring.
431 -- =============================================================================
432 hit_circle = class()
433 
434 function hit_circle:new(x, y, args)
... [50 more lines]

Final sanity check passes. Summary of the implementation:

Sounds (6 new files) — revolver_shot1/2/3.ogg, concrete_2/5/8.ogg. EBB names them gun_fire_1/2/3 and concrete_1/2/3 (file/index mapping is intentionally jumbled in EBB's code), so I matched both the file copies and the friendly names exactly.

Physics changes:

• World gravity is now (0, 384) — matches EBB. Ball still has gravity_scale=0 so it ignores world gravity (the chamber bouncing logic is unchanged).
• New tags: wall (border solids) and projectile.
• New collision pairs: projectile↔chamber, projectile↔wall. Both go through the same handler.

Border colliders: top_wall and bottom_wall are wall entities with single 'wall' static-box colliders covering exactly the visible portion of each border zone (gw wide × BORDER_TOP/BOTTOM tall). The off-screen extension that makes the rounded corners invisible is a visual-only trick in draw_borders() — colliders stay flush with screen edges.

hit_circle and hit_particle ported directly from EBB. Both render to game_layer so they pick up the outline + shadow + handcam jitter automatically. Particle is a directional capsule with gravity accumulation; it autoscales width/height with launch velocity using EBB's exact remap (4..12 wide × 2..6 tall over 0..250 px/s).

projectile — bullet variant only. EBB's exact bullet parameters: 15×8 box, restitution 0.75, density 0.4, friction 0, gravity_scale 0.5, bullet=true (CCD), apply_impulse(15·cos/sin direction). Pop-on-spawn 'hit' spring + 0.1s white flash. Visual is a yellow rounded rectangle with corner radius h/2 = 4 (pill shape), oriented along velocity each frame via math.atan(vy, vx).

Spawn point on ball-wall hit: uses chamber:wall_normal_for(ball.x, ball.y) (Ricochet's helper, robust under chamber rotation) to compute the outward normal angle. Spawn offset from ball is BALL_RADIUS + WALL_T + PROJECTILE_SPAWN_GAP = 22 along the outward normal — that's 8 px past the outer wall edge with the projectile's 4-pixel half-height clearing it. The projectile's outgoing direction is the same outward normal, so it always exits perpendicular to the wall it was spawned by.

Muzzle flash — fire_muzzle_flash(x, y, direction) plays a random gun_fire_* sample, spawns a hit_circle (radius 8, yellow, flash on spawn), and 1-3 yellow hit_particles with EBB's exact velocity/duration/gravity values, fanned 60° around the firing direction. Replaces EBB's boom_particle muzzle flash.

Wall-impact effect — projectile_wall_hit_fx(x, y, normal_angle, intensity) is the same VFX recipe (so the firing visual and the impact visuals share a vocabulary), played with EBB's exact projectile-wall parameters: radius 6 + 4*intensity, particle velocity intensity * (100..200), gravity 256, fanned 60° around normal_angle + π (away from the wall — flipping Box2D's "from-A-to-B" contact normal so particles fly outward). Uses concrete sounds.

Update loop — drains projectile↔chamber and projectile↔wall events with the same handler. Intensity is EBB's remap(speed, 300, 600, 0, 1). Calls projectile_wall_hit_fx and projectile:on_wall_hit(intensity) (which pulses the spring, flashes, decrements bounces, kills on exhaustion).

One thing worth flagging: EBB also bounces projectiles off the bottom wall with gravity, so they tend to land and skip a couple times before dying. Same physics applies here — bullets fired downward (when ball hits the bottom of the chamber) will arc, hit the green floor border, lose 25% velocity per bounce, and die after 2 wall hits. Bullets fired left/right from the chamber that miss the borders will fly off-screen forever (no left/right walls). For now they accumulate physically forever — once we have enemy spawning we'll likely add a "die when far off-screen" check. Easy to add when we need it; mentioning it so it doesn't surprise you.

Run and see how it looks. Each ball-wall hit should now produce: a yellow muzzle flash (ring + particle spray + revolver crack) and a yellow capsule that flies outward, arcs, bounces twice off the white top / green bottom borders with concrete impacts and matching VFX, then dies.

You can actually remove all sounds for now, I'll add them later batched.

149:sounds.ball_wall   = sound_load('assets/ball_wall.ogg')
150:sounds.gun_fire_1  = sound_load('assets/revolver_shot1.ogg')
151:sounds.gun_fire_2  = sound_load('assets/revolver_shot2.ogg')
152:sounds.gun_fire_3  = sound_load('assets/revolver_shot3.ogg')
153:sounds.concrete_1  = sound_load('assets/concrete_2.ogg')   -- EBB names: concrete_1/2/3 → files concrete_2/5/8
154:sounds.concrete_2  = sound_load('assets/concrete_5.ogg')
155:sounds.concrete_3  = sound_load('assets/concrete_8.ogg')
327:  sound_play(sounds.ball_wall, 0.4, pitch * random_float(0.95, 1.05))
611:  sound_play(sounds['gun_fire_' .. random_int(1, 3)], 0.63, random_float(0.95, 1.05))
634:  sound_play(sounds['concrete_' .. random_int(1, 3)], 0.7, random_float(0.95, 1.05))

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

305  -- by hit_circle + hit_particles.
306 function ball:on_wall_hit(hx, hy, nx, ny)
307   local vx, vy = self.collider:get_velocity()
308   local speed  = math.length(vx, vy)
309   local intensity = math.clamp(math.remap(speed, 0, BALL_SPEED, 0, 1), 0, 1)
310 
311   -- Wall-hit sound — pitch ramps above intensity 0.45, ±5% random pitch jitter.
312   local pitch = 1.0
313   if intensity > 0.45 then
314     pitch = 1.0 + math.remap(intensity, 0.45, 0.7, 0, 1)
315   end
316   sound_play(sounds.ball_wall, 0.4, pitch * random_float(0.95, 1.05))
317 
318   -- Uniform pulse on the 'hit' spring — small "thump" on every bounce.
319   spring_pull(self.spring, 'hit', 0.3)
320 
321   -- Fire a projectile outward along the wall normal. Use the chamber's
322   -- own outward-normal helper rather than Box2D's contact normal — robust
323   -- under chamber rotation and indifferent to Box2D's normal-sign convention.
324   local out_angle = the_chamber:wall_normal_for(self.x, self.y)
325   local onx, ony  = math.cos(out_angle), math.sin(out_angle)
326   local d         = BALL_RADIUS + WALL_T + PROJECTILE_SPAWN_GAP
327   local muzzle_x  = self.x + d * onx
328   local muzzle_y  = self.y + d * ony
329   fire_muzzle_flash(muzzle_x, muzzle_y, out_angle)
330   spawn_projectile(muzzle_x, muzzle_y, out_angle)
331 
332   -- Bounce jitter — rotate the post-bounce velocity slightly so the ball
333   -- can't settle into a repeating path. Speed is preserved by :update.
334   local a = math.atan(vy, vx) + random_float(-BALL_BOUNCE_JITTER, BALL_BOUNCE_JITTER)
... [5 more lines]

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

588  -- impacts. `direction` is the projectile's outgoing direction; particles
589 -- spray forward from the muzzle in a 60° cone around it.
590 function fire_muzzle_flash(x, y, direction)
591   sound_play(sounds['gun_fire_' .. random_int(1, 3)], 0.63, random_float(0.95, 1.05))
592   spawn_hit_circle(x, y, {
593     radius         = FIRING_HIT_CIRCLE_RADIUS,
594     duration       = random_float(0.15, 0.3),
595     color          = yellow,
596     flash_on_spawn = true,
597   })
598   for i = 1, random_int(1, 3) do
599     spawn_hit_particle(x, y, {
600       velocity       = random_float(100, 200),
601       direction      = direction + random_float(-math.pi/3, math.pi/3),
602       duration       = random_float(0.3, 0.5),
603       color          = yellow,
604       gravity        = FIRING_PARTICLE_GRAVITY,
605       flash_on_spawn = true,
606     })
607   end
608 end
609 
610 -- Wall-impact effect. Same VFX recipe as the muzzle flash, just with the
611 -- impact point + the wall's outward direction. Used for both projectile-vs-
612 -- chamber and projectile-vs-wall bounces.
613 function projectile_wall_hit_fx(x, y, normal_angle, intensity)
614   sound_play(sounds['concrete_' .. random_int(1, 3)], 0.7, random_float(0.95, 1.05))
615   spawn_hit_circle(x, y, {
616     radius         = 6 + 4 * intensity,
617     duration       = random_float(0.15, 0.3),
... [20 more lines]

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

OK

All sound code stripped: removed the sounds-loading block, the ball wall-hit sound_play (and the now-unused intensity + pitch calculation that fed only the sound), and the two sound_play lines in fire_muzzle_flash and projectile_wall_hit_fx. Everything else (springs, VFX, projectiles, physics) is unchanged. The .ogg files are still in assets/ so you can re-load them in one batch later.

There's no reason to have both wall and chamber tags, I believe the chamber can just be wall as well.

Good catch — they behave identically (static, restitution=1, friction=0) and the handlers don't differentiate.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now update the collision drains — merge the two projectile-wall drains into one, and switch ball-chamber to ball-wall.

645    collection_update(projectiles, dt)
646   collection_update(effects, dt)
647 
648   for _, ev in ipairs(collision_entities_begin('ball', 'chamber')) do
649     local b = ev.a
650     if b and not b._dead then
651       b:on_wall_hit(ev.x or b.x, ev.y or b.y, ev.nx or 0, ev.ny or 0)
652     end
653   end
654 
655   -- Projectile bounces — same handler for chamber and border walls. EBB's
656   -- intensity formula remaps speed 300..600 → 0..1, both for the spring
657   -- pull and the VFX scaling. Box2D's contact normal points from the
658   -- first body toward the second; we flip with +π so particles fly
659   -- AWAY from the wall the projectile just hit.
660   for _, ev in ipairs(collision_entities_begin('projectile', 'chamber')) do
661     local p = ev.a
662     if p and not p._dead then
663       local vx, vy   = p.collider:get_velocity()
664       local intensity = math.clamp(math.remap(math.length(vx, vy), 300, 600, 0, 1), 0, 1)
665       local normal_angle = math.atan(ev.ny or 0, ev.nx or 0) + math.pi
666       projectile_wall_hit_fx(ev.x or p.x, ev.y or p.y, normal_angle, intensity)
667       p:on_wall_hit(intensity)
668     end
669   end
670   for _, ev in ipairs(collision_entities_begin('projectile', 'wall')) do
671     local p = ev.a
672     if p and not p._dead then
673       local vx, vy   = p.collider:get_velocity()
674       local intensity = math.clamp(math.remap(math.length(vx, vy), 300, 600, 0, 1), 0, 1)
... [20 more lines]

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

OK

Three places updated:

1. Tag registration — dropped 'chamber', kept only 'wall' for everything bouncy. Two collision pairs instead of three: ball↔wall and projectile↔wall.
2. chamber:_build_collider — all four chamber sticks now tagged 'wall' (replace_all on the four add_box(... 'chamber' ...) calls + the constructor).
3. Update loop — single ball↔wall drain (was ball↔chamber), single projectile↔wall drain (was two — chamber + wall — doing identical work).

Code is shorter and the "wall" abstraction now matches the visual reality: anything green/white that bounces things is just a wall, regardless of whether it's part of the chamber assembly or a border solid.

Projectile speed is too fast, projectiles should also bounce off sides, can add invisible walls there if needed.

Two edits — lower the impulse, and add two invisible side walls.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

623        gravity        = FIRING_PARTICLE_GRAVITY,
624       flash_on_spawn = true,
625     })
626   end
627 end
628 
629 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
630 -- init
631 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
632 the_chamber       = chamber(CHAMBER_X, CHAMBER_Y, CHAMBER_HALF)
633 balls[#balls + 1] = ball(CHAMBER_X, CHAMBER_Y)
634 top_wall          = wall(gw/2, BORDER_TOP/2,        gw, BORDER_TOP)
635 bottom_wall       = wall(gw/2, gh - BORDER_BOTTOM/2, gw, BORDER_BOTTOM)
636 
637 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

OK

Two changes:

1. PROJECTILE_VELOCITY_IMPULSE: 15 → 8. Roughly halves the launch speed. Easy to dial further — let me know if it still feels too fast or now too slow.

2. Two new side walls, sitting just off-screen at x = -8 and x = gw + 8, each 16 px wide × gh tall. They use the same wall class as the top/bottom borders, so they feed into the same projectile↔wall collision drain and produce the same yellow bounce VFX automatically. No changes needed in the draw code — draw_borders() only renders the top + bottom (via direct layer_rounded_rectangle calls), and the wall class itself has no draw method, so these stay invisible by design.

Net result: the screen perimeter is fully sealed for projectiles. The chamber sticks plus the four border walls all share the wall tag, all share the bounce-with-yellow-VFX behavior, and projectiles ricochet around with their gravity arc + 0.75 restitution + 2-bounce budget until the budget runs out.

Slightly less projectile speed. Instead of particles on shoot, spawn a few stars instead. emoji_particle I believe is the class in Emoji Ball Battles that spawns a general emoji particle, re-use that. Spawn 2-3 starts at most. Add gravity to the player's ball and let it collide within the chamber naturally, without changing its velocity manually. Let me see what that looks like and then we'll adjust with the energy improvements from Emoji Ball Battles as needed so it doesn't stop bouncing. Particles when projectiles hit walls... are they the same as in Emoji Ball Battles or slightly different? It looks like there may be too many particles or that they're living too long or moving too fast, I don't know which one yet. Or it may simply be a function of the projectile's velocity, if I remember correctly that used an intensity-based method.

Let me find emoji_particle in EBB.

1341:        self.effects:add(emoji_particle(projectile_object.x, projectile_object.y, an.images.cd, {
1378:          self.effects:add(emoji_particle(cd_object.x, cd_object.y, an.images.cd, {
2438:            self.parent.effects:add(emoji_particle(child.x, child.y, an.images.cd, {
3090:    my_arena.effects:add(emoji_particle(spawn_x, spawn_y, an.images.heart, {
3291:    my_arena.effects:add(emoji_particle(self.emoji_x, self.emoji_y, an.images.star, {
3310:    my_arena.effects:add(emoji_particle(self.weapon_x + ox, self.weapon_y - 4, an.images.boom, {
3399:emoji_particle = object:extend()
3401:function emoji_particle:new(x, y, image, args)
3430:function emoji_particle:update(dt)
4293:          self.parent.parent.effects:add(emoji_particle(self.x, self.y, an.images.cd, {

3399 emoji_particle = object:extend()
3400    
3401    function emoji_particle:new(x, y, image, args)
3402      args = args or {}
3403      self.x, self.y = x, y
3404      self.image = image
3405      object.new(self)
3406      self.scale = args.scale or 1
3407      self.velocity = args.velocity or an.random:float(75, 150)
3408      self.direction = args.direction or an.random:angle()
3409      self.duration = args.duration or an.random:float(0.4, 0.6)
3410      self.scale = 14*self.scale/self.image.width
3411      self.gravity_velocity = 0
3412      self.gravity = args.gravity or 0
3413      self.angle_mode = args.angle_mode -- nil, 'forward', 'backward', or number
3414      if type(self.angle_mode) == 'number' then self.rotation = self.angle_mode else self.rotation = an.random:angle() end
3415      self.rotation_speed = args.rotation_speed or an.random:float(-2*math.pi, 2*math.pi)
3416      if self.angle_mode then self.rotation_speed = 0 end
3417    
3418      self:add(timer())
3419      self:add(spring())
3420      self.timer:tween(self.duration, self, {velocity = 0, scale = 0}, math.linear, function() self:kill() end)
3421    
3422      if args.flash_on_spawn then
3423        self.flashing = true
3424        local flash_duration = (args.flash_on_spawn or 1)*self.duration
3425        self.timer:after(flash_duration, function() self.flashing = false end)
3426        self.spring:pull('main', 0.3, 3, 0.7)
3427      end
3428    end
... [30 more lines]

3285   self.spring:pull('emoji_scale', 0.3, 3, 0.7)
3286      self.spring:pull('emoji_rotation', an.random:float(-0.3, 0.3), 3, 0.5)
3287    
3288      -- Spawn star emoji particles
3289      local my_arena = self.parent.parent
3290      for i = 1, an.random:int(1, 2) do
3291        my_arena.effects:add(emoji_particle(self.emoji_x, self.emoji_y, an.images.star, {
3292          velocity = an.random:float(75, 125),
3293          direction = an.random:float(-math.pi/4, 5*math.pi/4),
3294          scale = 1,
3295          duration = an.random:float(0.4, 0.6),
3296          flash_on_spawn = 0.25,
3297          gravity = 128,
3298        }))
3299      end
3300    end
3301    
3302    function weapon_ui:shoot()
3303      -- Spawn boom emoji particles
3304      local my_arena = self.parent.parent
3305      local ox
3306      if self.team == 'player' then ox = 8 else ox = -8 end
3307      local dir_base
3308      if self.team == 'player' then dir_base = -math.pi/4 else dir_base = math.pi end
3309      for i = 1, an.random:int(1, 2) do
3310        my_arena.effects:add(emoji_particle(self.weapon_x + ox, self.weapon_y - 4, an.images.boom, {
3311          velocity = an.random:float(75, 125),
3312          direction = an.random:float(dir_base, dir_base + math.pi/4),
3313          scale = an.random:float(1.4, 1.6),
3314          duration = an.random:float(0.3, 0.5),

Copying the star asset.

ball_wall.ogg
concrete_2.ogg
concrete_5.ogg
concrete_8.ogg
outline.frag
revolver_shot1.ogg
revolver_shot2.ogg
revolver_shot3.ogg
shadow.frag
slight_smile.png
star.png

Now the edits — projectile speed, image load, ball gravity + remove manipulations, then emoji_particle class and the new muzzle-flash.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now the ball — switch gravity on, remove velocity renorm + bounce jitter.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now removing the dead BALL_BOUNCE_JITTER constant since we no longer apply jitter.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now add the emoji_particle class. I'll place it right after hit_particle.

476  -- the launch velocity via apply_impulse (matches EBB exactly so the in-air
477 -- trajectory feels the same: short low arc, decays after each bounce).
478 -- =============================================================================
479 projectile = class()
480 
481 function projectile:new(x, y, direction, args)
482   args = args or {}
483   self.x, self.y = x, y
484   self.direction = direction
485   self.bounces   = args.bounces or PROJECTILE_BOUNCES
486   self.flashing  = false
487   make_entity(self)
488   self.timer  = timer_new()
489   self.spring = spring_new()
490   spring_add(self.spring, 'hit', 1)
491 
492   self.collider = collider(self, 'projectile', 'dynamic', 'box', PROJECTILE_W, PROJECTILE_H)
493   self.collider:set_position(x, y)
494   self.collider:set_restitution(PROJECTILE_RESTITUTION)
495   self.collider:set_friction(0)
496   self.collider:set_density(PROJECTILE_DENSITY)
497   self.collider:set_gravity_scale(PROJECTILE_GRAVITY_SCALE)
498   self.collider:set_bullet(true)
499   self.collider:apply_impulse(
500     PROJECTILE_VELOCITY_IMPULSE * math.cos(direction),
501     PROJECTILE_VELOCITY_IMPULSE * math.sin(direction)
502   )
503 
504   -- Pop-on-spawn pulse + brief white flash (EBB-faithful).
505   spring_pull(self.spring, 'hit', 0.3, 3, 0.5)
... [5 more lines]

461  end
462 
463 function hit_particle:draw()
464   local col = self.flashing and white() or self.color()
465   local r   = math.min(self.w, self.h) / 2
466   layer_push(game_layer, self.x, self.y, self._draw_angle or 0, self.sx, self.sy)
467   layer_rounded_rectangle(game_layer, -self.w/2, -self.h/2, self.w, self.h, r, col)
468   layer_pop(game_layer)
469 end
470 
471 function hit_particle:destroy() end
472 
473 -- =============================================================================
474 -- projectile — EBB Gun/Revolver bullet. Yellow capsule, gravity-affected,
475 -- bounces off walls/chamber up to `bounces` times then dies. Box2D applies
476 -- the launch velocity via apply_impulse (matches EBB exactly so the in-air
477 -- trajectory feels the same: short low arc, decays after each bounce).
478 -- =============================================================================
479 projectile = class()
480 

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now add the spawn helper and replace the muzzle flash particles with stars.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

OK

Summary of changes + my read on the projectile-wall particle situation:

Projectile speed: PROJECTILE_VELOCITY_IMPULSE: 8 → 6. Slightly slower again.

Star muzzle flash:

• Copied star.png to assets, loaded as the global star image.
• Added emoji_particle class — direct port of EBB's emoji_particle (lines 3399-3451 in EBB). Same fields: velocity, direction, gravity_velocity accumulator, angle_mode (nil/forward/backward/number), spring 'main' for spawn-pop, scale-and-velocity tween to 0 over duration. The 14-px-target scale normalization (scale = 14 * args.scale / image.width) is preserved so an input scale of 1 always renders at 14 px wide regardless of source image.
• Added spawn_emoji_particle(x, y, image, args) helper.
• fire_muzzle_flash now spawns 2-3 stars instead of the yellow capsule particles. Star args mirror EBB's pattern (velocity 75-125, duration 0.4-0.6, gravity 128, flash_on_spawn 0.25).

Ball gravity:

• set_gravity_scale(0) → set_gravity_scale(1). World gravity (384) now applies fully to the ball.
• Removed the velocity renormalization block from ball:update.
• Removed the ±5° bounce jitter from ball:on_wall_hit (was modifying velocity manually).
• Removed dead BALL_BOUNCE_JITTER constant.
• Kept contain_in_chamber as a defensive guardrail — it only fires when the ball escapes the chamber on resize/rotation, not as a continuous physics override.

Net behavior: ball launches at speed 240 in a random direction, then gravity takes over. Box2D handles bouncing with restitution=1, friction=0. As you predicted, Box2D will bleed energy on each bounce despite restitution=1 (numerical tolerance), so the ball will likely settle into a low-energy state at the chamber bottom over time. We'll see it in motion and decide which energy-restoring trick to port from EBB next: probabilistic wall_energy_boost, the system-energy ball-ball tracking, or a velocity-floor enforcer that only kicks in below a threshold.

On the projectile-wall particles: I checked, and they ARE the same as EBB's projectile-wall hit (matched line-for-line with EBB's main.lua line 952-963 — count 1-3, duration 0.3-0.5, velocity intensity × random(100, 200), gravity 256, color yellow). What's different is the intensity formula's calibration:

intensity = clamp(remap(speed, 300, 600, 0, 1), 0, 1)

That 300, 600 range is calibrated for EBB's much faster projectiles (impulse 15 in EBB → ~300-450 px/s typical speeds). Our impulse is now 6, so projectile speeds are around 80-150 px/s — which means intensity is mostly 0 in our game. With intensity ≈ 0:

• particle velocity ≈ 0 → particles spawn but don't fly outward, just fall under gravity 256
• hit_circle radius ≈ 6 (the +4*intensity ramp doesn't fire)
• particle count is unchanged (still 1-3 random)

So what you're probably seeing is stationary particles falling straight down at every bounce, in groups of 1-3, lasting 0.3-0.5 s. The "too many / lasting too long / moving too fast" all could read true in different aspects:

• "too many" — count and duration multiply: 2 bounces per projectile × 1-3 particles × 0.3-0.5s overlap = 4-12 particle-seconds visible per bullet
• "too long" — the duration matches EBB at full speed, but our slow particles barely move so they sit there for the full 0.3-0.5s instead of dispersing
• "too fast" — unlikely here unless intensity got near 1

Cheap fix: recalibrate the remap to our actual speed range, e.g. remap(speed, 50, 200, 0, 1). That would put intensity near 0.5-1.0 for normal hits, so particles actually fly outward — closer to the EBB visual feel even at our slower speeds.

Want me to make that change, or leave it for you to observe with the new gravity-ball setup first? The new ball physics will produce different projectile spawn velocities (sometimes faster when ball is falling, sometimes slow), so the intensity issue may already partly self-resolve.

You're spawning both stars and particles when shooting, only stars are fine. Projectile's initial angle should be a mix of the normal from the wall and the angle of the ball when it hits, like in Ricochet. What are the energy improvements that Emoji Ball Battles added? Currently the ball keeps bouncing, but it never bounces to the top wall and it bounces in the same predictable manner. We want more variety on the bounces but keeping the gravity because it looks better.

Let me first find EBB's energy-management code in detail.

444:  self.max_ball_speed = 448
451:  self.system_energy = 250  -- default until first measurement
452:  self.min_wall_energy_boost = 1.0   -- boost at high energy (>=600)
453:  self.max_wall_energy_boost = 1.11 -- boost at very low energy (<=100)
454:  self.wall_energy_boost = 1
455:  self.wall_boost_chance = 0  -- probability of applying boost (0-100)
592:     Solution: Track system_energy (sum of both ball speeds) on ball-ball collisions.
606:     Also cap linear speed at @max_ball_speed and angular velocity at ball.max_angular_velocity.
608:  Speed is capped at @max_ball_speed to prevent things from getting too chaotic.
664:    self.system_energy = speed_a + speed_b
666:    local energy_ratio = math.remap(math.clamp(self.system_energy, 100, 600), 100, 600, 0, 1)
667:    self.wall_boost_chance = (1 - math.quad_out(energy_ratio)) * 100
669:    if self.system_energy <= 250 then
670:      self.wall_energy_boost = self.max_wall_energy_boost
671:    elseif self.system_energy >= 400 then
672:      self.wall_energy_boost = self.min_wall_energy_boost
674:      local boost_ratio = math.remap(self.system_energy, 250, 400, 0, 1)
675:      self.wall_energy_boost = math.lerp(math.sine_out(boost_ratio), self.max_wall_energy_boost, self.min_wall_energy_boost)
678:    -- Track high speed hits (either ball > 0.78*@max_ball_speed)
679:    local is_high_speed_hit = max_speed > 0.78*self.max_ball_speed
700:      local speed_ratio = math.remap(max_speed, 0, self.max_ball_speed, 0, 1)
745:    -- Cap speed at @max_ball_speed
747:    if speed_a > self.max_ball_speed then
748:      local scale = self.max_ball_speed/speed_a
754:    if speed_b > self.max_ball_speed then
755:      local scale = self.max_ball_speed/speed_b
761:    local is_low_horizontal = math.abs(vx_a) + math.abs(vx_b) < 0.25*self.max_ball_speed
816:    -- Cap speed at @max_ball_speed
818:    if speed_a > self.max_ball_speed then
819:      local scale = self.max_ball_speed/speed_a
... [4 more lines]

588       When intervention triggers, both balls get random horizontal impulse (100-200).
589 
590   4. WALL FALLBACK (prevents stalling) - ball-wall collisions
591      Problem: System energy can drop too low even with other systems in place.
592      Solution: Track system_energy (sum of both ball speeds) on ball-ball collisions.
593      On ball-wall collisions, probabilistically apply energy boost.
594      - Probability (quad_out): 100% at energy <=100, drops fast to 0% at energy >=600
595      - Boost value (sine_out): max at energy <=250, drops to 1.0 at energy >=400
596 
597   5. STUCK BALL DETECTION (prevents floor sliding) - implemented in ball class
598      Problem: A ball can lose vertical velocity and slide along a wall indefinitely.
599      Solution: Each ball tracks how long its vertical velocity stays very low (|vy| < 5)
600      while still having horizontal movement (|vx| > 5). If this persists for >0.5 seconds,
601      apply impulse to unstick it.
602 
603   6. WEAPON ENERGY BOOST (compensates for weapon collision energy loss) - weapon-weapon collisions
604      Problem: Weapon collisions drain energy from the system.
605      Solution: Apply @weapon_energy_boost (1.14x) on weapon-weapon collisions.
606      Also cap linear speed at @max_ball_speed and angular velocity at ball.max_angular_velocity.
607 
608   Speed is capped at @max_ball_speed to prevent things from getting too chaotic.
609 ]]
610 function arena:early_update(dt)
611   -- Background gradient (drawn early so clouds appear on top)
612   bg:rectangle_gradient_v(0, 0, gw, gh, sky_top(), sky_bottom())
613 
614   -- Pause system: press space or click to start
615   -- Music
616   if an:key_is_pressed('m') then
617     an:music_play('bgm')
... [55 more lines]

756        vx_b = vx_b*scale
757       vy_b = vy_b*scale
758     end
759 
760     -- Track low horizontal velocity collisions to prevent stalling
761     local is_low_horizontal = math.abs(vx_a) + math.abs(vx_b) < 0.25*self.max_ball_speed
762     if is_low_horizontal then
763       self.low_horizontal_hit_count = self.low_horizontal_hit_count + 1
764 
765       -- Linear: 25% per hit, guaranteed at 4 hits
766       local kick_chance = math.clamp(self.low_horizontal_hit_count, 0, 4)/4
767       if an.random:bool(kick_chance*100) then
768         self.low_horizontal_hit_count = 0
769         -- Apply horizontal impulse to both balls
770         vx_a = an.random:sign()*an.random:float(100, 200)
771         vx_b = an.random:sign()*an.random:float(100, 200)
772       end
773     else
774       self.low_horizontal_hit_count = 0
775     end
776 
777     ball_a.collider:set_velocity(vx_a, vy_a)
778     ball_b.collider:set_velocity(vx_b, vy_b)
779 
780     -- Sound
781     an:sound_play('ball_ball', 0.4, an.random:float(0.95, 1.05))
782 
783     -- Visual effects at collision contact point
784     -- Intensity normalized 0-1 based on combined speed (0-800 range)
785     local intensity = math.remap(combined_speed, 0, 800, 0, 1)
... [30 more lines]

588:     When intervention triggers, both balls get random horizontal impulse (100-200).
601:     apply impulse to unstick it.
1174:    if projectile_object.kitchen_knife_stuck then goto continue_knife_ball end
1959:  self.low_vy_time = 0
1960:  self.low_vy_threshold = an.random:float(0.5, 1.5)
2217:    self.low_vy_time = self.low_vy_time + dt
2218:    if self.low_vy_time > self.low_vy_threshold and math.abs(vy) < 15 then
2219:      self.low_vy_time = 0
2220:      self.low_vy_threshold = an.random:float(0.5, 1.5)
2232:    self.low_vy_time = 0
3871:-- Dash particle: spawns when ball unsticks from floor

2210     end
2211      end
2212    
2213      -- Low floor detection: if vertical velocity stays low while near the floor, give it a hop
2214      local vx, vy = self.collider:get_velocity()
2215      local near_floor = self.y + self.radius > self.parent.y + self.parent.h - 20
2216      if near_floor then
2217        self.low_vy_time = self.low_vy_time + dt
2218        if self.low_vy_time > self.low_vy_threshold and math.abs(vy) < 15 then
2219          self.low_vy_time = 0
2220          self.low_vy_threshold = an.random:float(0.5, 1.5)
2221          self.collider:apply_impulse(math.sign(vx)*an.random:float(0, 6), -24)
2222          -- Sound
2223          an:sound_play('hop', 0.5, an.random:float(0.95, 1.05))
2224          -- Squash horizontally, stretch vertically (opposite of floor hit)
2225          self.spring:pull('squash_y', 0.5, 3, 0.5)
2226          self.spring:pull('squash_x', -0.25, 3, 0.5)
2227          -- Spawn dash particle at ball's bottom, direction opposite to velocity
2228          local particle_angle = math.remap(vx, -100, 100, math.pi/4, 3*math.pi/4) + an.random:float(-math.pi/8, math.pi/8)
2229          self.parent.effects:add(dash_particle(self.x, self.y + self.radius, {direction = particle_angle}))
2230        end
2231      else
2232        self.low_vy_time = 0
2233      end
2234    
2235      -- Draw ball
2236      local squash_x = self.spring.squash_x.x
2237      local squash_y = self.spring.squash_y.x
2238      local hit_scale = self.spring.hit.x
2239    
... [10 more lines]

1025:      projectile_object.collider:set_gravity_scale(2)
1944:  self.collider:set_restitution(1)
1945:  self.collider:set_friction(0)
1946:  self.collider:set_linear_damping(0)
1951:  self.collider:set_restitution(1, self.weapon_shape)
1952:  self.collider:set_density(0, self.weapon_shape)
1955:  self.collider:set_restitution(1, self.weapon_sensor)
1956:  self.collider:set_density(0, self.weapon_sensor)
2021:  self.collider:set_gravity_scale(0)
2590:    self.collider:set_gravity_scale(0)
2605:  self.collider:set_gravity_scale(1)
2925:  self.collider:set_gravity_scale(1)
3948:    self.collider:set_restitution(0.75)
3949:    self.collider:set_friction(0)
3950:    self.collider:set_gravity_scale(0.5)

[Showing results with pagination = limit: 15]

123:function collider:set_density(density, shape) physics_shape_set_density(shape or self.shape, density) end
124:function collider:get_density(shape) return physics_shape_get_density(shape or self.shape) end

I have everything I need. Let me explain the energy systems first, then code the changes.

EBB's six energy systems (lines 540-608 in EBB main.lua):

1. Cooldown energy gain — per-ball, energy gain from weapon cooldown progression. Multi-ball weapon-game thing, not relevant for us.
2. Wall energy boost — probabilistic velocity multiplier on wall hits when speed is low. Single-ball relevant.
3. Horizontal intervention — on ball-ball collisions, if both balls have low |vx|, kick them randomly. Multi-ball, not relevant.
4. Wall fallback — same machinery as #2; explicit fallback formulas (1-1.11x at low energy, 0% chance at high energy). Already covered by #2.
5. Stuck ball detection — when ball is near floor with |vy| < 15 for 0.5–1.5s, apply impulse (sign(vx)·random(0,6) horizontal, -24 vertical). Single-ball relevant.
6. Weapon energy boost — 1.14× multiplier on weapon-weapon hits. Multi-ball, not relevant.

So #2 + #5 are what apply to a single-ball setup. Together they cover the two failure modes you described:

• "Never bounces to top wall" → #5 fires periodic upward kicks when stuck near floor.
• "Predictable bounces" → #2's boost is uniform (no direction change), but #5's horizontal nudge varies bounce trajectory each time it triggers, and the energy maintenance lets occasional fast bounces produce wider arcs.

Now the code changes — drop the hit_circle, mix the projectile angle Ricochet-style, port both energy systems.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now add the energy boost constants, port Ricochet's projectile angle, and add the wall energy boost to ball:on_wall_hit.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now update ball:new to add the unstick state, and ball:on_wall_hit for the wall energy boost + Ricochet's mixed projectile angle.

266    -- union.
267   layer_push(game_layer, self.x, self.y, self.angle, 1, 1)
268   layer_rounded_rectangle(game_layer, -h - t, -h - t, len, t,   r, col)  -- top
269   layer_rounded_rectangle(game_layer, -h - t,  h,     len, t,   r, col)  -- bottom
270   layer_rounded_rectangle(game_layer, -h - t, -h - t, t,   len, r, col)  -- left
271   layer_rounded_rectangle(game_layer,  h,     -h - t, t,   len, r, col)  -- right
272   layer_pop(game_layer)
273 end
274 
275 function chamber:destroy()
276   if self.collider then self.collider:destroy() end
277 end
278 
279 -- =============================================================================
280 -- ball — slight_smile emoji bouncing inside the chamber at constant speed.
281 -- Ricochet's approach: dynamic circle collider with restitution=1, friction=0,
282 -- linear_damping=0, fixed rotation, bullet (CCD). Box2D bleeds energy even at
283 -- restitution=1, so :update renormalizes velocity to BALL_SPEED every frame.
284 -- A small ±5° jitter on each bounce keeps it from settling into a repeating
285 -- path. :contain_in_chamber is defensive — handles the ball getting pushed
286 -- outside on resize/rotation/tunneling.
287 -- =============================================================================
288 ball = class()
289 
290 function ball:new(x, y)
291   self.x, self.y = x, y
292   self.radius    = BALL_RADIUS
293   self.speed     = BALL_SPEED
294   make_entity(self)
295   self.timer  = timer_new()
... [30 more lines]

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now add the floor unstick to ball:update.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

94   WALL_BOOST_SPEED_LOW   = 50      -- below this speed, boost chance = 100%
95  WALL_BOOST_SPEED_HIGH  = 300     -- above this speed, boost chance = 0%
96  WALL_BOOST_VALUE_LOW   = 100     -- below this speed, max boost
97  WALL_BOOST_VALUE_HIGH  = 200     -- above this speed, no boost
98  WALL_BOOST_MAX         = 1.15    -- max velocity multiplier (EBB uses 1.11)
99  WALL_BOOST_MIN         = 1.0
100 FLOOR_UNSTICK_VY_THRESHOLD = 15  -- |vy| below this counts as "stuck"
101 FLOOR_UNSTICK_KICK_X       = 12  -- horizontal nudge magnitude (sign-of-vx · random(0..N))
102 FLOOR_UNSTICK_KICK_Y_MIN   = 60  -- upward impulse min (Box2D impulse units)
103 FLOOR_UNSTICK_KICK_Y_MAX   = 100
104 
105 -- Projectile (EBB Gun/Revolver bullet — capsule, gravity-affected, bounces)
106 PROJECTILE_W                = 15
107 PROJECTILE_H                = 8
108 PROJECTILE_VELOCITY_IMPULSE = 6       -- impulse magnitude applied at spawn (EBB uses 15; tuned down for our smaller play area)
109 PROJECTILE_RESTITUTION      = 0.75
110 PROJECTILE_DENSITY          = 0.4
111 PROJECTILE_GRAVITY_SCALE    = 0.5
112 PROJECTILE_BOUNCES          = 2       -- bounces before death (EBB default)
113 PROJECTILE_FLASH_DURATION   = 0.1

114  PROJECTILE_SPAWN_GAP        = 8       -- px past the outer wall edge so spawn doesn't clip the chamber
115 
116 -- Firing VFX parameters (the muzzle flash — replaces EBB's boom_particle).
117 -- Mirrors EBB's projectile-wall hit visual: a yellow hit_circle plus 1-3
118 -- yellow hit_particles flying outward.
119 FIRING_HIT_CIRCLE_RADIUS = 8
120 FIRING_PARTICLE_GRAVITY  = 256
121 
122 WORLD_GRAVITY_Y = 384                  -- matches EBB; ball has gravity_scale=0 so it's unaffected
123 
124 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
125 -- physics
126 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
127 physics_init()
128 physics_set_gravity(0, WORLD_GRAVITY_Y)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

117:PROJECTILE_HIT_PARTICLE_GRAVITY = 256
776:      gravity        = FIRING_PARTICLE_GRAVITY,

760  -- Wall-impact effect. Same VFX recipe as the muzzle flash, just with the
761 -- impact point + the wall's outward direction. Used for both projectile-vs-
762 -- chamber and projectile-vs-wall bounces.
763 function projectile_wall_hit_fx(x, y, normal_angle, intensity)
764   spawn_hit_circle(x, y, {
765     radius         = 6 + 4 * intensity,
766     duration       = random_float(0.15, 0.3),
767     color          = yellow,
768     flash_on_spawn = true,
769   })
770   for i = 1, random_int(1, 3) do
771     spawn_hit_particle(x, y, {
772       velocity       = intensity * random_float(100, 200),
773       direction      = normal_angle + random_float(-math.pi/3, math.pi/3),
774       duration       = random_float(0.3, 0.5),
775       color          = yellow,
776       gravity        = FIRING_PARTICLE_GRAVITY,
777       flash_on_spawn = true,
778     })
779   end
780 end
781 
782 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
783 -- init
784 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

OK

Summary:

1. Stars only on shoot: removed the spawn_hit_circle call from fire_muzzle_flash. Just 2-3 spinning star emoji particles now.

2. Projectile angle (Ricochet's mix): replaced "fire straight along wall normal" with the Ricochet recipe — read the post-bounce velocity, reflect it across the wall normal to recover the pre-bounce outward direction, then take the angular midpoint of the wall normal and that ball-outward angle via atan2(sin(a)+sin(b), cos(a)+cos(b)) (wrap-safe). Effect: glancing wall hits fire the projectile angled toward the ball's approach, perpendicular hits fire straight out. The spawn position still uses the wall normal (constant offset distance regardless of impact angle).

3. EBB energy systems explained — see the breakdown above the code edits. Six systems total in EBB (lines 540-608), only #2 and #5 apply to single-ball.

4. Energy management implemented — both ported with thresholds calibrated for single ball:

• Wall energy boost in ball:on_wall_hit (runs first, before projectile spawn). At low speeds (<300 px/s), there's a probabilistic chance — (1 - quad_out(remap(speed, 50, 300, 0, 1))) — of multiplying velocity by a factor between 1.0 (at speed ≥200) and 1.15 (at speed ≤100), with sine_out lerp between. Net: when ball is slow, ~100% chance of a 15% boost; when fast, the boost fades out and stops triggering. EBB uses 1.11; we use 1.15 because we have one ball instead of two contributing to system energy.
• Floor unstick in new ball:floor_unstick(dt) method, called from ball:update after contain_in_chamber. Tracks low_vy_time while ball is near the chamber floor (y > chamber.y + half - radius - 5); when |vy| < 15 for longer than low_vy_threshold (random 0.5-1.5s, re-rolled each kick), applies an upward impulse random(60..100) plus a horizontal nudge sign(vx) * random(0..12) in the current direction. Pulses the 'hit' spring for visual feedback.

The two together: wall boost stops the gradual energy bleed so accumulated bounces stay lively, and floor unstick periodically slingshots the ball up with a slight horizontal change — that's where most of the directional variety should come from. The threshold randomization (per-cycle) means consecutive unsticks won't pulse at the same cadence, so the path doesn't become regular even with frequent unsticks.

Cleanup: removed dead FIRING_HIT_CIRCLE_RADIUS. Renamed FIRING_PARTICLE_GRAVITY → PROJECTILE_HIT_PARTICLE_GRAVITY (the old name was misleading — it was used for projectile-wall hits, not muzzle flash).

The kick magnitudes (60..100 upward, 0..12 horizontal) and the boost ranges are best-guess values for our 100×100 chamber. If the ball still doesn't reach the top, increase FLOOR_UNSTICK_KICK_Y_MAX. If unsticks happen too often, increase the time threshold lower bound or FLOOR_UNSTICK_VY_THRESHOLD. If bounces feel too predictable still, we can also add a small post-bounce angle jitter — easiest single knob for "more chaos."

You can remove both the wall energy boost system and floor unstick one. This game doesn't need those specific ones. Let's just add a much simpler one where every nth wall hit it adds a random additional force to the bounce. Sometimes this is more angled, sometimes it's just higher intensity. You can also remove particles when the ball hits a wall, that's what I was confusing with particles for when the projectile is spawned.

A few thoughts on the particle question first, since I want to flag potential confusion before changing things:

Currently on ball-wall hit: ball:on_wall_hit does (1) spring pulse, (2) fire_muzzle_flash which spawns 2-3 stars, (3) spawn_projectile. There are no hit_particle (small capsules) being spawned on ball-wall events — those only appear in projectile_wall_hit_fx, which fires when a projectile hits a wall.

So "particles when ball hits a wall" maps to either:

• The muzzle-flash stars (technically emoji_particle instances triggered by the ball-wall hit). Removing these contradicts your earlier "stars are fine."
• Nothing — current state already has no capsule particles on ball-wall hit, just stars.
• The projectile-wall capsule particles (the ones you originally complained were "too many / too long / too fast"). These fire on projectile-wall hits, not ball-wall hits, but easy to conflate.

I'll go with the most conservative read: leave the muzzle flash alone (you said stars are fine), and verify there are no other particles on ball-wall hits (there aren't). If you actually meant the projectile-wall particles, say the word and I'll strip them.

Now the rest of the changes — drop both energy systems, add the Nth-bounce random force.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now strip the energy-boost code from ball:on_wall_hit, drop the floor_unstick state from ball:new, remove the method + its caller, and insert the special-bounce logic.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now strip floor_unstick — remove the call from update and the method itself.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

OK

Summary:

Removed: WALL_BOOST_* and FLOOR_UNSTICK_* constant blocks; the boost code in ball:on_wall_hit; the ball:floor_unstick method; the unstick state (low_vy_time, low_vy_threshold) from ball:new; and the floor_unstick call in ball:update. Both EBB energy systems are gone.

Added: Three constants — SPECIAL_BOUNCE_INTERVAL = 5, SPECIAL_BOUNCE_IMPULSE_MIN = 30, SPECIAL_BOUNCE_IMPULSE_MAX = 70 — plus a wall_hit_count field on the ball. In ball:on_wall_hit, before the projectile-fire logic:

• increment counter
• when counter ≥ INTERVAL, reset and roll: 50/50 between angled (atan(vy, vx) + π/2 · random_sign() — perpendicular to current velocity) and intensity (atan(vy, vx) — along current velocity), magnitude random(30..70). Apply as apply_impulse.

The post-impulse velocity is what feeds the projectile-angle calculation immediately below, so the projectile direction reflects the kick correctly.

Particles on ball-wall hit: double-checked, none currently. Only the muzzle-flash stars are spawned, and you said those are fine. If you actually meant the projectile-wall capsule particles in projectile_wall_hit_fx (the ones I noted before were calibrated for EBB's faster bullets and so render mostly-stationary in our game), say so and I'll strip them.

Run and see how the variety feels. The SPECIAL_BOUNCE_INTERVAL and IMPULSE_MIN/MAX are the obvious knobs — interval down for more frequent kicks, impulse up for stronger redirects.

The impulse is too much.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Halved both bounds — 30→15, 70→35. If still too strong, lower further (or drop the interval to 7-10 so the kick is rarer).

Hmm, yes, it's possible projetile_wall_hit_fx is being called when projectiles are just created, which shouldn't be the case?

Good catch — that's a real possibility. Let me trace the geometry.

Spawn distance: d = BALL_RADIUS + WALL_T + PROJECTILE_SPAWN_GAP = 10 + 4 + 8 = 22 from the ball center along the outward wall normal. Ball is at chamber_half - radius = 40 from chamber center when contacting the inner wall, so spawn is at chamber_center + 62 along the outward axis.

But the projectile collider is created at angle 0 — long axis (15 px) along world X regardless of firing direction. So:

• Left/right wall hits (firing along world X): projectile half-extent in the spawn-normal direction is PROJECTILE_W/2 = 7.5. Spawn at +62, projectile back end at +54.5, wall outer edge at +54 → only 0.5 px of clearance. Box2D contact tolerance plus float drift can absolutely register that as a contact on the very next physics step, which would fire projectile_wall_hit_fx immediately and burn a bounce before the projectile has visibly moved.
• Top/bottom wall hits (firing along world Y): projectile half-extent in Y is PROJECTILE_H/2 = 4. Spawn at -62, projectile bottom at -58, wall top at -54 → 4 px of clearance. Better, but not generous.

Fix: account for the projectile's actual half-extent along the spawn direction instead of treating the whole box as a point. The collider doesn't rotate (we only update the visual self.angle in draw), so the OBB-vs-axis formula |W/2·cos(θ)| + |H/2·sin(θ)| gives the correct half-extent along any wall normal direction.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

OK

Net effect — at axis-aligned chamber walls:

• Horizontal firing (left/right walls): old gap 0.5 px → new gap 8 px. Was almost certainly the cause of the spurious-immediate-bounce you spotted.
• Vertical firing (top/bottom walls): old gap 4 px → new gap 8 px. Was probably fine but is now uniform.

PROJECTILE_SPAWN_GAP now means "clearance past the projectile's outer edge along the wall normal" rather than "clearance past the wall edge with the projectile centered" — the projectile's own size is properly accounted for. Should kill the immediate projectile_wall_hit_fx calls on spawn. If you still see particles spawning at the muzzle, the issue is something else and I'll keep digging.

The ball should have a maximum velocity, once it reaches that maximum velocity, the probability for the next wall hit decreasing its velocity by 25%, let's say, increases, and then we keep the every Nth interval boost.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now find the special-bounce block in ball:on_wall_hit and add the soft cap immediately after.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

OK

Two new constants — BALL_MAX_SPEED = 480 (2× initial) and BALL_DECAY_RATE = 0.75 — and a do-scoped block right after the special-bounce code in ball:on_wall_hit. Reads post-bounce-post-special-bounce velocity, computes speed/max clamped to [0, 1], and uses math.quad_in(ratio) as the decay probability:

When it triggers, velocity is multiplied by 0.75 (uniform — direction unchanged, just slower). The pairing with the special-bounce impulse is the intended dynamic: special bounce can launch the ball over BALL_MAX_SPEED, the next wall hit very likely bleeds 25% off, ball settles back below max until the next special bounce.

Note your SPECIAL_BOUNCE_IMPULSE_MIN/MAX = 0 means the boost is currently inert (zero magnitude) — the count-and-fire structure still runs every 5th hit, just applies a no-op impulse. The cap is fully active independently. Set the impulse range to non-zero to reactivate the boost loop and see how the two systems play together.

It seems hard to make sure that the ball doesn't get unnaturally fast... Do you have any ideas on how to variate its velocity for variation's sake without making it eventually get super fast?

Honest take: the cap-by-probability approach is fundamentally fragile because it's reactive. By the time the ball is at max speed, the system is already reacting; if the rate at which energy is being added (special-bounce, plus subtle Box2D position-correction quirks at restitution=1) outpaces the decay rate at any point, speed creeps up monotonically. You can patch by tuning thresholds, but it's a moving target.

A few different ideas, ranked by how cleanly they solve the underlying problem:

1. Lower the chamber restitution (1.0 → 0.92 or so). This is the structural fix. Every bounce naturally bleeds ~8% of velocity — self-regulating, no discontinuous decay events, no probability tuning. Special-bounce boost adds energy; bounce loss removes it; equilibrium emerges automatically. Whatever boost magnitude you pick, the ball settles into a speed band where bleed-per-second equals boost-per-second. To go faster average → bigger boost. To go slower → smaller boost. No cap code needed.

2. Variate by rotating velocity instead of adding impulse. Replace the every-Nth-hit boost: instead of apply_impulse(magnitude · cos/sin), do set_velocity(|v| · cos(θ + δ), |v| · sin(θ + δ)) where δ is a random rotation (say ±π/6). Direction changes, magnitude is preserved exactly. This gives you all the path variety with zero energy injection. The ball can never get faster than physics + restitution=1 allow, which is bounded already.

3. Hard cap as a final safety net. In ball:update, after :sync(): if length(vx, vy) > BALL_MAX_SPEED, scale to max. Crude but absolute — guarantees the ceiling no matter what other systems do. Often used as a backstop alongside a softer system. Cheap to add, hard to argue with.

4. Continuous velocity damping above target. Use set_linear_damping dynamically — set damping > 0 only when speed > target_speed. Smooth, no discrete events, but Box2D damping is exponential and can feel mushy.

My recommendation: #1 + #2 together. Drop chamber restitution to 0.92 (in chamber:_build_collider, the set_restitution(1, shape) becomes set_restitution(0.92, shape)), and replace the special-bounce impulse with a special-bounce rotation — same every-Nth-interval cadence, but it kicks the velocity sideways instead of speeding it up. Removes both axes of "energy growth" while keeping (and improving) the variety axis. The soft-cap and hard-cap code becomes unnecessary.

If you want to be fully belt-and-suspenders, layer #3 on top — a 3-line clamp in ball:update that does nothing 99% of the time but guarantees the absolute ceiling.

Want me to code #1 + #2? It's a small diff: change one number in the chamber, swap the special-bounce body to compute rotation instead of impulse, optionally delete the soft-cap block. The current BALL_MAX_SPEED and BALL_DECAY_RATE constants would become unused — happy to delete or leave as dead config knobs.

Let's do 1, 2 and 3 together, changing 2 to also add a slight multiplier on the velocity. It's important to have variance on the intensity too, but I think with the max speed constraint and the constant drain from the 0.92 restitution it might work.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now apply restitution to the chamber walls + border walls.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now replace the special-bounce body in ball:on_wall_hit with rotation + multiplier, and remove the soft-cap block.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now add the hard cap to ball:update.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

OK

Three layers in place:

Layer 1 — natural energy bleed. WALL_RESTITUTION = 0.92 on every chamber stick and border solid (in chamber:_build_collider and wall:new). Each bounce loses ~8% of the velocity component along the contact normal, which gives a self-regulating equilibrium without any probability code. Note: Box2D combines restitution with max(a, b), so the projectile (own restitution 0.75) bouncing off a 0.92 wall ends up at 0.92 — slightly less bouncy than before, which is fine.

Layer 2 — variety on the special bounce. Every SPECIAL_BOUNCE_INTERVAL = 10 hits, instead of the impulse boost: read current speed, rotate velocity direction by random(-π/4, π/4), multiply magnitude by random(0.9, 1.15). Both axes vary independently. The multiplier range is mildly biased upward (mean 1.025) so the special bounce isn't perfectly energy-neutral — it nudges energy in slightly to counterbalance the 0.92 bleed, giving a mid-equilibrium speed rather than a slow death.

Layer 3 — hard cap. New ball:enforce_max_speed method called from ball:update after :sync(). If |v| > BALL_MAX_SPEED, scale to max preserving direction. Cheap (one math.length, one branch) and absolute — no matter what physics quirks or unlucky-streak multipliers do, the ball cannot exceed 400 px/s.

Cleanup: removed BALL_DECAY_RATE and SPECIAL_BOUNCE_IMPULSE_MIN/MAX; deleted the soft-cap probability block from ball:on_wall_hit. The doc comment on the ball class still describes the high-level behavior accurately.

Tuning levers if it doesn't feel right:

• Want the ball faster on average → bump WALL_RESTITUTION toward 1 (less bleed) or push the multiplier range further up.
• Want the ball slower → drop restitution to 0.88 or pull the multiplier down.
• Variety feels too tame → widen SPECIAL_BOUNCE_ROTATION_RANGE (try math.pi/3) or drop interval to 7.
• Variety feels too chaotic → narrow rotation to math.pi/6, or raise interval to 15.

Let's make the angle change slightly less abrupt, and let's make the Nth hit a random range too instead of every Nth with certainty.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now the ball needs to roll its first interval at construction, and reroll on each trigger. Find the relevant spots.

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

OK

Two changes:

Rotation range: math.pi/4 → math.pi/6 (±45° → ±30°). Less abrupt redirect when the special bounce fires.

Interval is now a range: dropped SPECIAL_BOUNCE_INTERVAL = 10, added SPECIAL_BOUNCE_INTERVAL_MIN = 7 and SPECIAL_BOUNCE_INTERVAL_MAX = 13. New ball state field next_special_bounce_at rolled from this range at ball construction and re-rolled every time the special bounce fires. So the cadence averages around 10 wall hits but jitters between 7 and 13 — no audible/visual rhythm to learn.

Tuning notes: the rotation range and the interval range are independent knobs. If 30° still feels too sharp, drop to π/8 (22.5°). If you want the special bounce to feel more "rare event" than "regular feature", widen the interval range upward (e.g. 12-20 — averages 16 with more variance).

All effects should be in their own layer on top of most everything else, something like an effects layer, if it doesn't exist already.

I'll add the dedicated effects_layer (with its own derived outline) and route all three effect classes to it.

130  -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
131 -- layers (minimal pipeline: bg + game + derived shadow/outline + ui)
132 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
133 bg_layer     = layer_new('bg')
134 game_layer   = layer_new('game')
135 shadow_layer = layer_new('shadow')        -- derived from game via shadow shader
136 game_outline = layer_new('game_outline')  -- derived from game via outline shader
137 ui_layer     = layer_new('ui')
138 
139 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
140 -- shaders
141 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
142 shadow_shader  = shader_load_file('assets/shadow.frag')
143 outline_shader = shader_load_file('assets/outline.frag')
144 
145 -- outline shader needs pixel size to sample neighbors. gw/gh are static so
146 -- set the uniform once at load time.
147 shader_set_vec2_immediate(outline_shader, 'u_pixel_size', 1/gw, 1/gh)
148 
149 -- -----------------------------------------------------------------------------

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Now redirect the three effect classes' draws from game_layer to effects_layer.

496:function hit_circle:draw()
544:function hit_particle:draw()
620:function emoji_particle:draw()

494  function hit_circle:update(dt) timer_update(self.timer, dt) end
495 
496 function hit_circle:draw()
497   local col = self.flashing and white() or self.color()
498   layer_circle(game_layer, self.x, self.y, self.radius, col)
499 end
500 
501 function hit_circle:destroy() end
502 
503 -- =============================================================================

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543  
544 function hit_particle:draw()
545   local col = self.flashing and white() or self.color()
546   local r   = math.min(self.w, self.h) / 2
547   layer_push(game_layer, self.x, self.y, self._draw_angle or 0, self.sx, self.sy)
548   layer_rounded_rectangle(game_layer, -self.w/2, -self.h/2, self.w, self.h, r, col)
549   layer_pop(game_layer)
550 end
551 
552 function hit_particle:destroy() end

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619  
620 function emoji_particle:draw()
621   local s = self.scale * self.spring.main.x
622   layer_push(game_layer, self.x, self.y, self.rotation, s, s)
623   layer_image(game_layer, self.image, 0, 0, nil, self.flashing and white())
624   layer_pop(game_layer)
625 end
626 
627 function emoji_particle:destroy() end
628 

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

Now update the draw() pipeline — attach camera to effects_layer, render it, derive its outline, include it in the shadow build, and composite in the right z-order.

810        local vx, vy   = p.collider:get_velocity()
811       local intensity = math.clamp(math.remap(math.length(vx, vy), 300, 600, 0, 1), 0, 1)
812       local normal_angle = math.atan(ev.ny or 0, ev.nx or 0) + math.pi
813       projectile_wall_hit_fx(ev.x or p.x, ev.y or p.y, normal_angle, intensity)
814       p:on_wall_hit(intensity)
815     end
816   end
817 
818   camera_update(main_camera, dt)
819   process_destroy_queue()
820 
821   -- Resize input goes AFTER event drains + destroy queue so we don't
822   -- invalidate any in-flight Box2D body handles.
823   if input_pressed('chamber_smaller') then
824     the_chamber:resize(math.max(CHAMBER_HALF_MIN, the_chamber.half - CHAMBER_RESIZE_STEP))
825   end
826   if input_pressed('chamber_bigger') then
827     the_chamber:resize(math.min(CHAMBER_HALF_MAX, the_chamber.half + CHAMBER_RESIZE_STEP))
828   end
829 end
830 
831 -- Top + bottom border zones drawn as green rounded rectangles. Each rect
832 -- extends past the screen on its three OUTER sides (top/left/right for
833 -- the top border, bottom/left/right for the bottom border) so only the
834 -- inner edge's rounded corners are visible — the same off-screen-extension
835 -- trick emoji-merge uses for its solid_top.
836 function draw_borders()
837   local off = BORDER_OFFSCREEN
838   local r   = BORDER_RADIUS
839 
... [20 more lines]

855    layer_rectangle_gradient_v(bg_layer, 0, 0, gw, gh, sky_top(), sky_bottom())
856 
857   -- camera attaches to game_layer only (the sky bg should not jitter, and the
858   -- shadow / outline layers inherit the jitter automatically because they
859   -- derive from game_layer's texture)
860   camera_attach(main_camera, game_layer)
861   draw_borders()
862   the_chamber:draw()
863   for _, b  in ipairs(balls)       do b:draw()  end
864   for _, p  in ipairs(projectiles) do p:draw()  end
865   for _, fx in ipairs(effects)     do fx:draw() end
866   camera_detach(main_camera, game_layer)
867 
868   -- flush queued commands to FBOs ---------------------------------------------
869   layer_render(bg_layer)
870   layer_render(game_layer)
871   layer_render(ui_layer)
872 
873   -- derive shadow + outline from game_layer -----------------------------------
874   layer_clear(shadow_layer)
875   layer_draw_from(shadow_layer, game_layer, shadow_shader)
876 
877   layer_clear(game_outline)
878   layer_draw_from(game_outline, game_layer, outline_shader)
879 
880   -- composite to screen --------------------------------------------------------
881   layer_draw(bg_layer)
882   layer_draw(shadow_layer, 4, 4)
883   layer_draw(game_outline)
884   layer_draw(game_layer)
... [3 more lines]

The file E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua has been updated successfully. (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

OK

Effects now have their own layer + outline:

Layers added: effects_layer (the new home for hit_circle, hit_particle, emoji_particle) and effects_outline (its derived black-outline buddy). Layer creation block reordered for clarity, with a comment listing the final composite order.

Effect classes redirected: hit_circle:draw, hit_particle:draw, and emoji_particle:draw now write to effects_layer instead of game_layer. Three small replace edits, no behavior change beyond which FBO they land in.

Pipeline updated in draw():

• Camera attaches to both game_layer and effects_layer so the handcam jitter applies uniformly. Detached in reverse order.
• layer_render(effects_layer) added to flush the queued commands.
• shadow_layer is now built from both game_layer and effects_layer via two sequential layer_draw_from calls (matches EBB's pattern — clear once, draw_from each source through the shadow shader). Bursts/particles get drop shadows too.
• effects_outline is built fresh each frame from effects_layer via the outline shader (mirrors game_outline's build).
• Composite order: bg → shadow(+4,+4) → game_outline → game_layer → effects_outline → effects_layer → ui. Effects (and their outline) sit on top of the gameplay layer, below UI. Same z-order EBB uses.

Result: stars, hit circles, hit particles always render on top of the chamber/ball/projectiles, with their own black outline and combined drop shadow. UI stays on top of everything.

Great. Now that I can see it in action and that you mentioned how rich this game can be in terms of variables it has... Why don't we just make it an enemyless game and make it more like a score game like Balatro? Wouldn't that add a much richer avenue for build exploration? Can you imagine what it could be like?

Yes, this is a stronger direction. I'd been thinking the same thing while we were working on the energy systems — the chamber is already a beautiful little autopilot, but as a combat system it has to fight against itself: every mod has to clear the bar of "useful for killing things in time," which filters out a lot of interesting-but-weak interactions. As a scoring system, every mod is evaluated purely against other mods. That's exactly the regime where build games get rich.

Why scoring works structurally

The Balatro insight isn't really about poker — it's that chips × mult is a multiplicative combination, and multiplicative systems explode combinatorially. Every joker becomes interesting because adding +5 chips is good in a low-chip build, mediocre in a high-mult build, but devastating when stacked with a ×1.5-mult-per-X joker that triggers on the same condition. The depth doesn't come from the cards; it comes from interactions between cards being non-linear.

The chamber engine is already shaped for this. It generates a stream of events — wall hits, projectile spawns, projectile-wall bounces, projectile deaths — and each event is a hook for a card to fire on. Once you assign chips/mult to those events, every parameter we already have (special-bounce cadence, ricochet count, restitution, projectile count, ball speed, chamber size, gravity, etc.) becomes a knob that affects scoring rate, and every card that mods those knobs becomes a real decision.

Round structure

Three options I'd consider:

1. Hit-count rounds. Each round is 30 wall hits. You score those hits. Round ends when count is reached. Pros: clean, discrete, matches Balatro's "you have N hands". Cons: fast wall-hits-per-second from speed mods feels less rewarding (round just ends faster).
2. Time rounds. Each round is 20 seconds of chamber-time. Pros: speed mods directly increase score throughput, which is intuitive. Cons: can devolve into passive watching if there's nothing for the player to do during the 20s.
3. Energy rounds. The ball loses energy slowly; round ends when it stops moving. Pros: most thematic — encourages energy mods, ties straight into the bouncing physics. Cons: round length is unpredictable, harder to balance score thresholds.

My pick: time rounds, with the player able to spend "mana"-equivalent during the round to trigger one-shot effects (more on that below). That solves the watch-don't-play problem.

What scoring looks like

Every chamber event has a base value and is multiplied by current mult. Some events are common-and-cheap, others are rare-and-juicy:

• Wall hit: +5 chips, base.
• Special bounce: +20 chips, ×1.1 mult for the rest of the round.
• Projectile-wall bounce: +10 chips per bounce.
• Projectile death: +50 chips bonus if it died from ricochet exhaustion (rewards investment).
• Speed milestones: ball reaches max speed → ×1.5 mult for 2 seconds.
• Geometric: ball passes through chamber center while a projectile is mid-flight → ×2 mult on next event.

Cards then attach to these. "Every 5th wall hit: ×2 mult for the next bounce." "Projectile that bounces 3+ times: +100 chips on death." "While ball speed > 350: all chip values doubled." Etc.

Build archetypes I can see emerging

These are sketches — the actual archetypes will emerge from the cards you put in the pool, but the chamber's parameter space already implies several attractors:

• Speed/frequency build. Push restitution toward 1, push special-bounce magnitude up, shrink chamber. Many fast wall hits per second. Low per-event value, high event count. Synergizes with "+chips per wall hit" cards and "×mult while ball is fast" cards.
• Ricochet build. High projectile bounces (PROJECTILE_BOUNCES = 6+), low projectile count. Each projectile is a long story. Synergizes with "every Nth bounce: extra chips" and "projectile that bounces > X: huge bonus."
• Multi-spawn build. Every wall hit spawns 3-5 projectiles. Pure brute force throughput. Wants chamber bigger (more space for projectiles to do their thing) and gravity lower (longer flight times).
• Geometry build. Cards that care about chamber shape (square / triangle / hexagon). Chamber rotation re-enabled. Wall colors/properties (gold wall = chip multiplier, red wall = mult multiplier, etc.).
• Combo build. Chains of conditions that each ×1.x mult. Single round can spike to absurd scores when the chain holds, fizzles otherwise. High-variance, high-skill build to play.

The interesting thing is that several of these are mutually incompatible — speed builds want small chambers, multi-spawn builds want big ones — which is the Balatro property where your shop choices commit you to a build identity.

What the player actually does

This is the part where I'd push back on pure-passive. Balatro's not passive — you're choosing which cards to play, when to discard, what order. For us, the chamber autopilots, but the player should have some per-round agency. Options:

• Hand of "trigger cards". You draw 3-5 cards per round, hold them during chamber-run, click to fire one when conditions look right. Card costs mana that regenerates over the round.
• Wall painting. Pre-round, you assign N modifiers to specific chamber walls. "Top wall: +5 chips. Right wall: ×1.2 mult." The ball's trajectory determines which paints fire most. You're betting on physics.
• Ball spawning. You have a reserve of balls. Throw them into the chamber at chosen times. Each spawned ball costs mana and adds to the score-generating pile.

I'd start with #2 (wall painting) as the simplest. It's pre-round so it doesn't fight the autopilot, but it gives the player meaningful spatial decisions tied directly to where the chamber happens to bounce.

Concerns / open questions

• Visual richness. Without enemies, the screen has fewer moving things. Score popups (+5, +20 ×1.5, "COMBO!") will need to do real visual work. The good news: emoji + outline + shadow style is already extremely score-game-y. Numbers floating up from impact points, big "ROUND CLEAR" stingers, juicy round-end summaries. Balatro proves this aesthetic carries.
• The "I'm watching, not playing" risk. Real, but mitigatable. Every round needs at least one decision moment. The shop in between is the main one; the per-round trigger card / wall painting / ball-throw is the in-round one.
• Difficulty scaling. Balatro scales score thresholds geometrically. Need to figure out our progression curve early — with one ball at 240 px/s we're scoring at, say, 50 chips per second baseline. By ante 5 we need to be scoring 100k+. The mods need to support that scale. Not insurmountable, but worth designing the curve before stuffing the card pool.
• Roguelite vs. roguelike. Balatro is single-run. A score game without enemies is naturally close to that — but if you're thinking longer arcs (persistent unlocks, decks, stake levels), now's the time to bake in.

My read

This is a clearer game than the chamber-and-enemies version. The combat layer was always going to be the part where the design got messy — balancing enemy spawns, deciding what "winning" means, figuring out fail states. Removing it lets the chamber engine be what it actually wants to be: a beautiful score-generating machine that you optimize.

It also matches your tooling: you've already got every parameter clearly named, every event already firing through clean handlers, an effects/particle system primed for popups. Adding a scoring layer is a couple-hundred lines of code; replacing the energy work we just did with score-event hooks is closer to a refactor than a rewrite.

Want me to sketch a concrete scoring schema (event → base value table) and a starter set of 10-15 cards to give the design something tangible to react to? That's usually where these design conversations turn productive — the abstract feels good, the concrete reveals what's actually fun.

The only thing I'd push back on is your default events for chips. I actually think there should be no default events and everything should be card driven. So the card loop from the original game (Ricochet) remains, but some cards have fundamental modifications tied to events that give the player chips or mults. By default, nothing does. The player just has to draft a deck that allows him to score from the initial cards he plays. There's the chance of the player getting softlocked if he doesn't draw or play good cards on game start, but we can fix that in multiple ways later. Assuming this is the case, can you try to imagine possible builds? Here are some events I think are interesting: ball wall hit, projectile spawn, projectile wall hit, projectile die, projectile phase through side walls, banner/region (banners/region spawn in some location in the map and when a projectile hits it it grants something), chamber size, ball amount, wall special (side of chamber has special effects), enemies that spawn but serve as nothing but extra chips/mults or with different effects, ... what else?

Pure card-driven scoring is the right call, and here's why the "no defaults" version is actually more interesting than my original suggestion:

When the engine has default scoring, every card has to be evaluated against a baseline ("is this card better than just bouncing more?"). That baseline implicitly punishes weird cards — the "+0.1 mult on banner-color match while ball is below 100 px/s" card has no chance against a vanilla "+5 chips per wall hit." With no defaults, exotic cards live or die against each other, which is where flavor lives. Soft-lock risk is real but Balatro-solvable — guaranteed-good starter pack, weighted shop pool early, mulligan, etc.

Events I'd add to your list

Your list is already strong. Some I'd tack on, sorted from "obviously useful" to "interesting but speculative":

• Ball-ball collision (relevant once ball amount is in play). Lets you build around multi-ball geometry — collisions become discrete events distinct from wall hits.
• Time-based ticks. "Every 0.5s: trigger." Doesn't need any chamber event to fire, which means you can build score engines that don't depend on a working chamber. Great anti-soft-lock card type.
• Tempo / chain. Two wall hits within X seconds of each other = a "chain" event. Three in a row = a longer chain. Enables rhythm-feel builds.
• Dwell. "Projectile that has existed for >2s" or "ball that hasn't bounced in 1.5s." Rewards long arcs / multi-bounce ricochet patterns.
• Proximity / passing. "Two projectiles within 30px of each other." "Projectile crosses chamber center." Spatial-coincidence triggers, where the chamber's geometry becomes the puzzle.
• Tripwires. Player-placed invisible lines; projectile crossing fires the event. Like banners, but lines instead of points — scores trajectories rather than impact locations.
• First/last/Nth-of-round. "First wall hit: ×100 chips." "Final projectile death: +500 chips." Lets cards tie value to round-shape rather than per-event.
• Silence. "No events for 1 second." Sounds weird but enables ambient/contemplative builds — and forces card designs that fight against the engine's normal busyness.
• State conditionals. Not events themselves, but modifiers on events: "while ball is above 300 px/s," "while there are 2+ projectiles in air," "while no balls are above the chamber midline." These are how cards interact non-linearly.
• Cross-event combos. "Ball wall-hit AT THE SAME TIME as banner activation" — explicit "this rare coincidence" hooks. High variance, high payoff.
• End-of-round summary events. "On round end: +chips equal to total wall hits this round." Lets cards score retroactively based on accumulated state.

Build archetypes I can already see

Sketching what you could play given your event list + the ones above. I'm trying to make these feel distinct — different card pools, different chamber configs, different optimal play.

1. Tempo machine. Core: small chamber, fast ball, every wall-hit-triggered card stacking +chips and "every Nth +mult" cards. Card example: "Each wall hit: +3 chips. Every 5th: +0.5 mult for the rest of the round." Wants: CHAMBER_HALF=25, high WALL_RESTITUTION, multi-ball. Strength: high event count → linear cards scale spectacularly. Low ceiling per-event but huge volume. Risk: cards that score on rare events are dead in this build.

2. Projectile factory. Core: each wall hit spawns 3-5 projectiles; high PROJECTILE_BOUNCES. Cards score on "projectile spawn" and "projectile wall hit" rather than ball wall hit. Card example: "Each projectile spawned: +8 chips. Each projectile that bounces 3+ times: ×1.1 mult." Wants: big chamber, slow ball, low gravity (longer flight times). Strength: one ball wall hit produces ~10 projectile-events. Multiplies via the spawn rule. Tension: high projectile count = visual/physics chaos, harder to also do banner/spatial builds.

3. Banner hunter. Core: place 5-10 banners with different effects. Build optimizes projectile count, bounces, and trajectory variety so projectiles hit lots of banners. Card example: "Place +20-chip banner. Each banner hit: ×1.05 mult permanently this round." Wants: the chamber to send projectiles in lots of different directions — encourages high SPECIAL_BOUNCE_INTERVAL, mid-density walls. Strength: spatial decisions become a puzzle between rounds, not just card-buying. Card-design opportunity: banners with conditions ("only fires for projectiles that already bounced once") dramatically increase the puzzle space.

4. Phase master. Core: side walls phase-through, projectiles exit and re-enter from the other side (or score on phase). Card example: "Projectile that phases through a side wall: +30 chips. Each phase: ×1.2 mult, stacks 5×." Wants: horizontal projectile flight (firing direction along x), so chamber stick walls oriented to point side-to-side, low gravity. Strength: opens up off-chamber/off-screen projectile lifecycle as a scoring axis. Visually distinctive. Risk: requires a phase-through mechanic to exist; very specific.

5. Enemy garden. Core: enemies spawn and exist purely as moving chip/mult containers. Different enemy types = different rewards (gold = chips, red = mult, blue = card draw, etc.). Card example: "Each red enemy hit: +0.1 mult, max 3. Each gold enemy hit: +25 chips." Wants: projectile coverage of moving targets — multi-projectile spawn, homing, ricochet. Strength: introduces visual richness back into a no-combat game. Movement makes the screen feel alive even without threat. Versus banners: banners are fixed (placement decision), enemies move (timing decision). They're complementary, not redundant.

6. Chamber sculptor. Core: cards modify chamber dimensions, shape, rotation, and per-wall properties. Card example: "While chamber half < 35: ×1.5 mult on all events." "Top wall is gold: +10 chips per top-wall hit." "Chamber rotates 0.5 rad/s: +0.05 mult per rotation." Wants: the chamber itself to be the build identity — small/fast, large/slow, rotating, asymmetric, etc. Strength: the chamber's configurability is already real (we have CHAMBER_HALF, CHAMBER_ROTATION_RATE, per-wall shapes). Cards that read these values get a free physics-engine of variability. Card design insight: "while X" conditional cards are worth a lot here — they're synergy magnets.

7. Ball multiplier. Core: multi-ball builds. 3-5 balls in the chamber, each generating events independently. Card example: "Add a ball at start of round." "Each ball-ball collision: +50 chips, ×1.1 mult." Wants: big chamber, low gravity, balls don't merge or die. Strength: superlinear event count (each ball generates events, plus they collide with each other). Risk: hardest to keep visually clean — N balls + projectiles + banners = busy. Probably caps at 3-5 balls in practice.

8. Combo / streak. Core: cards that care about consecutive events without breaks. "Three wall hits within 0.5s = +500 chips." "Five projectile bounces in a row from one projectile: ×3 mult." Wants: high event density and tight tempo. Pairs with tempo build. Strength: feels skill-y even though physics autopilots — when the streak hits, you'll feel it. High variance. Failure mode: miss the streak conditions and the round is ~zero. Players need to know whether they're hitting streaks (visual feedback critical).

9. Slow build / payoff. Core: cards that build mult invisibly during the round, fire at end. "Each wall hit: stack +0.02 mult on a hidden meter. End of round: ×meter chips equal to total events." Round looks boring until the final score reveal explodes. Wants: long rounds, lots of events, no per-event flash. Strength: rewards patience and commits to a build identity. End-of-round juicy moment. Risk: feels passive while playing. Shines in retrospect.

10. Glass cannon. Core: one massive multiplier on a single rare event. Build the whole deck to make that event happen once per round at maximum power. Card example: "First time chamber resizes this round: ×100 chips on next event." "First projectile that completes its full 5-bounce ricochet: +10000 chips." Wants: setup cards that orchestrate the rare event (chamber resizers, ricochet boosters), payoff cards that score it big. Risk: highest variance archetype. One missed setup = round gone.

What this implies for the scoring layer

A few architectural notes if/when we build this:

• Event bus. Every event in your list (and mine) becomes a structured emission: {type, x, y, payload, speed, ...}. Cards subscribe to types and read payloads. This is just a list of listener tables keyed by event-type — not heavy.
• Card state. Each card may carry per-round state (counters, accumulated mult, "fired this round" flags). Need a clear lifecycle: pre-round init → during-round events → end-of-round summary → discard.
• Chip × mult accumulator. Two numbers per round, exposed for end-of-round display. Cards add to chips, add to mult, or multiply mult. Three operations is enough — Balatro's whole depth comes from those three primitives recombining.
• Event-tagging. A wall hit isn't just "wall hit" — it has a source ball, a wall side, a speed, an angle. Cards filter on these attributes. Don't pre-collapse the data; let cards pick what they care about.
• Determinism. With seeded random + event ordering, runs are replayable, which makes balance testing tractable. Worth getting right early.

Honest concerns

• Build legibility. Pure card-driven means the player has to understand what each card does and how it stacks. Balatro's solution: rich tooltips, hover-state visualization, end-of-round score breakdown that shows every multiplier in sequence. We'd need to budget for this UI from day one. The chamber-game part is mostly done; the score-display part is its own project.
• Soft-lock probability. Real but solvable — Balatro deals with it via guaranteed-decent base jokers, weighted shop pools, mulligan. Worth designing with this in mind from card 1.
• The "I'm watching" problem persists. No defaults makes the early game more watch-y, since with bad cards literally nothing happens. Possibly mitigate by having cards that produce scoring spectacle even when they're scoring poorly — flashy chip popups regardless of value. Visual noise compensates for low actual value.
• Card pool size. For Balatro-quality variety you probably need 80-150 unique cards. That's months of design work. Worth scoping a "playable in 20 cards" first version, then expanding.

Where I'd start

If we pivot, the smallest first version that proves the design:

1. Implement the event bus (all your events plus a couple of mine — tempo, time tick, end-of-round).
2. Hardcode chips and mult counters with a debug HUD.
3. Implement 8-12 cards covering 3 archetypes (tempo, banner, multi-projectile).
4. Single-round playtest — does the core loop feel like Balatro's chip-and-mult buildup?
5. Decide: is this fun? If yes, expand card pool. If no, the design has issues regardless of card count.

That'd be 2-3 sessions of work, ends with a playable prototype that tells us whether the bet is right. Want to start there, or keep brainstorming first?

I had some time to rest and my thoughts are now in order. Here's what I believe the game should be like. It should be like Emoji Ball Battles in physical structure. The arena should just like the arena there, there should be no chamber (by default). Balls bounce inside the arena, multiple balls can bounce and touch each other just like they do in that game. We can lift the energy system for the most part, with some caveats that in the original game, balls could have weapons attached to them that would also collide with each other and that factored into how the energy system worked. We will also have this in this game, but we need to make sure that the energy system is stable even when weapons aren't present.

All events that can happen in the game that give points are events that happen through core cards. Core cards are cards like, +x points on wall hit, +x projectile spawn on wall/ball hit, +enemy spawn, +chamber spawn, +region/zone spawn, +points per second without ball hitting a wall, and so on. These are fundamental cards that dictated how you generate points. By default, points aren't generated in any way, you have to play a card that enables it. And then it's just a matter of making cards that explore each type of build and combinations between builds cleverly. The systems/events we'll want for the game initially are the ones I just mentioned: wall hits, projectiles, enemies, chamber/walls inside the arena, region/zones (regions attached to the side walls that give points or have different behaviors when something hits them), floating points... There may be a few more that are simple and that I'm missing. Ah, improvements. These work just like Artifact improvements, where at the start/end of a round, they have some effect. Those will be placed in locations just outside the arena, kind of like improvements are placed at the top/bottom of lanes in Artifact.

On top of core cards, we may have spell cards that do an immediate effect. Then we may have spells that permanently alter something about the player, these are passive cards. Then we may have cards that spawn new objects, like a ball. These ball cards are essentially, each ball will have different stats and innate properties and we can spawn multiple of them into the same arena, changing the feel of each build. Then we may have cards that behave like items in Artifact, which can be attached to units in the game, mostly balls. These may be weapons (and here we can lift a lot of code from Emoji Ball Battles), each weapon having different point generating effects. And I think that covers it... Maybe I'm forgetting some type.

The gameplay loop is draft before run, each round you have to reach a certain amount of points and it's timed. You play the cards you can play with the mana you have, and then you watch your ball generate points until the end of the round. If you made over the necessary amount of points you continue, if not you lose. Next round you draw more cards, repeat. We may add other things in between rounds, but for now let's just keep it simple like this.

Then there's the point generation itself. Points x mult is a clever system, but because our game has no innate notion of events like Balatro does, it gets harder to build around this... I think? Maybe I'm wrong here, here's where you could interject with your own ideas. For now, I'm not entirely sure exactly how I want the point system to work. But I do know the events we have and how they could generate points, we already went over a lot of the possibilities there.

I think this is it. What do you think?

Let's try chip resolution model that's per round. Also, core cards, items, units, improvements, are all permanent per run instead of per round. Some may be per round, but the default is permanent. If you have no further questions, update/change/create the design document with all this in mind, be brief, doesn't need to be super detailed, just something that new instances can read so they can roughly get the idea. Make sure to include card and event type taxonomies.

Let me check if a design doc already exists.

Exit code 2
ls: cannot access 'E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/*.md': No such file or directory

File created successfully at: E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/design.md (file state is current in your context — no need to Read it back)

design.md created. Brief but complete enough that a fresh instance can ramp up — concept, loop, physics origin, scoring model, both taxonomies, the card primitive shape, open questions, and a "what's implemented vs. what's not" line.

Three places I made calls worth flagging:

1. Per-round chips × mult resolution is locked in as the model — chips and mult both accumulate over the whole round, score = chips × mult at round end. Per-event scoring is gone from the design.
2. Permanent per-run is the default for Core / Item / Unit / Improvement / Spell-passive. Spell-instant is the one type whose default is one-shot. Caveat in the table that some specific cards may override.
3. Three card primitives (+chips, +mult, ×mult) carried over from our discussion as the explicit design shape. Listed plainly so card authors don't reinvent.

The card primitive shape is sketched as a Lua table format — not committing the implementation, just giving future-me a starting point that matches how the existing entity classes are structured.

Move the current main.lua to reference/, we'll start coding things anew in a new conversation.

total 28
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121 0 Apr 26 09:45 ./
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121 0 Apr 26 20:14 ../
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121 0 Apr 26 09:45 emoji-merge-main/
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121 0 Apr 26 09:45 emojunky-one/
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121 0 Apr 26 09:45 super emoji box/
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121 0 Apr 26 09:45 super emoji pop/
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121 0 Apr 26 09:45 super-emoji-box/
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121 0 Apr 26 09:45 super-emoji-invaders/
drwxr-xr-x 1 adn 197121 0 Apr 26 09:45 super-emoji-pop-prototype/

E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/reference/main.lua

E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-bounce/:
anchor/
anchor.exe*
assets/
design.md
reference/
run.bat

Moved. main.lua is now at reference/main.lua — the working chamber/ball/projectile prototype is preserved as a reference for the rebuild. Project root has just anchor/, anchor.exe, assets/, design.md, reference/, run.bat — clean slate for the new pass.

Note: run.bat and anchor.exe will fail to launch the game now since there's no main.lua at the project root. That's fine for the gap between conversations; the next session will create a fresh one.

Let's end this session now, let's call it Emoji Ball Bounce Exploration

Launching skill: end-session

Base directory for this skill: E:\a327ex.claude\skills\end-session

End Session Workflow

This skill is invoked from the same conversation where the work was done. You already have the full session context in memory — you do NOT need to read the transcript.

Step 1: Get Session Info

Ask the user for the session title (max 30 characters). Examples: "Anchor Phase 10 Part 5", "Physics Arena Setup", "Timer System Fix", "Thalien Lune Design".

Determine the project yourself from your session context — you know which repo(s) were worked on, which files were created/modified, and where they live. No need to ask. See Step 6 for the list of known project roots; if the session touched something outside the list, infer the root from the paths you actually edited.

Step 2: Write Summary

Write the summary from your conversation memory. You have the full session context — no need to read any files.

The summary should be thorough and detailed. Each major topic deserves its own section with multiple specific bullet points. Don't compress — expand.

Purpose: These summaries serve as searchable records. Future Claude instances will grep through past logs to find how specific topics were handled. The more detail you include, the more useful the summary becomes for finding relevant context later.

Format (this is just an example structure — adapt sections to match what actually happened):

# [Title]

## Summary

[1-2 sentence overview of the session's main focus]

**[Topic 1 - e.g., "Spring Module Implementation"]:**
- First specific detail about what was done
- Second detail - include file names, function names
- User correction or feedback (quote if notable)
- Technical decisions and why

**[Topic 2 - e.g., "Camera Research"]:**
- What was researched
- Key findings
- How it influenced implementation

**[Topic 3 - e.g., "Errors and Fixes"]:**
- Specific error message encountered
- Root cause identified
- How it was fixed

[Continue for each major topic...]

---

[Rest of transcript follows]

Rules: - Be thorough — If in doubt, include more detail, not less. Each topic should be as detailed as possible while still being a summary. - Think searchability — Future instances will search these logs. Include keywords, function names, error messages that someone might grep for. - One section per major topic — Don't combine unrelated work into one section - Chronological order — Sections should match conversation flow - Specific details — Error messages, file names, function names, parameter values - Include user quotes — When user gave notable feedback, quote it (e.g., "k/d variables are not intuitive at all") - Weight planning equally — Research, proposals, alternatives considered, user feedback on approach are as important as implementation - Weight problems solved — Errors, root causes, fixes, user corrections all matter - Technical specifics — Include formulas, API signatures, parameter changes when relevant

Step 3: Get User Approval

Show the title and summary to the user. Wait for approval before proceeding. If they have corrections, fix them.

Step 4: Convert Transcript and Write Log File

# Find recent sessions (Claude + Cursor; see script). Same script lives in Anchor2:
python E:/a327ex/Anchor2/scripts/find-recent-session.py --limit 5
# or: python E:/a327ex/Anchor/scripts/find-recent-session.py --limit 5

The script shows sessions sorted by when they ended. The first result is the current conversation (since end-session was invoked here). Use it.

Convert the transcript to markdown and write the log file with the approved summary as header:

python E:/a327ex/Anchor2/scripts/jsonl-to-markdown.py [SESSION_PATH] E:/a327ex/anchor.blot.im/logs/[slug].md
# or: python E:/a327ex/Anchor/scripts/jsonl-to-markdown.py ...

The same script auto-detects Claude Code JSONL vs Cursor/Composer agent JSONL (~/.cursor/projects/.../agent-transcripts/...). For Composer sessions, use find-recent-session.py (it merges both sources) and pick the [cursor] line for the current chat.

Use lowercase hyphenated slug derived from the title (e.g., "anchor-primitives-hitstop-animation").

Then replace the default header (# Session YYYY-MM-DD...) with the approved title and summary.

Step 5: Sync Context Files to Blot

cp E:/a327ex/.claude/CLAUDE.md E:/a327ex/anchor.blot.im/context/CLAUDE.md
cp E:/a327ex/Anchor/docs/* E:/a327ex/anchor.blot.im/context/

When the session was Anchor2 (optional):

cp E:/a327ex/Anchor2/.claude/CLAUDE.md E:/a327ex/anchor.blot.im/context/CLAUDE_ANCHOR2.md

Step 6: Commit Project Repo

Identify the project repo(s) worked on this session from your own context — you already know which repos were touched and which files changed. For the common projects, here are the canonical staging commands:

Project	Root	Stage command
Anchor	E:/a327ex/Anchor	git add docs/ framework/ engine/ scripts/ reference/
Anchor2	E:/a327ex/Anchor2	git add framework/ engine/ arena/ reference/ scripts/ docs/ .claude/
emoji-ball-battles	E:/a327ex/emoji-ball-battles	git add -A
orblike	E:/a327ex/orblike	git add -A
thalien-lune	E:/a327ex/thalien-lune	git add -A

For a project not listed, infer the root from the files you actually created or modified this session and stage those. If multiple candidate roots look valid, ask the user which files to stage.

cd into the project root, stage, run git status to verify before committing.

IMPORTANT — FULL SUMMARY IN COMMIT: The commit message MUST include the FULL summary from the log file. Read the summary back from the log file to ensure nothing is missing.

IMPORTANT — COMMIT METHOD: The summary contains backticks, special characters, and markdown that WILL break heredocs and git commit -m. ALWAYS use the file-based method below. NEVER try a heredoc first — it will fail and produce a malformed commit that needs amending.

Commit using a temporary file (extracts only the summary text, not the markdown heading or ## Summary line):

# Extract summary: skip line 1 (# Title) and line 3 (## Summary), take lines 4 onward until the --- separator
awk 'NR>=4 && /^---$/{exit} NR>=4{print}' E:/a327ex/anchor.blot.im/logs/[slug].md > /tmp/commit_msg.txt

# Prepend the title (plain text, no #) and append attribution
sed -i "1i [Title]\n" /tmp/commit_msg.txt
printf "\nGenerated with [Claude Code](https://claude.com/claude-code)\n\nCo-Authored-By: Claude <noreply@anthropic.com>\n" >> /tmp/commit_msg.txt

git commit -F /tmp/commit_msg.txt

Step 7: Push Both Repos

# Push project repo to GitHub
git push origin main

# Push Blot repo (logs and context are already there)
cd E:/a327ex/anchor.blot.im && git add -A && git commit -m "[Title]" && git push origin master

Step 8: Confirm

Tell the user: - Commit hash - That GitHub push succeeded - That Blot push succeeded

ARGUMENTS: Emoji Ball Bounce Exploration

Here's the title and summary for review.

Title: Emoji Ball Bounce Exploration

Emoji Ball Bounce Exploration

Summary

Long exploratory session that built a working physics prototype for emoji-ball-bounce/ (variant of Ricochet using Emoji Ball Battles' visual style on Anchor 2), then iteratively refined it through several mechanical pivots, ending in a design conversation that shifted the project's direction from "chamber + enemies + projectiles" to "Balatro-style score game with Artifact-style card layer over EBB physics." Final state: working prototype archived to reference/main.lua, fresh design.md written for the rebuild.

Project setup (initial scope):

• Created emoji-ball-bounce/ folder. Copied anchor/ framework + anchor.exe from Ricochet (latest known-good Anchor 2 framework, Apr 24).
• Copied outline.frag and shadow.frag from Emoji Ball Battles assets/. Engine is unchanged from Anchor 1, so EBB shaders work as-is.
• Wrote initial main.lua at 480×270 / scale=3 / filter='rough'. Five layers: bg, game, shadow (derived via layer_draw_from(shadow, game, shadow_shader)), game_outline (derived via outline shader), ui. Pipeline: bg → shadow(+4,+4) → outline → game → ui. Test circle at center to verify shader pipeline.
• Anchor1→Anchor2 translation notes documented inline: an:layer('foo') → layer_new('foo'); an:shader(...) → shader_load_file(...); layer:draw_from(src, shader) → layer_draw_from(layer, src, shader); image:draw(x, y, sx, sy) → layer_push + layer_image.

Background gradient fix:

• Initial mistake: used bg_color = color(48, 49, 50) as the screen fill. EBB defines this constant but never draws it as the screen bg. Actual EBB draw call (line 612) is bg:rectangle_gradient_v(0, 0, gw, gh, sky_top(), sky_bottom()) — sky blue (135, 206, 235) → off-white (231, 232, 233).
• Fixed by switching to layer_rectangle_gradient_v with the gradient colors.

Chamber + ball:

• chamber class: 4 green rounded-rect sticks (emoji-merge arena look), all sized 2*half + 2*WALL_T long so they overlap at corners (resolved an earlier corner-gap issue from the asymmetric layout). Static box collider with restitution=1, friction=0. Continuous CHAMBER_ROTATION_RATE = 0.3 rad/sec rotation, [/] resize within [25, 100] half. chamber:contains and chamber:wall_normal_for for ball containment + projectile spawn direction.
• ball class: slight_smile.png emoji at BALL_RADIUS=10, image scaled by 2*radius/image.width. Spring 'hit' for squash on wall hit. Initial Ricochet-style velocity renormalization to keep BALL_SPEED constant despite Box2D's bleed at restitution=1. contain_in_chamber defensive containment (clamps in chamber-local space, reflects outward velocity components). Bounce jitter ±5° to break repeating paths.

Resolution and wall layout:

• Changed width=640, height=360 (from 480×270) for more game space, scale=3. Walls extended to full length (2*half + 2*t) to fix corner gaps. BALL_SPEED increased 120 → 200 → 240 → eventually unchanged.

Wall-bounce feel:

• Investigated EBB's exact ball-wall code (lines 891-933). Findings: sound (intensity-pitched ball_wall.ogg, volume 0.4, pitch ramps above intensity 0.45), directional squash via squash_x/squash_y springs based on wall normal, plant interaction. NO camera shake on wall hit (EBB shakes on ball-on-ball, not wall hits) and NO hit_stop. EBB does have always-on handcam at line 33: handcam(true, {x=2, y=2, rotation=0.02}, 0.5).
• Honestly reported that user's recollection of "camera shake on wall hit" was incorrect.
• Implemented sound + intensity-pitched playback + handcam camera. User then asked to remove the squash entirely. Then later asked to remove all sounds for batch addition later.

Projectile system (EBB Gun/Revolver bullet port):

• Found EBB's ball:fire_single_shot and projectile class. Ported the bullet variant: 15×8 capsule, restitution=0.75, density=0.4, gravity_scale=0.5, bullet=true, apply_impulse(15·cos/sin), 2 bounces. Pop-on-spawn 'hit' spring + 0.1s flash.
• Ported hit_circle (port of EBB lines 3456-3482) and hit_particle (port of EBB lines 3786-3829) classes.
• World gravity set to (0, 384) to match EBB. Ball's gravity_scale=0 initially (kept it floating) — later changed to 1.
• Added top/bottom border solids: 40px and 50px (360 × 120/1080 = 40, 360 × 150/1080 = 50 — Ricochet's proportions scaled). Initially separate chamber and wall tags; user asked to consolidate to single wall tag.
• Side walls (invisible, off-screen) added so projectiles bounce off all four sides.
• Spawn-too-close bug: with horizontal firing, the projectile (width 15, half 7.5) spawned only 0.5 px past the wall outer edge → Box2D registered an immediate collision and burned a bounce + spawned the wall-hit VFX at the muzzle. Fixed by computing OBB half-extent in wall-normal direction: proj_half_in_normal = |W/2·cos(θ)| + |H/2·sin(θ)|, added to spawn distance.
• Muzzle flash visual: replaced EBB's boom_particle with hit_circle + hit_particles. User asked to drop the hit_circle and use 2-3 stars instead. Star.png copied from EBB; ported emoji_particle class (EBB lines 3399-3451). Final muzzle flash is just stars via spawn_emoji_particle(x, y, star, {...}).

Ball physics evolution:

• User: "let it collide naturally, without changing its velocity manually." Removed the velocity renormalization, set gravity_scale=1, removed bounce jitter.
• Ball got "stuck" in low-energy slides → user asked for energy improvements. Researched and explained EBB's six energy systems (cooldown, wall energy boost, horizontal intervention, wall fallback, stuck ball detection, weapon energy boost). Implemented systems #2 and #5 (single-ball-relevant ones) with thresholds adapted from EBB's two-ball-system_energy values.
• User asked to remove both energy systems and replace with simpler "every Nth wall hit, apply random impulse" mechanic. Implemented SPECIAL_BOUNCE_INTERVAL with 50/50 perpendicular vs along-velocity impulse.
• Impulse magnitudes iterated down: 30-70 → 15-35 → 5-10 → 0-0 (user testing).
• User: "ball gets too fast" — proposed three-layer solution: (1) drop WALL_RESTITUTION from 1 to 0.92 for natural bleed, (2) replace impulse with velocity rotation + multiplier (preserves direction-change variety with mild intensity variance, mean ≈ 1.025), (3) hard cap at BALL_MAX_SPEED=400 in ball:update via enforce_max_speed method. User chose all three.
• Rotation range tuning: π/4 → π/6 (less abrupt). Interval changed from fixed N=10 to range random_int(7, 13), then user adjusted to 6-10. Each special bounce re-rolls the next interval target.

Effects layer:

• User asked for effects on a dedicated layer above gameplay. Added effects_layer and effects_outline. Redirected hit_circle:draw, hit_particle:draw, emoji_particle:draw to the new layer. Pipeline now: shadow built from both game_layer and effects_layer (matches EBB's pattern); outline derived per-layer; composite order bg → shadow(+4,+4) → game_outline → game → effects_outline → effects → ui. Camera attached to both world layers for handcam jitter.

Design pivot — first round:

• User proposed enemyless score game like Balatro. Long discussion: combat-vs-scoring tradeoff for build variety, Balatro's chips×mult as the depth engine, three round structures (hit-count / time / energy), build archetypes (tempo, projectile factory, banner hunter, phase master, enemy garden, chamber sculptor, ball multiplier, combo, slow-build, glass cannon).

Design pivot — second round:

• User pushed back on default scoring events: "no defaults, everything card driven." Discussed why this is structurally stronger (no baseline forces all mods to be measured against "+5 chips per wall hit," exotic cards live or die against each other). Iterated event taxonomy and card type taxonomy.
• User then settled the design: EBB-style physics arena (no chamber by default — chamber spawns from a card), multi-ball with weapons (lift EBB's energy systems, must remain stable in single-ball / no-weapon configs), card-driven scoring with no defaults. Card types: Core (scoring sources), Item (attached to balls, weapons mostly), Unit (ball spawners), Improvement (Artifact-style border-zone effects), Spell (instant or passive). Default persistence is permanent per run, not per round.

Scoring model:

• Per-round chips × mult resolution (not per-event). Chips and mult both accumulate over the round; final score = chips × mult at round end.
• Three card primitive operations: +chips, +mult, ×mult.
• Discussed Balatro-vs-no-defaults equivalence — chips × mult math works identically without defaults; only the soft-lock concern differs (mitigatable via guaranteed starter-pack composition).

design.md written:

• New file at emoji-ball-bounce/design.md. Sections: Core loop, Physics, Scoring, Event taxonomy table, Card type taxonomy table, Card primitive shape (Lua-table sketch), Open questions, "What's already implemented as of this writing." Brief but complete enough for fresh instances to ramp up.

Cleanup:

• Moved emoji-ball-bounce/main.lua to emoji-ball-bounce/reference/main.lua to preserve the working prototype while clearing the slate for the rebuild. Project root now: anchor/, anchor.exe, assets/, design.md, reference/, run.bat. Noted that run.bat will fail to launch the game until a fresh main.lua is created in the next session.

Approve the title + summary, or send corrections?

Yes.

2026-04-26T23:36:17.316Z 49c3ebaf-1516-4f8d-97a6-e4db761c1d10 [claude] <-- MOST RECENT
   C:\Users\adn\.claude\projects\E--a327ex\49c3ebaf-1516-4f8d-97a6-e4db761c1d10.jsonl

2026-04-26T23:07:39.829Z 8f867da8-6295-4e85-8aa6-d0f5774e6771 [claude]
   C:\Users\adn\.claude\projects\E--a327ex\8f867da8-6295-4e85-8aa6-d0f5774e6771.jsonl

2026-04-26T22:42:57.364Z 27b23945-15c3-4fe6-8e55-a650c008d974 [claude]
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2026-04-26T16:44:25.853Z 4095a51e-7820-4d02-8d63-cc7b2ec545d3 [claude]
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2026-04-26T15:51:54.795Z c219fe18-809e-4000-be4a-fa5e224e8bba [claude]
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