Building a CLI Hangman Game in Python

Hello everyone! My name is Tyler Edlin, and today I’m excited to share a small project I’ve been working on - a CLI Hangman game built with Python. This article will guide you through the process of setting up the project, understanding the code, and overcoming the challenges I faced.

Project Overview
The Hangman game is a simple word-guessing game where the player tries to guess the word one letter at a time. The game provides feedback on the guesses and keeps track of the number of tries remaining. If the player guesses all letters correctly, they win. If they run out of tries, they lose.

Setting Up the Environment

• Install Python:
  Ensure Python is installed on your system.

• Set Up a Virtual Environment:
  Create a virtual environment to manage dependencies.
  Activate the virtual environment.

Project Features and Implementation

1. Initializing the Game

   • Define the word that needs to be guessed.
   • Set up a display for the word with underscores.
   • Initialize the number of tries the player has.

2. Explaining the Game

   • Print instructions to the user about how to play the game.

3. Handling User Input

   • Prompt the user to input a single letter.
   • Validate that the input is a single alphabetic character.

4. Implementing the Game Loop

   • Continue to ask for guesses until the user either wins or loses.
   • Update the display with correct guesses.
   • Track the number of incorrect guesses.

5. Winning or Losing the Game

   • Print a winning message if the user guesses all letters correctly.
   • Print a losing message and reveal the word if the user runs out of tries.

Challenges and Solutions

One challenge I faced was validating the user input to ensure it was a single alphabetic character. I solved this by using a while loop and checking the length and content of the input.

Conclusion

This project was a great way to practice Python programming and understand the basics of game development. I encourage you to try building your own version and see how you can improve it.

Feel free to check out the GitHub repository for the full code. If you enjoyed this article, follow me for more programming tutorials and projects. Happy coding!

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Github Link