3
\$\begingroup\$

Introduction

Elite was the first space trading video game, written and developed by David Braben and Ian Bell and published by Acornsoft for the BBC Micro and Acorn Electron computers in in September of 1984.

Screenshot of elite ship

The Elite universe contains eight galaxies, each with 256 planets to explore. Due to the limited capabilities of 8-bit computers at the time, these worlds were procedurally generated. A single seed number is run through a fixed algorithm the appropriate number of times and creates a sequence of numbers determining each planet's complete composition (position in the galaxy, prices of commodities, and name and local details; text strings are chosen numerically from a lookup table and assembled to produce unique descriptions, such as a planet with "carnivorous arts graduates"). This means that no extra memory is needed to store the characteristics of each planet, yet each is unique and has fixed properties. Read more about this here: Elite random number generator

Screenshot of elite planet data

Challenge

Like the Elite game did, write a script which can procedurally generate a list of 8 galaxies each of which contains 256 planets. (You need to generate a total of 2048 planet names).

The 8 galaxy names can be defined before hand or procedurally generated. This is your choice.

Output

  • Please post your script here and perhaps use paste bin or an equivalent to host your output.

Rules

  • At a minimum your script must generate 2048 planet names and 8 galaxy names.
  • Each 256 planets should be nested within the array of a galaxy.
  • This is a popularity-contest! Try to make your code clever, interesting, slick or retro.
  • This is not code-golf. As such, readable code is appreciated. Still, try to keep size low remember the original programmers only had 32Kb or memory to work within for the whole game.
  • Repeats of planet names of more than 3 in a row is not allowed and a single planet name must not appear more than 5 times in the total 2048 planets.
  • Input is optional and not required.
  • Standard Loopholes apply.

How to get kudos

  • If your script also generates economy, government, tech level, population, gross productivity, average radius and comments about each planet.
  • If your planet names look organic (doesn't have to be in English) but for example 'Lave' looks better and is easier to read than 'Esdqzfjp'.
  • If your planet names don't contain profanity such "Arse". I only mention this because the original programmers had to do this.
  • If you do this challenge in BBC Basic.
\$\endgroup\$
8
  • \$\begingroup\$ I'm a little confused about the goal. Is it "produce 2056 random names"? \$\endgroup\$
    – Ypnypn
    Mar 22, 2015 at 21:32
  • \$\begingroup\$ The goal is to produce 8 galaxies, each of which contains 256 planet names. Like the game did. That equals 2048 planet names to generate. \$\endgroup\$
    – Ben Paton
    Mar 22, 2015 at 21:36
  • \$\begingroup\$ This reminds me of Oolite. \$\endgroup\$ Mar 22, 2015 at 22:24
  • 2
    \$\begingroup\$ I voted to close because, as Ypnypn said, the question asks to generate 2056 random names without any constraints, plus optionally "economy, government, tech level, population, gross productivity, average radius and comments about each planet." This is why closed as too broad. Please read the description of the close vote reason. This has nothing to do with the challenge being unclear. "There are either too many possible answers, or good answers would be too long for this format." (mostly the former.) Also getting a good answer doesn't mean the question isn't still too broad. \$\endgroup\$ Mar 23, 2015 at 14:13
  • 1
    \$\begingroup\$ The name generation by itself is close enough to codegolf.stackexchange.com/q/40682/194 to be a duplicate. \$\endgroup\$ Mar 23, 2015 at 18:27

1 Answer 1

5
\$\begingroup\$

Java

I just though I would start out this contest with something :). The names are organic and are generated on the fly. Run with any arguments to use interactive mode.

import java.io.PrintStream;
import java.util.Arrays;
import java.util.Random;
import java.util.Scanner;

public class Main {

    private final static int[][] frequencies = new int[][]{   //Generated with names from http://www.minorplanetcenter.net/iau/lists/MPNames.html
            {96, 323, 512, 445, 222, 113, 407, 249, 514, 134, 740, 1287, 975, 3188, 212, 235, 13, 2131, 997, 909, 501, 398, 226, 50, 355, 165, 3223},
            {626, 61, 8, 8, 877, 3, 3, 28, 322, 5, 7, 114, 9, 8, 425, 4, 0, 396, 44, 6, 260, 0, 7, 0, 51, 3, 40},
            {607, 4, 129, 16, 287, 9, 14, 1728, 248, 4, 364, 139, 9, 8, 518, 7, 18, 99, 27, 41, 94, 2, 0, 0, 49, 42, 102},
            {842, 49, 13, 46, 784, 17, 38, 45, 425, 18, 21, 65, 56, 31, 503, 10, 2, 224, 90, 70, 169, 13, 50, 0, 86, 37, 421},
            {326, 203, 264, 375, 284, 128, 231, 143, 513, 67, 261, 1436, 399, 1874, 159, 179, 9, 2873, 940, 680, 206, 402, 180, 64, 317, 125, 1527},
            {161, 7, 3, 1, 246, 170, 6, 6, 128, 5, 2, 61, 16, 5, 122, 3, 0, 253, 16, 28, 105, 3, 3, 0, 4, 0, 122},
            {596, 16, 27, 27, 595, 8, 62, 150, 250, 17, 16, 134, 32, 100, 319, 11, 6, 272, 53, 28, 258, 3, 18, 10, 46, 18, 507},
            {1360, 24, 33, 16, 1001, 2, 9, 14, 1219, 9, 55, 123, 93, 204, 683, 8, 0, 178, 55, 88, 383, 21, 50, 0, 96, 0, 453},
            {1104, 148, 802, 362, 646, 85, 333, 97, 47, 160, 477, 789, 486, 2022, 309, 149, 15, 501, 1007, 614, 137, 142, 65, 43, 146, 147, 1598},
            {309, 5, 6, 13, 183, 1, 2, 2, 224, 1, 15, 2, 4, 11, 354, 1, 0, 3, 15, 6, 132, 2, 0, 0, 8, 2, 103},
            {1094, 15, 10, 9, 614, 6, 7, 166, 718, 9, 39, 133, 32, 36, 737, 9, 0, 137, 92, 20, 343, 17, 25, 1, 153, 2, 494},
            {1219, 105, 66, 280, 1319, 87, 73, 55, 1259, 17, 77, 1034, 142, 35, 622, 80, 4, 38, 209, 146, 271, 67, 21, 0, 224, 33, 612},
            {1790, 139, 135, 14, 591, 6, 6, 21, 859, 9, 16, 16, 120, 23, 599, 121, 5, 24, 87, 11, 252, 3, 12, 0, 78, 7, 249},
            {1139, 159, 291, 744, 1103, 55, 881, 124, 1014, 72, 298, 80, 108, 519, 735, 52, 12, 110, 543, 495, 140, 27, 59, 10, 203, 120, 2308},
            {72, 299, 215, 258, 167, 138, 150, 288, 124, 62, 282, 824, 456, 1643, 200, 199, 5, 1054, 815, 457, 408, 698, 201, 26, 145, 96, 1181},
            {517, 9, 5, 2, 474, 17, 3, 204, 263, 0, 16, 95, 10, 6, 311, 131, 0, 147, 45, 34, 87, 0, 1, 0, 24, 2, 66},
            {1, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 30, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 116, 2, 1, 0, 0, 0, 5},
            {1518, 162, 175, 366, 1113, 44, 325, 86, 1469, 18, 204, 176, 211, 294, 1196, 58, 11, 294, 331, 505, 439, 57, 37, 4, 311, 44, 1349},
            {904, 66, 452, 26, 770, 22, 17, 935, 522, 13, 439, 132, 109, 56, 570, 131, 10, 28, 442, 932, 437, 46, 44, 0, 68, 50, 1616},
            {1009, 24, 60, 13, 1026, 20, 21, 607, 618, 29, 47, 74, 52, 35, 862, 12, 0, 399, 365, 481, 180, 18, 30, 1, 90, 125, 657},
            {164, 191, 273, 207, 233, 51, 186, 75, 170, 55, 238, 344, 292, 555, 55, 72, 5, 694, 672, 274, 13, 35, 23, 32, 76, 82, 421},
            {535, 3, 4, 4, 441, 0, 10, 3, 577, 1, 16, 28, 1, 12, 153, 4, 0, 26, 91, 4, 12, 1, 0, 0, 30, 1, 475},
            {516, 5, 2, 5, 289, 4, 2, 43, 290, 0, 17, 32, 11, 26, 109, 2, 0, 25, 57, 1, 33, 0, 1, 0, 13, 0, 49},
            {35, 2, 7, 2, 25, 2, 2, 3, 63, 1, 3, 5, 0, 0, 9, 1, 0, 4, 3, 5, 26, 1, 3, 0, 0, 0, 82},
            {557, 38, 55, 46, 138, 22, 26, 31, 72, 18, 44, 126, 75, 143, 238, 31, 1, 81, 108, 57, 214, 9, 27, 9, 6, 8, 706},
            {241, 12, 4, 22, 196, 0, 8, 146, 142, 0, 17, 11, 16, 15, 87, 2, 1, 11, 23, 11, 122, 10, 13, 0, 19, 49, 206},
            {1282, 1246, 1014, 818, 540, 466, 757, 928, 351, 680, 1207, 835, 1479, 552, 375, 957, 40, 795, 1710, 952, 150, 455, 435, 34, 288, 226, 0}
    };

    private final static int MIN_NAME_LENGTH = 4;

    private final static String INFO = "Type \"galaxy x\" to change galaxy. Type a number to get the name of that planet. Type \"exit\" or any invalid input to exit.";

    private final static Scanner in = new Scanner(System.in);
    private final static PrintStream out = System.out;


    public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {

        if (args.length == 0){

            long seed = hash(System.nanoTime());

            for (int i = 0; i < 8; i++){

                long galaxySeed = (hash(i) ^ seed) + 1;
                out.println("Galaxy " + generateName(new Random(galaxySeed)));

                for (int j = 0; j < 256; j++){

                    long planetSeed = (hash(j) ^ galaxySeed) + 1;
                    out.println(generateName(new Random(planetSeed)));

                }
            }
            return;
        }

        out.println(INFO);

        out.println("Seed?");
        long seed = hash(in.nextLong());

        out.println("Galaxy?");
        long galaxySeed = hash(in.nextInt()) ^ seed;
        in.nextLine();//Get rid of rest of line.

        String galaxyName = generateName(new Random(galaxySeed));
        out.println("The name of your galaxy is " + galaxyName + ".");

        while (true){

            String input = in.nextLine().trim().toLowerCase();

            try {
                if (input.startsWith("galaxy")) {

                    int galaxy = Integer.parseInt(input.substring(6).trim());
                    galaxySeed = (hash(galaxy) ^ seed) + 1;

                    galaxyName = generateName(new Random(galaxySeed));
                    out.println("The name of your galaxy is " + galaxyName + ".");

                } else if (input.startsWith("exit")){
                    return;
                } else {

                    int planet = Integer.parseInt(input);
                    long planetSeed = (hash(planet) ^ galaxySeed) + 1;

                    String planetName = generateName(new Random(planetSeed));
                    out.println("The name of your planet is " + planetName + ".");

                }
            } catch (Exception e){
                return;
            }
        }

    }

    private static String generateName(Random rand) {

        int previousChar = randomIndex(frequencies[26], rand);
        String name = "" + (char)(previousChar + 'A');

        for (;;){

            int[] frequency = frequencies[previousChar].clone();

            frequency[26] *= Math.max(name.length() - (MIN_NAME_LENGTH - 1), 0) ; //Hack, reduces name lengths.

            int nextChar = randomIndex(frequency, rand);

            if (nextChar == 26){
                return name;
            }

            previousChar = nextChar;

            name += (char) (nextChar + 'a');
        }
    }

    private static int randomIndex(int[] frequencies, Random rand) {

        int total = Arrays.stream(frequencies).sum();

        int n = rand.nextInt(total);
        int i = 0;

        for (int frequency : frequencies){
            n -= frequency;
            if (n < 0){
                return i;
            }
            i++;
        }

        throw new IllegalStateException();
    }

    private static long hash(long i) {
        return (int) ((131111L*i)^i^(1973*i)%7919); //http://stackoverflow.com/a/9640543/4230423
    }
}

It uses the same code to generate galaxy names as planet names. Here are some example names:

Kanipeso
Danlerg
Deigaji
Kanialu
Fulla
Tirr
Smanger
Anikuraba
Dotia

For full output of 8 galaxies look here.

\$\endgroup\$

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.