Implementing the Hangman Game in Python

, Hangman was a very enjoyable recreation in our house. We might seize a pen and paper and take turns selecting phrases for the opposite to guess. Right now, it’s utilized in classroom settings to assist children follow their spellings, perceive strategic determination making by selecting vowels first, and brainstorm doable phrases from hints.

On this article, we are going to undergo the Hangman Sport by implementing it in Python. It is a beginner-friendly undertaking the place we are going to be taught the fundamentals of the Python language, similar to defining variables, generally used features, loops, and conditional statements.

Understanding the Mission

First, we are going to perceive the sport and get into the depths of how our code ought to work.

In a typical 2-player Hangman Sport, Participant 1 chooses a phrase, hiding it from Participant 2, and generates blanks similar to the variety of letters within the phrase he selected for guessing. Participant 2 has to guess the phrase by guessing one letter at a time. Participant 2 has an outlined variety of lives firstly, and with every mistaken guess of letters, they lose a life (to the purpose the place the person is hanged). With every proper guess, the lives stay the identical as earlier than. If Participant 2 loses all their lives with out guessing the phrase, the sport is over, and so they lose. In the event that they handle to guess the phrase, they win the sport. That is the define of the sport in its conventional sense.

On this undertaking, the pc will probably be Participant 1, producing the phrase to guess, whereas we, the person, will probably be Participant 2. Allow us to implement the above utilizing a flowchart for higher comprehension.

Drawing a flowchart and defining every step helps in turning our thought course of into code, so its at all times a very good follow to attract one. Now allow us to begin with coding the issue!

Step 1: Checklist of Phrases and the Random Module

Step one on this undertaking is for the pc to decide on a random phrase that the person should guess. For this objective, we are going to want each an inventory of phrases from which the pc picks one phrase to be guessed, and a Python perform referred to as random, which can randomly select that phrase from the given listing.

To generate the listing, I googled the 100 commonest nouns used within the English language and located a list. I used these phrases and created a Python listing with it for use on this undertaking.

Because the identify suggests, a Python Checklist is a datatype that shops in itself a set of things. An inventory of colours will probably be outlined in Python as colours = ["red", "yellow", "green", "blue", "pink"]. You possibly can take a look at the Checklist syntax and extra info from the Python official web page on List.

word_list = [
    "time",
    "year",
    "people",
    "way",
    "day",
    "man",
    "thing",
    ...
    ]

You possibly can entry the undertaking recordsdata from my GitHub repository. hangman_words.py is the Python file that comprises the listing of phrases from which the pc will randomly select a phrase for the sport.

Now, as soon as our listing is created, we want the pc to decide on a random phrase from the given listing of phrases word_list. Python has a module particularly for this objective referred to as “random”. We’ll import the module and use it to permit the pc to randomly select a phrase word_to_guess from the listing words_list. You possibly can print the word_to_guess whereas coding the undertaking to boost understanding, and remark it out when taking part in with the pc!

import random
word_to_guess = random.alternative(word_list)
print(word_to_guess)

For extra info on the random.alternative() perform, click on here.

Step 2: Producing Blanks

The subsequent step is to generate blanks equal to the variety of letters within the word_to_guess in order that the person will get an concept of the variety of letters within the phrase he has to guess. For this, we are going to outline a variable referred to as blanks which can act as a container for the unguessed letters of the phrase. It’s going to include the variety of “_” equal to the variety of letters within the word_to_guess.

To calculate the variety of letters within the word_to_guess that has been randomly picked by the pc from the words_list, we are going to use the Python perform len()that calculates the size of a string. Extra info on this in-built perform could be accessed via this link.

blanks = ""
word_length = len(word_to_guess)

As we now know the variety of letters in word_to_guess, we are going to use this quantity so as to add an equal variety of “_” within the variable blanks. For this objective, we are going to use the for loop, a Python performance that enables us to iterate over gadgets in a sequence, in our case, the string that’s saved within the variable word_to_guess. Click on here to be taught extra about for loop and its syntax.

for i in vary(word_length):
    blanks = blanks + " _"
print("Phrase to guess: " + blanks)

The above block of code will iterate over the variety of letters within the word_to_guess string and generate a clean for every letter. It’s going to print out as many _ because the variety of letters, every clean as a placeholder for the letter of the phrase to guess. So for the phrase “time”, the output printed on the display screen will probably be :

Phrase to guess: _ _ _ _

Step 3: Prompting the Person to Guess a Letter

Now the sport truly begins! The pc has picked a phrase, generated clean placeholders for the letters in that phrase. Now comes the time for the person to start out guessing the phrase by guessing one letter at a time.

To ask the person for a letter, we are going to use the enter perform in Python and retailer it within the variable guess:

guess = enter("Guess a letter").decrease()

Click on here to be taught extra concerning the Python built-in perform enter().

Step 4: Verify if the Letter is within the Phrase

As soon as the person has guessed a letter, we are going to test whether or not the person has guessed it proper and test whether it is within the word_to_guess.

To do that, we are going to use a for loop. Furthermore, we will even create one other variable, your_word, which can replace with the guessed letters and an empty listing referred to as,letters_guessed which can retailer the letters guessed appropriately by the person (this will probably be helpful as we are going to see later).

So, for instance, if the pc has picked the phrase “cheesecake”, as the sport progresses and the person has guessed the letters “c”, “e”, and “a”, that is what each your_word and letters_guessed would appear like:

your_word = c_ee_eca_e

letters_guessed = [“c”, “e”, “a”]

letters_guessed = []
your_word = ""

for letter in word_to_guess:
    if letter == guess:
        your_word  = your_word + letter
        letters_guessed.append(guess)
    elif letter in letters_guessed:
        your_word  = your_word + letter
    else:
        your_word = your_word + "_"

So principally what the above loop does is that it iterates via the word_to_guess one letter at a time, and checks:

• If the letter guessed by the person guess is within the word_to_guess, the code will replace the variable your_word so as to add the letter guessed at its applicable location. We have to perceive that in Python, strings are in reality a sequence of characters, and lots of listing features are relevant to strings as nicely. Furthermore, we will even add this letter guessed appropriately to the listing letters_guessed.
• If the letter that the person has guessed, guess, is within the letters_guessed, which suggests the person has already steered this letter earlier than, then we gained’t want so as to add this to the letters_guessed, however simply have so as to add the letter within the your_word at its applicable location.
• Else, if the letter guessed by the person will not be within the word_to_guess, and subsequently won’t be within the letters_guessed, we are going to easy generate blanks in locations.

If the code above appears a bit overwhelming, be happy to only run the above for loop whereas defining the variables and printing every of the variables: word_to_guess, guess, guessed_letters, and your_word and printing the variables the place they’re modified.

Step 5: Creating the Whereas Loop that runs till the Sport is Over

Allow us to refer again to the flowchart we created to assist us perceive the undertaking. With a view to code this undertaking, we want to remember the next factors:

• The person has an outlined variety of lives firstly
• For every letter guessed mistaken, the lives are decreased by 1
  • If the person runs out of lives, the person loses and the sport is over
  • If the person has lives left, the pc will ask the person to guess one other letter
• For every letter guessed proper, the lives stay unchanged, and a clean is changed by a letter within the placeholder blanks
  • If the variable your_word is all crammed, the person wins the sport, and the sport is over
  • If the variable <code>your_word has clean areas left, then the pc will once more ask the person to guess the subsequent letter

Since we have now created the for loop beforehand that caters to the guessed letter, now could be the time to include the thought of lives, and cut back it when the person has guessed a letter mistaken.

Allow us to outline the variety of lives for the person with the variable number_of_lives. The person has 6 possibilities to recommend the mistaken letter in guessing the phrase.

number_of_lives = 6

Now, contemplating the factors talked about above, we additionally want a variable or a situation that tells us to cease asking the person to guess when the sport is over. Allow us to code it with the assistance of a Boolean variable.

Merely stating, a Boolean is a datatype in Python that shops both True or False. We’ll use this Boolean variable to proceed the sport whereas it’s False and vice versa. Initially, whereas the sport begins, this variable will probably be False, that means the sport will not be over.

game_over = False

Now we are going to introduce a whereas loop with the situation that it’ll run so long as the sport will not be over, and we are going to embody the circumstances talked about above on this whereas loop. Take a look at extra concerning the whereas loop from the Python official documentation here.

whereas not recreation over:
     print("nYou have ", number_of_lives, " lives remaining!")
     guess = enter("Guess a letter: ").decrease()

     your_word = ""

     for letter in word_to_guess:
        if letter == guess:
            your_word  = your_word + letter
            letters_guessed.append(guess)
        elif letter in letters_guessed:
            your_word  = your_word + letter
        else:
            your_word = your_word + "_"
     print("Phrase to guess: ", your_word)

Within the above piece of code, we have now added the enter assertion in addition to the print assertion, which can output the letters guessed to date in keeping with their place within the word_to_guess.

Step 6: Dealing with Conditions

The final step is to deal with completely different circumstances. What occurs if the letter the person has guessed has already been steered by the person, or the letter will not be within the phrase? Additionally, what if all of the letters have been guessed and there aren’t any extra blanks in your_word? This might imply that the person has guessed the phrase and thus gained.

We’ll add this example within the code with he following traces:

if guess in letters_guessed:
    print(f"nYou've already guessed {guess}")

if "_" not in your_word:
    game_over = True
    print("nYou have guessed the phrase! YOU WIN!")

Furthermore, if the letter guessed by the person will not be within the word_to_guess, the person’s guess is inaccurate, then their lives will probably be decreased by 1, and we are going to inform the person that their guessed letter will not be within the phrase. If lowering the lives by a mistaken guess finishes all of the person’s lives, then our boolean variable game_over will probably be set as True , and the sport will finish, with the person shedding the sport.

if guess not in word_to_guess:
    number_of_lives -= 1
    print(f"nYou guessed {guess}, that is not within the phrase. You lose a life.")

    if number_of_lives == 0:
        game_over = True
        print(f"nIT WAS {word_to_guess}! YOU LOSE!")

Keep in mind so as to add the above blocks of code contained in the whereas loop that runs till the sport will not be over. An entire code together with helpful feedback could be accessed via this GitHub repository for a greater understanding.

Conclusion

The above coding undertaking was performed with the fundamentals of the Python language. We got here throughout some built-in features, like print(), and enter(), we used the random module to generate random phrases to guess and used for and whereas loops in varied iterations in keeping with want. We additionally went via the conditional if, elif and else statements. These are all the fundamental instruments that each newbie should know earlier than they soar into complicated coding. We might even have outlined and referred to as features on this program, however this was meant to be a beginner-friendly introduction to the Python language. If you’re a professional in Python, be happy to share varied different methods we might have approached this undertaking!