Space Invaders (Pygame starter)

A from-scratch Space Invaders starter built with Pygame APIs.

Setup

python3 -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate  # Windows: .venv\Scripts\activate
python -m pip install --upgrade pip setuptools wheel
pip install -r requirements.txt
python main.py

macOS fix for SDL.h file not found

If pip install pygame tries to compile from source and fails with SDL.h file not found, use these steps:

1. Use Python 3.12 (3.13 may not have wheels for all pygame builds yet).
2. Upgrade pip/setuptools/wheel in your venv.
3. Install from requirements.txt (this project now uses pygame-ce, which ships prebuilt wheels on macOS more reliably).

Example:

brew install python@3.12
python3.12 -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
python -m pip install --upgrade pip setuptools wheel
pip install -r requirements.txt
python main.py

Controls

• Move: A/D or Left/Right
• Shoot: Space
• Start game: Enter (or Space on start screen)
• Pause/resume: P
• Restart after win/lose: R
• Quit: Esc

Included gameplay

• Smoothed player acceleration/deceleration for tighter movement feel
• Gentler per-wave speed scaling so progression stays beatable
• Invader firing from bottom-most survivors in each column (classic behavior)
• Destructible bunkers and pixel-style sprites inspired by original Space Invaders silhouettes
• Animated invader sprite frames + bonus UFO target worth extra points
• Explosion particle effects on alien/UFO/player hits
• Wave progression (3 waves to win), plus score/lives/high-score HUD
• Persistent local high score saved to high_score.json
• Start / pause / win / lose states and restart flow