A cartoon character holding a game controller, with a Flappy Bird game on a screen behind them

Opening the Window

You are about to build Flappy Bird from scratch using Python. Every game starts the same way: with a blank window. Let’s make one.

Your First Game Window

This is all the code you need to open a window and paint it sky blue. Hit Run Code to see it in action.

game.py

1import pygame

2pygame.init()

4screen = pygame.display.set_mode((400, 600))

5screen.fill((135, 206, 235))

6pygame.display.update()

The Invisible Grid

Your game screen is like graph paper. Every pixel has an address made of two numbers: X and Y.

X: 0, Y: 0

X Position →

Y Position ↓

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X and Y

X = how far right. Y = how far down. Want to move something down the screen? Make Y bigger. It is the opposite of math class.

Where is (0, 0) on a game screen?

The Heartbeat

A game is not a single picture. It redraws the screen over and over, about 60 times per second. This is called the game loop.

A circular diagram: Listen for input, Update game state, Draw everything, Repeat — The game loop: Listen, Update, Draw, Repeat.

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Why a loop?

Movies show 24 pictures per second. Games show 60. Each picture is called a “frame” and your code draws every single one. A while True loop makes this happen.

What does the game loop do?

Your Turn: Set the Size

Fill in the blanks to create a 400x600 game window.

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Level Goal

Create a portrait-mode screen 400 pixels wide and 600 pixels tall.

Logic Lab: python.py

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import pygame pygame.init() # Create the game window (width, height) screen = pygame.display.set_mode((, ))

Choose for blank #1