Ncurses Flappy Bird

Terminal Flappy Bird clone written in C with ncurses.

Features

• Real-time gameplay loop with gravity/jump physics.
• Config-driven rendering and level tuning.
• Persistent save state and hall-of-fame scores by nickname.
• Persistent global gameplay statistics across runs.
• Dynamic streak-based score multiplier system.
• Configurable terminal sound cues (beep or bell).
• Portable build with dependency tracking (Makefile).

Repository layout

.
├── assets/                     # level files, settings, banners, save/hof data
├── include/flappybird/         # public headers
├── src/                        # source implementation
├── .taskfiles/                 # modular Taskfile tasks
├── Makefile                    # build, run, lint, format
└── Taskfile.yaml               # task orchestration

Build and run

Requirements

• C compiler with C11 support (gcc/clang)
• ncurses development package
• make

Commands

make all
./flappy_bird

or via Task:

task build:all
task build:run

Configuration

Screen and render settings

Edit /assets/settings/settings.conf:

• header and border colors
• header dimensions
• FPS
• sound settings (sound_enabled, sound_mode)
• optional gravity defaults

Gameplay controls

• Space: jump
• P: pause/resume
• E: end run
• H: in-game quick hint
• Left/Right: menu navigation
• Enter: select
• B: exit information pages

Map size

Edit constants in /include/flappybird/rendering.h:

• MAPSIZEX
• MAPSIZEY
• margins and border width constants

Levels

Levels are defined in /assets/levels/level_<n>.conf.

To add a level:

1. Copy an existing file (for example level_3.conf).
2. Rename it to the next numeric level.
3. Adjust speed, gravity, spacing, width and color values.

Developer workflow

Make targets

• make all: build binary
• make run: build and run
• make debug: debug build
• make release: optimized build
• make lint: static analysis via cppcheck
• make format: format C files via clang-format
• make clean: remove artifacts

Task targets

• task setup: install pre-commit hooks and run baseline checks
• task ci: clean build + lint checks
• task quality:pre-commit: run all pre-commit hooks

Pre-commit hooks

Configured in /.pre-commit-config.yaml:

• file hygiene checks (pre-commit-hooks)
• YAML and Markdown linting
• clang-format auto-formatting for .c/.h
• build verification on pre-push

Notes

• Runtime save files are:
  • /assets/saves.conf
  • /assets/hall_of_fame.conf
  • /assets/game_stats.conf
• All are git-ignored through /assets/.gitignore.