It's been a long wait, but we've finally released Steno Arcade version 1.6.1, a culmination of internal builds 1.2.1-1.6.1, which includes new Steno Hero songs, general gameplay improvements, and bug fixes. Details below: 1.6.1:

• Now, whenever the “more info” button is pressed to show song lyrics, buttons that have mouse focus takes precedence over buttons that have key focus
• Added support for the scroll wheel for the song list in Steno Hero
• Added more space before the “Contributors” header in the credits popup
• Slightly edited which beeps play when the song start in Steno Hero
• Fixed a bug where holding the song button then pressing the lyrics button causes the menu music to play over the song in-game
• Fixed a bug where holding the song button causes the song to play after lyrics are displayed
• Altered the color "grading" on lines in Steno Hero to affect the last word, before space is pressed

1.6.0:

• Added readme and license

1.5.0:

• Added new audience members
• Added beeps to the timer at start of Steno Hero

1.4.0:

• Added song preview that plays the song when the user views the lyrics
• Added new songs:
  • “Antarctic Moon” by Dan O’Connor
  • “Code Monkey” by Jonathan Coulton
  • “Cherubs” by Josh Woodward
  • “Learn to Fly” by Josh Woodward
  • “Let It In” by Josh Woodward
  • “My Favorite Regret” by Josh Woodward
  • “On Brevity” by Josh Woodward
  • “Steno Hero” by Josh Woodward
  • “The Most” by Ancient Free Gardeners

1.3.0:

• Added first pass of screen reader support. On Windows only, supports any reader using Microsoft’s IAccessible framework (Microsoft Narrator, NVDA..)

1.2.1:

• Added contributor names to credits

What's next? We're close to completing Steno Hero. We'll be adding one more song, evaluating the song difficulty rankings based on player feedback, and will do our best to address any reported bugs, but otherwise Steno Hero is complete and we'll be starting work on one of the other games in the Steno Arcade collection.

[ 2017-07-06 05:08:59 CET ] [ Original post ]

Steno Arcade is a suite of four arcade games designed to teach and drill steno and keyboarding fundamentals in an immersive, addictive, responsive, and interactive way. Steno Arcade is 100% free and open source and works with any steno machine or keyboard.

The Early Access build of Steno Arcade includes one of the four games in the suite, Steno Hero! Imagine your favorite rhythm games, but instead of pressing buttons that vaguely emulate the original instruments, you're hitting steno chords or keyboard keys to precisely and accurately produce the lyrics to your favorite music! It's like singing karaoke with your fingers! Steno Hero currently includes seven songs, with more to be added over time:

“Sunday Smiled” by Hungry Lucy
“The Standing Ones” by Hungry Lucy
“I Think I Started a Trend” by Brad Sucks
“I’m Your Moon” by Jonathan Coulton
“Mandelbrot Set” by Jonathan Coulton
“That Spells DNA” by Jonathan Coulton
“I Feel Fantastic” by Jonathan Coulton

While Steno Arcade is designed to be played with a steno machine, it can also be looked at as a traditional typing game that can be played with any standard keyboard. You only need an NKRO (N-key rollover) keyboard if you intend to learn stenography and want to play the game using steno. For example, the slower, easier songs in Steno Hero are perfectly playable using a standard keyboard, but when you get to the faster, harder songs you may find yourself having trouble keeping up with a standard keyboard and will need to use steno if you want to complete the songs with a high level of accuracy and precision.

Steno Arcade is being developed on top of the Godot open source game engine, and the source will be released under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) license upon completion.

Steno Arcade is brought to you by The Open Steno Project and For All To Play.