A Rock Every 800 ms

Part of the Game Rules section of Coddy's Pygame journey. Lesson 12 of 29.

One rock at a time is a quiet game. With a timer, a new rock can drop every 800 ms while the others are still falling. Keep the rocks in a list:

SPAWN = pygame.USEREVENT + 2
...
if event.type == SPAWN and state == "play":
    rocks.append(pygame.Rect(random.randint(0, 456), -24, 24, 24))

Each event has its own number, so SPAWN is USEREVENT + 2, one past POINT. Start its timer next to the other one, and set rocks = [] in reset().

Every frame, move all the rocks, then keep only those still in the window:

for rock in rocks:
    rock.y += 4
rocks = [rock for rock in rocks if rock.top <= 360]

Without that second line, every rock that ever fell stays in the list. The game would move and test thousands of rocks nobody can see, and slow down the longer you play.

Drawing and the hit test become loops over rocks too.

Challenge

Medium

Replace rock with a list named rocks, empty in reset().
Add SPAWN = pygame.USEREVENT + 2 and a timer for it every 800 ms, started in reset().
On SPAWN during play, add a 24 by 24 rock at y -24 and a random x from 0 to 456.
Each frame move every rock down 4, drop those whose top is past 360, draw them all and test each one for a hit.

Try it yourself

import random
import pygame

pygame.init()
screen = pygame.display.set_mode((480, 360))
pygame.display.set_caption("Meteor Dodge")
clock = pygame.time.Clock()
heart = pygame.image.load("assets/images/heart.png").convert_alpha()
heart_empty = pygame.image.load("assets/images/heart_empty.png").convert_alpha()
font = pygame.font.Font("assets/fonts/pixel.ttf", 24)
big_font = pygame.font.Font("assets/fonts/pixel.ttf", 48)
WHITE = (240, 240, 240)
PLATE = (60, 60, 90)
POINT = pygame.USEREVENT + 1


def reset():
    global player, rock, score, lives, hit_time
    player = pygame.Rect(220, 300, 40, 40)
    rock = pygame.Rect(random.randint(0, 456), -24, 24, 24)
    score = 0
    lives = 3
    hit_time = -2000
    pygame.time.set_timer(POINT, 1000)


def draw_menu():
    screen.fill((30, 30, 46))
    title = big_font.render("Meteor Dodge", True, WHITE)
    title_rect = title.get_rect(center=(240, 140))
    pygame.draw.rect(screen, PLATE, title_rect.inflate(24, 12))
    screen.blit(title, title_rect)
    hint = font.render("Press Enter to play", True, WHITE)
    screen.blit(hint, hint.get_rect(center=(240, 200)))


def draw_game():
    screen.fill((30, 30, 46))
    safe = pygame.time.get_ticks() - hit_time < 1000
    if not safe or pygame.time.get_ticks() // 100 % 2 == 0:
        pygame.draw.rect(screen, (255, 196, 0), player)
    pygame.draw.rect(screen, (235, 80, 80), rock)
    score_text = font.render(f"{score:05}", True, WHITE)
    score_rect = score_text.get_rect(topright=(470, 10))
    pygame.draw.rect(screen, PLATE, score_rect.inflate(12, 8))
    screen.blit(score_text, score_rect)
    for i in range(3):
        if i < lives:
            screen.blit(heart, (10 + i * 40, 10))
        else:
            screen.blit(heart_empty, (10 + i * 40, 10))


def play_frame():
    global score, lives, state, hit_time
    keys = pygame.key.get_pressed()
    if keys[pygame.K_LEFT]:
        player.x -= 6
    if keys[pygame.K_RIGHT]:
        player.x += 6
    player.clamp_ip(screen.get_rect())

    rock.y += 4
    if rock.top > 360:
        rock.y = -24
        rock.x = random.randint(0, 456)
    now = pygame.time.get_ticks()
    if rock.colliderect(player) and now - hit_time > 1000:
        hit_time = now
        lives -= 1
        if lives == 0:
            state = "over"
    draw_game()


def draw_over():
    draw_game()
    message = big_font.render("Game over", True, WHITE)
    screen.blit(message, message.get_rect(center=(240, 160)))
    hint = font.render("Press R to play again", True, WHITE)
    screen.blit(hint, hint.get_rect(center=(240, 200)))


reset()
state = "menu"

running = True
while running:
    for event in pygame.event.get():
        if event.type == pygame.QUIT:
            running = False
        if event.type == POINT and state == "play":
            score += 1
        if event.type == pygame.KEYDOWN:
            if event.key == pygame.K_RETURN and state == "menu":
                state = "play"
            elif event.key == pygame.K_r and state == "over":
                reset()
                state = "play"

    if state == "menu":
        draw_menu()
    elif state == "play":
        play_frame()
    else:
        draw_over()
    pygame.display.flip()
    clock.tick(60)

pygame.quit()