Tic-tac-toe, a game that uses Xs and Os, involves two players who take turns marking the spaces in a three-by-three grid with X or O. The player who succeeds in placing three of their marks in a horizontal, vertical, or diagonal row is the winner of the game.

Features of The Game

• The game is played on a grid that's 3 squares by 3 squares.

• You are X, and your friend (or the computer) is O. Players take turns putting their marks in empty squares.

• The first player to get 3 of their marks in a row (up, down, across, or diagonally) is the winner.

• When all 9 squares are full, the game is over and it is a draw.

Steps in Achieving the Code

1. I imported dart:io by typing, import dart:io which is a library that allows you to work with files, directories, sockets, processes, HTTP servers and clients, and more. Many operations related to input and output are asynchronous and are handled using [Future]s or [Stream]s, both of which are defined in the dart:async library.

2. I also imported dart:core by typing import dart:core which is a built-in type, collection, and other core functionality for every Dart program. It provides basic collections such as List, Map and Set.

3. Bool winner = false; this statement is false because the game is yet to start and there is no winner yet.

4. Bool isXturn = true; this statement is true because it's the turn of player X to play ie to start the game. IntmoveCount =0;

5. List<String> is used to list the value ie (coordinates) the players are to use while playing the game from numbers 1-9

6. List<String> combination= ['012', '048', '036', '147', '246', '258', '345', '678']; the combinations for the game are generated here.

7. In my main void I generated the board for the game. Then get the next characters to play and also check if the combination is true or false for a player ie X or O. The players are required to place their values where they want to place them ie X or O as the case may be so this goes on until there is a winner or in the case where there is a draw the console is cleared using clearScreen(); and another new board is been redrawn with new information with generateBoard(); this has to go on until a winner is been declared.

8. So in the end, I created an if-else statement that if the platform is Windows print(process.runSync("cls", [] ,runInShell: true).stdout); but if the otherwise print(process.runSync("clear", [], runInShell: true).stdout).

Code Sample

import 'dart:core';

import 'dart:io';

bool winner = false;

bool isXturn = true;

List<String> cordinates = ['1', '2', '3', '4', '5', '6', '7', '8', '9'];

List<String> combinations = ['012', '048', '036', '147', '246', '258', '345', '678'];

void main() {

generateBoard();

getnextCharacter();

}

int movementCount = 0;

//check if a combination is true or false for a player (X or 0)

bool checkCombination(String combination, String checkFor) {

//split the numbers in a list of integers

List<int> numbers = combination.split('').map((item) {

return int.parse(item);

}).toList();

bool match = false;

for (final item in numbers) {

if (cordinates[item] == checkFor) {

match = true;

} else {

match = false;

break;

}

}

return match;

}

void checkWinner(player) {

for (final item in combinations) {

bool combinationValidity = checkCombination(item, player);

if (combinationValidity == true) {

print('$player WON!');

winner = true;

break;

}

}

}

//get input, check winners

void getnextCharacter() {

//get input from player

print('Choose Number for ${isXturn == true ? "X" : "O"}');

int number = int.parse(stdin.readLineSync()!);

//change the value of selected number in cordinates

cordinates[number - 1] = isXturn ? 'X' : 'O';

//change player turn

isXturn = !isXturn;

//increment move count

movementCount++;

if (movementCount == 9) {

winner = true;

print('DRAW!');

} else {

//clear the console

clearScreen();

//redraw the board with the new information

generateBoard();

}

//

//Check Validity for players, declare winner

//

//check validity for player X

checkWinner('X');

//check validity for player O

checkWinner('O');

//until we have a winner, we call current function again

if (winner == false) getnextCharacter();

}

//clear console screen

void clearScreen() {

if (Platform.isWindows) {

print(Process.runSync("cls", [], runInShell: true).stdout);

} else {

print(Process.runSync("clear", [], runInShell: true).stdout);

}

}

void generateBoard() {

print(' | | ');

print(' ${cordinates[0]} | ${cordinates[1]} | ${cordinates[2]} ');

print('___|___|___');

print(' | | ');

print(' ${cordinates[3]} | ${cordinates[4]} | ${cordinates[5]} ');

print('___|___|___');

print(' | | ');

print(' ${cordinates[6]} | ${cordinates[7]} | ${cordinates[8]} ');

print(' | | ');

}

}

}

}

Conclusion

This article has shown the basics of creating a functional tic-tac-toe game using the dart programming language in a very simple way. The code sample includes a tictactoe game that can be played effectively between two players. Have fun playing the game!