As you will no doubt recall, violence played a large part in the Skool games. If Eric was going to prevent Einstein from reaching the head’s study during break, hitting would be involved; if Eric was going to prevent Mr Wacker from finding the hidden pea shooter on the fire escape, out would come the catapult. Decking one’s teachers and fellow pupils was part and parcel of daily skool life.

About time, then, that support for such violence was implemented in Pyskool. One concept I had to introduce to get this to work was the “uninterruptible command” - that is, a command that survives a lesson change, instead of being replaced by a new command from a new command list from a new lesson. Having teachers or pupils rise suddenly from the floor, or catapult pellets mysteriously vanish, as soon as the (still silent) bell rang was simply not acceptable.

So, anyway, look forward to hitting and firing in Pyskool 0.0.2, which I’ll try to push out the door soon. And, of course, in true Pyskool tradition (if this young project can be said to have established one), punchability and pelletability will be configurable. You want teachers to be vulnerable to Eric’s fist? You got it!