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Phssthpok posted:Once you're happy with your Signal Multiplexer, check out this advanced labeling technique: Idgi, what is happening here, won't the center always run all instructions since there's no jumps?
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Sep 15, 2022 18:33
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Every j that appears there is a jump instruction
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Sep 15, 2022 18:38
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Tirranek posted:I'm super new and really bad at Zachtronics games but I picked some up in the recent humble bundle and am having a lot of fun. Starting out with TIS-100 and have been banging my head on the Multiplexer for a good few hours due to not having enough space, only to discover that you can put labels and commands on the same line. Really should have read the manual more carefully Learn to use the JRO command, it's really powerful and makes some levels much easier.
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Sep 15, 2022 19:46
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Ooooh, it's the JRO UP, that's pretty clever
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Sep 15, 2022 19:58
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Phssthpok posted:Once you're happy with your Signal Multiplexer, check out this advanced labeling technique: JRO...UP?  That looks really nice, but I'm definitely missing something with how the nodes communicate. How does MOV N, DOWN relate to the commands in the center node? (Assuming telling me doesn't make future puzzles too easy) Also, thanks everyone for the responses! I think these games might be getting their hooks in me. I just finished the Sequence Generator after lying in bed thinking about it:  I'm sure it's clunky and has some pointless lines, but it felt pretty great seeing it work 
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Sep 16, 2022 15:05
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Tirranek posted:JRO...UP? Imagine if instead you had in the top node MOV N DOWN and then in the center node MOV UP ACC; JRO ACC. Does that make more sense?
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Sep 16, 2022 15:17
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Dr. Stab posted:Imagine if instead you had in the top node MOV N DOWN and then in the center node MOV UP ACC; JRO ACC. Does that make more sense? Ohh, I think so. Interesting, thanks! I'll try copying it into the game to see it in action. Edit: Holy crap, that's amazing! Tirranek fucked around with this message at 16:15 on Sep 16, 2022 |
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Sep 16, 2022 16:05
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Wait until you see someone solve the Signal Pattern Detector (detect the input pattern 0,0,0) with no conditional instructions at all and figure that poo poo out. In fact, it uses only two different instructions at all - MOV and JRO. edit: I knew i still had this saved somewhere  Must be art, because i don't get it. HenryEx fucked around with this message at 19:38 on Sep 16, 2022 |
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Sep 16, 2022 19:34
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  i'm going to die mad about that tiny sliver to the left of my score on Chaz Cheddar. i had to do some serious bullshit to get my solution as compact as it is, and i have no earthly idea how i'd shave even 1k off of this one e: i did manage to factor out a multimixer and save 1k. still not on the leftmost sliver but at least i can hook up an animatronic now
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Sep 24, 2022 08:21
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Venuz Patrol posted:i'm going to die mad about that tiny sliver to the left of my score on Chaz Cheddar. i had to do some serious bullshit to get my solution as compact as it is, and i have no earthly idea how i'd shave even 1k off of this one  (for the curious: https://old.reddit.com/r/lastcallbbs/wiki/foodcourt)
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Sep 24, 2022 21:47
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That's a great resource. I love how saving just a little bit of cost on a stage usually requires completely overhauling every part of your layout
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Sep 24, 2022 22:36
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Jabor posted:There are a whole bunch of deductions that you can make, but most of them boil down to "if it was any other way it would make either a 2x2 open space, or a dead-end with no monster". And most of the rest become "if it did this then stuff wouldn't be connected". The 7x2 w/3 walls version of this was exactly what I needed to finish The Oblivion Hoard without guessing. Thanks! E: Now I just need to find something for The Engine of the Golemancer... 
Stickman fucked around with this message at 08:34 on Sep 25, 2022 |
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Sep 25, 2022 08:31
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Stickman posted:E: Now I just need to find something for The Engine of the Golemancer... That one does take a similar situation-specific deduction yeah. I'm confident you can find it though! Like last time, you'll need to look at a pair of rows/columns together, rather than looking at rows and columns individually.
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Sep 25, 2022 08:55
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Thanks, good to know that I'm on the right track  I assume none of the D&D puzzles require bifurcation? (in the sense of necessary inference rules being more specialized than humans could reasonable handle)
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Sep 25, 2022 10:34
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I don't think I ran into any of the main levels that required it, but it's not like I've done every single one of the shadow caverns puzzles. I'm not sure how the generator for those actually works.
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Sep 25, 2022 13:02
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Found something that might be of interest to all zachheads out there - Retro Gadgets Seems more like a toy/tool than a game with concrete goals, but pretty cool nonetheless.
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Oct 5, 2022 10:39
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grate deceiver posted:Found something that might be of interest to all zachheads out there - Retro Gadgets I've been playing around with that too. It's definitely more programming toolbox than game, but it has potential for sure. 
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Oct 6, 2022 08:56
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I am finding Fortune's Foundation to be extremely difficult lol, it's hard to wrap my head around especially having played all the other solitaires right before this. The specific rules are messing with my prior heuristics, as stacks that might look good are actually unwinnable because you can't move stacked cards, stacks go in both directions, using the free cell blocks you from melding cards off the stack lol
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Oct 9, 2022 00:54
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I have been staring at this position for like ten minutes, unable to determine how to proceed and wondering if I've already failed after two moves lol Does this game give you unwinnable deals? I know it happens with Klondike Edit: oh poo poo  Edit 2: it took me one hour but whew, that's one win with every solitaire 
CharlieFoxtrot fucked around with this message at 04:10 on Oct 9, 2022 |
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Oct 9, 2022 03:24
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I notice there are steam patches for a couple Zachtronics games today that switch the queries for the histograms for puzzles from servers to local copies. I wonder if that's just because they're old games (and there's low odds of these games getting massive histogram changes at this point) or if it's future-proofing in case the zachtronic servers go down in the future.
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Oct 14, 2022 20:20
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Bobulus posted:I notice there are steam patches for a couple Zachtronics games today that switch the queries for the histograms for puzzles from servers to local copies. I wonder if that's just because they're old games (and there's low odds of these games getting massive histogram changes at this point) or if it's future-proofing in case the zachtronic servers go down in the future.
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Oct 14, 2022 20:30
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Why would anyone use a guide for a single player puzzle game. Literally paid for these puzzles to be able to solve them 
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Oct 14, 2022 22:46
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Rynoto posted:Why would anyone use a guide for a single player puzzle game. Literally paid for these puzzles to be able to solve them i literally paid for the secret envelope that i'm not going to be able to open because 20th century food court is not my jam
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Oct 15, 2022 18:05
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I've found a video that perfectly expressed what it was like to make SpaceChem videos so many years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c33AZBnRHks tl;dw "My code solved the problem in a month. You guys brought that time down to, uh....under one millisecond." I know exactly how that feels, Mr. Parker. Original video for context: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-AfhLQfb6w
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Oct 18, 2022 05:21
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GuavaMoment posted:I've found a video that perfectly expressed what it was like to make SpaceChem videos so many years ago:
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Oct 18, 2022 05:49
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Got this game recently thinking I would be all about the food court but it turns out Forbidden Path is actually the best? I did all the official and bonus levels and am disappointed there isn’t any more.
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Oct 18, 2022 16:40
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May 17, 2023 20:44
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whoops lol
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May 19, 2023 16:38
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The important thing is, it works as designed
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May 19, 2023 17:00
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Unless you’re deliberately adding with boring loops, I’m honestly more amazed by a solution that fits within the puzzle constraints, takes that many cycles, and still finishes than I am with yet another boring unrolled loop! E: Which level is that?
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May 19, 2023 21:32
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CharlieFoxtrot posted:Does this game give you unwinnable deals? I know it happens with Klondike From what I had heard, the Zachtronics solitaires select from a pre-generated huge set of deals that are guaranteed to be solvable. Congrats on the win, even though I'm over half a year late with this.
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May 19, 2023 22:45
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Stickman posted:Unless you’re deliberately adding with boring loops, I’m honestly more amazed by a solution that fits within the puzzle constraints, takes that many cycles, and still finishes than I am with yet another boring unrolled loop! It was the early level where you hack your own arm, but I was still finding my feet with the game then. You won't see that score because I've since cut it down to 241. That solution wasn't anything interesting unfortunately, just me not knowing what I was doing at all - I basically forgot that you can use more than one EXA and also didn't realize you could just write a specific value/number directly to a register rather than modify the register's existing value. So I used ADDI/SUBI X 1 X to slowly work my way up/down every time a value was out of the required range then sent my single EXA to the port and back instead of using the M register. I'm now kind of stuck on the level where you unlock the Redshift. But the game is very cool. I like digging through the zines for clues. Though optimizing seems a little less gratifying here than in SpaceChem or Opus Magnum because the visual aspect is not as strong. edit: This level (hacking into the Redshift to get the SDK) feels like an insane difficulty spike. I have three problems to solve here and have been wracking my brain for the better part of two days, and have solved none of them. The bit about macro instructions in the second issue of the zine seems relevant to the first problem but I've been unable to translate that into actual working code. The par size for histograms being 50 tells me I'm clearly missing something, too. I might have to look up a hint else I risk this being the end of the road I think. edit2: With my solution currently at 3084/50 size I have solved the first two problems. Just need to seal the deal somehow. Though even if I succeed I'm not sure I have learned the right lessons from this level. I guess we'll see. Sway Grunt fucked around with this message at 20:58 on May 20, 2023 |
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May 20, 2023 06:17
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I somehow totally missed that Zach made a physical solitaire game. https://twitter.com/coincidenceteam/status/1675961165107838976?s=46
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Jul 13, 2023 23:35
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I've been checking out Neon Noodles, and I'm enjoying it. Cribs a lot of stuff from Zachtronics games. I was concerned at first when it seemed like you couldn't save multiple solutions, but it does allow for that once you get past the "tutorial" levels. None of my Zach-likes goons appear to have scores to compare to, feel free to add me (not a hyperlink so no bots scrape me up): https://steamcommunity.com/id/ + NickPancakes Some other recent-ish non-Zachtronics Zach-likes that might interest folks: Infinite Turtles - I played the first big and haven't gone back yet but it seems like it gets pretty insane. Manufactoria 2022 - Remake of an older browser game that I loved. Kinda like a 2D Infinifactory, where your main constraint is space.
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Aug 7, 2023 18:53
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Finally got off my keister to take one of the worst things I've ever made and kick it up from a top 2% solution to a top 1% solution. Behold, the lowest cost solution to purified gold https://i.imgur.com/We4MtNS.mp4 And because I am not entirely made of hatred, I also got a top 1% speed solution 
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Dec 31, 2023 20:34
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Got a nice hand of Fortune's Foundation with all trumps played in a single move: https://i.imgur.com/nVSRWsh.mp4
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Feb 26, 2024 00:08
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It's very nice to see this thread pop up every now and then, and it reminds me to pick up a zachtronics again every now and then as a bonus!
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Feb 26, 2024 14:09
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Do people still hear from Zach? Last I heard he wanted to become a teacher, managed it, but didn’t like it and quit?
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Feb 26, 2024 15:00
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hyphz posted:Do people still hear from Zach? Last I heard he wanted to become a teacher, managed it, but didn’t like it and quit? He now has a company called coincidence games that makes physical card games. https://coincidence.games/the-lucky-seven/
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Feb 26, 2024 20:35
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As a side note for those who like Zachtronics Games Balatro very much scratches a similar itch (building engines under constraints to accomplish specific mostly predictable goals) and would be worth checking out.
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Feb 28, 2024 20:26
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