|
Black Griffon posted:Edit: got it down to 15 symbols and I swear there's 14 symbol just scratching at my cornea. I know what you mean, when I look at that grid full of + and - operations I feel like I should be able to replace more of them with shifts but I just can't see it.
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2020 03:35
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 20, 2024 05:32 |
|
|
I remember actually going into OM’s files and recoloring all of the different icons to make them more distinctive because boy it can be hard to grok those timelines sometimes.
|
|
#
?
Jul 15, 2020 15:42
|
|
|
Oh hey, a new Zachtronics thread! It's worth noting that there are some other, non-Zachtronics games that are in a similar vein. For example, "Silicon Zeroes", where you lay out and design CPUs. This is a great chance for me to share my original solution for an early SpaceChem puzzle, "Split Before Bonding": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qE-wi6905a8 I don't remember which basic game mechanic I didn't yet understand at the time, but I built this beautiful solution around it. I saved the original video before I redid it, when I realized how far astray I had gone.
|
|
#
?
Jul 16, 2020 17:16
|
|
|
Glare Seethe posted:Timing Crystal. Cut this down by almost 400 cycles and am now second only to Stone Cold Jane Austen on my list.  This version is uglier, though. Also beat the main campaign in general so now off to the bonus stuff.
|
|
#
?
Jul 16, 2020 20:39
|
|
|
Glare Seethe posted:Cut this down by almost 400 cycles and am now second only to Stone Cold Jane Austen on my list. That revolver drum spin at the end is so nice though
|
|
#
?
Jul 16, 2020 20:50
|
|
|
Yeah I love that too. It's kind of a gorgeous game in general really, probably the prettiest Zachtronics.
|
|
#
?
Jul 16, 2020 20:58
|
|
|
Goddamn, the Production Alchemy puzzles do not mess around. I am definitely getting exposed here as a mere hobbyist rather than pro alchemist.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2020 15:40
|
|
|
Timing crystal Glare Seethe posted:Goddamn, the Production Alchemy puzzles do not mess around. I am definitely getting exposed here as a mere hobbyist rather than pro alchemist. Greetings fellow mere dabbler
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2020 17:32
|
|
|
I gave Molek-Syntez a try and I don't dislike it, but TBH the near lack of any aesthetic at all bounces me off. Which is weird, considering I liked TIS-100; possibly because that made no bones about being text-based programming in the first place, idk. Oh well, back to Opus Magnum, not like I actually ever beat that
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2020 17:58
|
|
|
I swear to god there's at least one more cycle to optimize out of Alcohol Separation, staring me right in the face, and I just can't see it   
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2020 17:59
|
|
|
You can get the count 11 lower You're grabbing an input once every six cycles, I'm sure you can do it more often than that
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2020 21:05
|
|
|
I moved on to Water Purifier and realized some tricks about how quickly you can handle inputs, so yeah I'll have to go back to apply those to the booze separator. I've got more levels to move on to first though because, god damnit. I'm going to beat a Zachtronics game. :extremelyseriousnod: There's more I could do here but I think I did pretty drat good on cycles and space, tbh!  
Ciaphas fucked around with this message at 21:28 on Jul 18, 2020 |
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2020 21:25
|
|
|
I haven't played OM in years, but you could probably speed that up by a cycle or two by having a rotating arm pick up and move the water input, instead of a track arm?
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2020 21:57
|
|
|
HenryEx posted:I haven't played OM in years, but you could probably speed that up by a cycle or two by having a rotating arm pick up and move the water input, instead of a track arm? That saved me five  and 3 area & 15g to boot, jeez how did I not see that?    Evidently I have no idea what is considered a "cycle" because I still can't work out how 90 became 85. Oh well, that's a tip I'll remember. Thanks!
Ciaphas fucked around with this message at 22:14 on Jul 18, 2020 |
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2020 22:03
|
|
|
You might be able to go even faster by making the new swing arm a 6x rotator then you wouldn't have to go back left after dropping.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2020 22:28
|
|
|
Ciaphas posted:Evidently I have no idea what is considered a "cycle" because I still can't work out how 90 became 85. Oh well, that's a tip I'll remember. Thanks!
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2020 22:36
|
|
|
I enjoyed opus magnum, but i'm really not a fan of its leaderboard style being your cumulative results rather than based on a single solution like spacechem was. It was a lot more open ended and easier to me than spacechem too, solving a puzzle prioritizing only low cycles, or low area and allowing the others to spiral out of control made it super easy to brute force solutions - and due to the leaderboard design it doesn't seem to encourage trying to find the best equal balance of all 3. I still love it, been playing spacechem again recently and I seem to have forgotten how to play it, I'm re-learning all over again which is fun. I've been a little intimidated by the assembly language based ones and haven't given them a shot.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2020 22:57
|
|
|
cubicle gangster posted:I enjoyed opus magnum, but i'm really not a fan of its leaderboard style being your cumulative results rather than based on a single solution like spacechem was. Opus Magnum and Spacechem's leaderboards work the same way though.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2020 23:23
|
|
|
cubicle gangster posted:I enjoyed opus magnum, but i'm really not a fan of its leaderboard style being your cumulative results rather than based on a single solution like spacechem was.
|
|
#
?
Jul 18, 2020 23:24
|
|
|
It's really tough to make something that looks elegant in the appendix in Opus Magnum. This one I just did certainly is not, but it's the last puzzle and surprisingly placed me in the second highest column for cycles, which I was kind of pleased about. I guess it's the Journal next, though I might go back to some earlier chapters first and see what I can do better. Reconstructed Solvent: 
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2020 17:45
|
|
|
you've got a diamond track with two arms on it, the easy way to elegant up your solution is to have them swap roles after each product so they end up going round in a circle instead of just back and forth
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2020 17:53
|
|
|
Yeah it's taken me a long long time to realize I can actually close/loop tracks so I'm not good with them yet. Likewise using multiple, parallel tracks is something I only started doing recently and in these constricted puzzles there usually isn't much room for it, but it really speeds up solutions and looks cool so I should go back and redo some stuff probably.
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2020 18:14
|
|
|
I mean, it's definitely more of an aesthetic thing for hobbyist alchemists than a practical one for professionals, since it essentially doubles your instruction count, and the accountants are gonna take one look at it and ask you to do a better job of productionization. Sometimes you can end up shaving a cycle over the transition, which is neat, and helps get the bean counters off your back.
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2020 18:19
|
|
|
Woot, please add my profile to the OP so I can compare my lovely Shenzhen I/O solutions with other goons (I have Shenzhen, TIS-100, MS, and OM) https://steamcommunity.com/id/bort_simpsone/
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2020 18:31
|
|
|
more nerds for the nerd mines!
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2020 19:00
|
|
|
Glare Seethe posted:I'm not thrilled with the output on this (OM/Sword Alloy) - I'm sure there's a way to make it both more efficient and aesthetically pleasing - but otherwise I'm quite happy with the rest of it. I've noticed I naturally gravitate towards tight-knitted designs and optimizing for area first; I basically try to have everything as bunched up as possible. Here's my 115 cycle Sword Alloy.  Some others that I'm proud of: Purified Gold (this one is simply absurd)  Stabilized Water  Alchemical Jewel  Voltaic Coil  Golden Thread  Stain Remover  Very Dark Thread (shaved 7 cycles off just now by adding the arm to move it an extra space right and back)  Climbing Rope Fiber 
|
|
#
?
Jul 25, 2020 08:04
|
|
|
The one I'm most proud of isn't top percentile (I miss one beat out of every six), but I'm just amazed it worked at all: Unstable Compound:  I should really go back and optimize more of the later levels, but now I'm sucked into Shenzhen  https://steamcommunity.com/id/stickasylum/
|
|
#
?
Jul 25, 2020 09:28
|
|
|
Hello new Zachtronics thread. I am definitely lower tier on the optimizations compared to the smart people here, if anyone hasn't added me in the last 2 iterations of the thread, I am here: https://steamcommunity.com/id/daedalus I always liked my purified gold solution just because I just built it up as binary counting and it worked the first time.  Here is a picture of my prized possession. It also came with a spiffy first 100 badge, but thats in a different house at the moment. 
|
|
#
?
Jul 25, 2020 10:38
|
|
|
What's your steam profile background from?
|
|
#
?
Jul 25, 2020 10:47
|
|
|
GotLag posted:What's your steam profile background from? That's FTL
|
|
#
?
Jul 25, 2020 11:02
|
|
|
GotLag posted:What's your steam profile background from? Daedalus1134 posted:That's FTL Backgrounds are the one reason I wish Zach would add steam cards to his more recent games. I'd love an Opus Magnum or Exapunks background.
|
|
#
?
Jul 26, 2020 07:28
|
|
|
The Opus Magnum hex grid with the V Critelli stamp would make a nice background
|
|
#
?
Jul 26, 2020 09:10
|
|
|
Here are the designs of mine I'm most satisfied with. Not necessarily the fastest, sometimes it's worth spending a few more cycles for a more aesthetically-pleasing layout. If that's not alchemy then I don't know what is.  https://i.imgur.com/CXNWOcz.mp4  https://i.imgur.com/Bw70h0t.mp4 Edit: added a cycle to Rocket Propellant for more symmetrical animation Edit 2: smoothing of courage potion animation GotLag fucked around with this message at 09:49 on Jul 26, 2020 |
|
#
?
Jul 26, 2020 09:26
|
|
|
  edit: Wasn't too bad after all...  I could probably drop that arm at the top-right now that I look at it, to save some gold. Sway Grunt fucked around with this message at 20:07 on Aug 12, 2020 |
|
#
?
Aug 12, 2020 17:44
|
|
|
Glare Seethe posted:Also need to solve KOHCTPYKTOP, which is the only level in the main campaign I haven't beaten, I kinda just looked at it and nope'd out since it was optional. Having now solved every level in Opus Magnum, including the entire Journal, I've gone back to SpaceChem to do this and, oh my loving god, it's so much harder. Granted I'm way out of practice and it took me a bit to get re-acquainted, and also this specific level is really hard in general, but still. In the time it took me to build two reactors I could've probably done four OM levels or something, and I still only have the vaguest idea/plan for the overall solution. I don't even get my beloved flip-flops for this one. edit: Beat that, but now I'm trying Moustachium 608 again and it's the most infuriating thing. I don't know why I can't figure it out. It's like my brain is fundamentally unsuited to solving this one specific level, not even in a hideously inefficient way, just like, at all. I just cannot do it. Why. edit2: Beat Moustachium 608. Thank you insomnia. Wild that the best I could manage was ~2650 cycles while the leaderbords show me that ~350 and even better is common. But at least mine is way cheaper on symbols than the average. Sway Grunt fucked around with this message at 04:22 on Aug 23, 2020 |
|
#
?
Aug 20, 2020 20:27
|
|
|
That made me curious to go look up the first time I beat KOHCTPYKTOP way back when and oh my loving god I have no idea what's going on. Order being top left, mid left, bottom left, top right, bottom right. https://imgur.com/a/tCCtCQu Spoiler album, just in case. Wildly inefficient, apparently!  This is going to make me replay spacechem.
|
|
#
?
Aug 27, 2020 07:31
|
|
|
Rynoto posted:Wildly inefficient, apparently! Not to worry, mine is - and I am not kidding - literally twice as inefficient as yours. See that very last, tiny column, that's where I'm at. This is one of those levels where optimization was not a factor for me, I'm just happy to get through it one way or another. The big bottleneck is unbonding the first molecule in the first reactor, everything is dependent on doing that quickly and I did it very... let's be generous, and say methodically. One other achievement I had left was Σ-Ethylene in under 6000 cycles, and in contrast I was really happy with how that one came out, am actually on top in cycles among friends. After spending some time on ResearchNet I now only have one achievement left, which is to do Falling with only two reactors. Without flip-flops this seems almost impossible, but I imagine I'll get there eventually... I have one idea but I suspect I might be too fixated on it and it's preventing me from approaching the problem from other angles.
|
|
#
?
Aug 27, 2020 09:07
|
|
|
Zachtronics style game Prime Mover has -80% sale (cheapest it's ever been) https://store.steampowered.com/app/693700/Prime_Mover/  It's not a clone of any specific Zach-game, but has a lot of similarities with many of them. SpaceChem is probably the closest comparison, but you're working with number nodes that you can't (directly) combine or compare between each other. The UI is not great, but the puzzles offer a good challenge. The end game seems to be more difficult than most of Zach-games (not including their bonus levels). Kennel fucked around with this message at 08:10 on Sep 1, 2020 |
|
#
?
Aug 27, 2020 14:00
|
|
|
  Getting all the achievements in this game has been an actual goal of mine and I've put it off for years to the point of thinking I might never go back to it, so I'm fairly pleased with myself at the moment. Incidentally, I'm really surprised SpaceChem only has 2000 Steam reviews. When it came out in 2011 it made a fairly sizeable splash, I thought, and it was right at the start of the indie game boom. I know these are niche games but I genuinely would've expected it to have far more reviews considering how well-known and highly-rated it is, and the timing of its release. It's also been very cheap for a very long time now so most people have had a chance to grab it. And Steam reviews were already a thing in 2011. But only 2000, really? Anyway, if anyone here has somehow managed to not own SpaceChem (and wants to play it, ideally), I've had a spare copy of it + DLC in my Steam inventory for years, so let me know. Also Zachtronics stuff is discounted over at Humble right now as part of their End of Summer sale.
|
|
#
?
Aug 28, 2020 15:17
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 20, 2024 05:32 |
|
|
Kennel posted:Zachtronics style game Prime Mover has -80% sale (cheapest it's ever been) this game is nice, thanks for the rec
|
|
#
?
Sep 1, 2020 06:53
|
|
