Idea for a puzzle game

[Quantum P.]

Puzzle games are hard to get right, so someone tell me if this idea sounds interesting.



The goal is to open all the doors. Pressing up toggles the doors according to a pattern, and left and right both rotate the pattern.

For example, to solve the above puzzle, press right twice. The two boulders on the left move over, and the boulder on the far right wraps around. Now that the boulders are above the closed doors, pressing up will cause them to open.

The genre of puzzle (push buttons to open all doors) has been done before, but this particular puzzle has some mathematical background to it. Basically, if you invent some new math rules, you can pretend the puzzles are numbers, and you can use certain math tricks to solve them. A simple example is if you solve puzzles A and B, that might make it trivial to solve a puzzle C = A*B.

It's a game with two puzzles. The first puzzle is, how do I open those doors. The second puzzle is understanding the system on which the game is built, so you can solve puzzles that look harder (but are really somewhat easy). A meta-puzzle, in a way.

I'll stop rambling.

Level prototype (.ZIP, 1.4KB)

[Commodore]

Having been programing ML for a while now I appreciate the title. I think you've invented a game where you are in a computer. Manipulating bits in this one way might only be the beginning. I was trying to think of variations on it an I think it seems one could use also "and/or" by having different coloured boulders that always set, or always clear, but that might make things too easy unless you pre-design the patterns. the random generator is cool but there should be some sort of fail-safe so it never generates a combination with only one boulder.

The only other variation I can think of is actually trying to write a small program (written and read in boulders) using only the two bitshifts and the xor to open the doors. The pattern would reset after each try though the program if the problem wasn't solved.

[Quantum P.]

ML the functional programming language, or ML short for machine language?

I like your idea for writing programs in boulders. Maybe surprisingly, I was thinking about it more like a calculator than a computer, but a mini Turing machine would be cool. Part of the puzzle would be figuring out what program you need to make.

My other ideas for variations were mostly just extending the math: using bases other than binary (decimal, 9+1=0), or finite fields (pattern changes if you rotate a 1 bit off the end). I was also thinking about adding a small amount of action to the game; I'm not sure how, but maybe if you were really stuck on a puzzle, you could go out and kill some monsters, and maybe one of them would drop a free bitflip, or a partial solution, or something.

Now I need to read up on Turing machines, though. :)

[Commodore]

Yes machine language. Specifically you emulate three opcodes ROR, (rotate bits right) ROL (rotate bits left) and EOR (exclusive or) The minor difference being you don't use a ninth bit: the carry flag, but it's pretty similar.

Given your mathematical prowess I think you might have some fun with assembly.

I like the enemy thing. Maybe there are repeatable challenges that give you the boulders you need to program and as you get the ability to write longer programs you can get deeper into the system. Some Tron type stuff or something.

[Quantum P.]

Above screenshot is kind of cheating, because it makes it look like I've worked more on the game than I really have. In reality, there's nothing on either side of this board.

I just like making the fun parts first. It's a sliding puzzle that uses gems in addition to the usual stuff, and it vaguely resembles some previous puzzles the player will have seen...

[Commodore]

it's pretty and pretty scary too!

[Schroedingers Cat]

Looks like the interior of a pyramid.

[Quantum P.]

Schrödinger guessed it!

[Quantum P.]

I might be slightly too ambitious here, but I have about 25 boards of artistic-liberty-Egyptian desert, and now I'm brainstorming: what are some small things you'd find in Egypt?

Asking because between the temple and the pyramids I just have 25 boards of sand and rocks.

[Commodore]

caravans, scorpions, oasis, guerrillas, hermits, crashed planes, sand whirlpool (giant ant-lion style?)

[Schroedingers Cat]

scarabs, mummified remains (human and animal), cactus plants, gold, snakes, spiders, bats