[HN Gopher] It's A(door)able
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It's A(door)able
Author : michaelbrooks
Score : 805 points
Date : 2023-05-03 10:32 UTC (12 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (ncase.me)
(TXT) w3m dump (ncase.me)
| sriram_malhar wrote:
| Well done! You got me!
| crazygringo wrote:
| The message at the end was cute, but playing this was
| infuriating. :(
|
| It took me like 20 tries just to get past the first panel,
| because it was buzz with failure every time I got to the door
| after picking up the key. It took forever to realize the buzz was
| from the timer, because it always buzzed once I was _already at
| the door_ , like the door was the wrong goal.
|
| Then once I realized it's time-based, another 20 tries to do the
| second panel in a short enough time. The third panel was easy,
| though.
|
| So something seems to be miscalibrated. (Macbook Air M1 on
| Chrome, and it's not like I've got a slow key repeat configured
| or anything.) I get that it's trying to force you to take the
| shortest distance, but playing this made me incredibly angry
| because it felt like it was unwinnable. And when I finally did
| succeed on the first and second panels, it felt random -- maybe
| it gave me extra time or something? It's not like I got any
| "better" at it.
| neogodless wrote:
| Huh, I didn't have sound enabled (or didn't get any buzzing)
| and all doors were readily unlocked on my first attempt.
|
| Have you tried upgrading your M1 processor to an AMD Ryzen? /s
| (sarcastic, but with love)
| SamBam wrote:
| The first panel where you literally only have to go backward
| then forward?
|
| There was a ton of time for me. Either something odd with
| your computer, or developer's timing algorithm doesn't work
| the same on all machines.
| neogodless wrote:
| I assume you meant to reply to the same person I replied
| to.
| crazygringo wrote:
| I'm going to guess the timing algorithm has something
| wonky. Because no, not enough time to go backwards then
| forwards.
| __MatrixMan__ wrote:
| I struggled with the second one, but I assumed it was just
| because I have low DEX
| metaljr wrote:
| This is amazing!!
| akshayrajp wrote:
| That's one way to make me blush while at work haha
| toxik wrote:
| Aable?
| Bjorkbat wrote:
| Lol, thanks Nicky Case, I needed that
| ricardo81 wrote:
| Good stuff, spirit of the original web.
| dbeley wrote:
| Clicked for a new Mini-ITX case in the shape of a cute door(?),
| stayed for the kind message <3
| EngManagerIsMe wrote:
| Cute!
|
| Mine said, "I 9 U!"
|
| But I see what they were trying to get me to do, cute.
| mordae wrote:
| I am showing this to kids at the game programming hobby group
| today. This is hilarious. I mean all of Nick's creations are
| dope, but this one caught me by surprise. :-)
| Gns89 wrote:
| addiction level over 9000
| brunoocasali wrote:
| That's so fun! :D
| clueless wrote:
| circular based design, a mission to find a key (answer), with
| time constraints, and the ending message
| (subjective/objective)... this is a work of spiritual art!
| Kyro38 wrote:
| The author has an interesting game about "trust":
| https://ncase.me/trust/
| dadadad100 wrote:
| This one reminded me that this is a well-studied problem. It
| turns out cooperation is nearly optimal [1]
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Evolution_of_Cooperation
| baggachipz wrote:
| This was awesome, thank you for linking.
| xp84 wrote:
| Echoing all the others that this Trust game is great, I noticed
| something else that struck me in some of the "play with the
| dials" stages.
|
| The game showed us that when you decrease the reward for
| Cooperate/Cooperate from +2 to +1, the Always-Cheats take over.
| But I tried increasing the reward for above the default of +2
| to +3 or +4 and an interesting thing happened: The naive
| Always-Cooperates actually took over!
|
| It made me think about how a lot of cynical people -- of both
| sides of the political divide -- play the 'game' as
| 'cutthroatly' as possible. I think if you asked these people
| how they see the world, they'd tell you that "the system is
| rigged anyway" such that there's barely any benefit to
| cooperating. "So why shouldn't I exploit everything I can to
| get mine?" And in a world where there's arguably not enough
| reward for cooperating, I can see how people arrive at a
| cynical conclusion and become Always-Cheaters. This is why
| people who work for minimum wage generally don't want to work
| hard and provide great customer service. And it's why companies
| who employ them don't want to pay them a living wage and
| benefits. Both sides would tell you that the rewards of doing
| that aren't worth the risks or the cost.
|
| If we could somehow bring about greater rewards for good-faith
| participation (working hard - a very high likelihood of
| affording a moderately nice lifestyle), I think a lot of
| cynicism would be outcompeted by more cooperative attitudes.
| Obviously I'd already be President of the World if I knew how
| to just make that happen, though.
| [deleted]
| nmz wrote:
| More about the prisoners dilemma it seems.
| tamasnet wrote:
| Thanks so much for sharing this, deeply impactful.
| batmansmom1 wrote:
| All of the games made by them are really awesome I highly
| recommend
| DiscourseFan wrote:
| I think game theory is really cool and all, but I'm not sure it
| actually has much relevance for analyzing human behavior. It is
| always taught in that way, to simplify it for undergrads, but
| the mathematical concepts, I think, are significantly more
| important than the "ethical" questions.
| jspann wrote:
| I liked playing this game! The art style, animations, and
| overall messages were a really good experience! I look forward
| to sharing this with my friends later.
| DavidPiper wrote:
| Adding a comment so this stands out. It's the game of Nicky's I
| come back to the most. A very interesting look into the game
| theory of trust.
| rapnie wrote:
| Also liked the Parable of the Polygons about the shape of
| society: https://ncase.me/polygons
|
| Hell, they are all great!
| acomjean wrote:
| She has a bunch of really though provoking web mini games.
|
| I always remember "parable of the polygons"
|
| https://ncase.me/projects/
|
| Everything seems fresh, though this door one was 2015.
| bentcorner wrote:
| Makes me wonder how you could apply this to social media.
|
| What if you had a social media site where you could only see
| the same set of people? (Say, 150 people - Dunbar's number)
|
| This isn't perfect by any means, but how would you fix it from
| there? Would you make it mix the population every few months?
| Maybe just comments/reactions are restricted to your cohort but
| you can see all posts? Would you mix the population based on
| some kind of score? Could that score be multi-dimensional?
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| It probably wouldn't work, because social media is voluntary.
| People can just reduce participation, or just leave, and find
| alternative ways to get whatever value they were getting from
| the social media site. Users stay because it's fun, or
| because their friends are staying (network effect); your
| proposed interventions would both frustrate the users and
| weaken or destroy the "glue" that keeps them coming back.
|
| In contrast, those natural social networks of yore - tribes,
| villages - were all-encompassing, and you were stuck with
| them. The modern social networks that are strong - school,
| university, work - also have this strong "like it or not, I'm
| stuck here with this people" component. Sure, it's easier to
| change a job than a tribe, but it's still _costly_.
| Alacart wrote:
| Am I going crazy or were many of these exact comments posted the
| last time this was linked?
| gowld wrote:
| When was that?
|
| It's shockingly not in the archives, so 'dang might have
| changed the date on an old submission, as he sometimes does for
| "second chance" (and that updated comment timestamps also,
| annoyingly).
|
| https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...
| EvanAnderson wrote:
| I feel like I've seen this happen on HN as well. I assumed I
| was going crazy but I'm glad to hear somebody else has seen
| this too.
| Lewton wrote:
| Sometimes posts are merged, but dang usually posts when he does
| it, maybe he forgot?
| carimura wrote:
| love it. although I thought putting my own message in at the end
| was going to build a map that created that message. that would be
| next level!
| ECBicalho wrote:
| I thought the same, I even tried accessing it in guest mode,
| ahaha. I wonder how complex it would be to extend to custom
| paths, maybe create predefined paths for some ASCII
| characters... maybe chatGPT helps me with that <laughs>
| xutopia wrote:
| This reminds me of early days of internet when flash was starting
| to gain a foothold. We had so many neat things like this
| appearing everywhere. Surprises after surprises. Nowadays the
| internet is really tame compared to that.
| jaimehrubiks wrote:
| I thought the custom message would generate a custom level that
| replayed those letters lol
| oaktowner wrote:
| I did it wrong! In the middle one, I didn't make a heart -- I
| went to and fro both on the left side, so it ended up looking
| more like a backwards question mark than a heart!
| clbrmbr wrote:
| Beautiful little gem. Bravo.
| chompychop wrote:
| Best thing I clicked today! Love it! I somehow expected "adding
| your personal message" to generate a level that would trace out
| my custom message though.
| entropicgravity wrote:
| It's a knotA(door)able for me.
| rahimnathwani wrote:
| What are some other amazing sites with handcrafted experiences,
| similar to ncase.me and ciechanow.ski?
| ifvictr wrote:
| Check out https://neal.fun!
| mavu wrote:
| Just when you are thoroughly resigned to the fact that humanity
| is just terrible, and that a large asteroid would be just the
| thing the planet needs, someone comes along and puts something
| out into the world that is just nice and beautiful.
|
| Well, shit.
|
| And THANK YOU!
| MC68328 wrote:
| It's very coercive, and therefore insincere.
| Gravityloss wrote:
| You _will_ let me love you!
| SamBam wrote:
| Not if you think of it as revealing the sender's message, not
| writing your own.
| arghwhat wrote:
| Okay, you got me.
| vvatsa wrote:
| ya, me too. Nice job.
| krsrhe wrote:
| [dead]
| assimpleaspossi wrote:
| I have no clue what's going on here.
|
| Why do people create these things and assume everyone will know
| what's happening.
| scubbo wrote:
| If you're talking about the game itself - because keys and
| doors are pretty universally understood symbols.
|
| If you're talking about the ending (no spoilers) - those
| symbols are also widely understood among the target audience of
| HN.
| _boffin_ wrote:
| Thank you
| phoe-krk wrote:
| Adding the time limit and actually making the clock go _faster_
| when a player is (purposefully) going off the rails is a sinister
| trick to ensure that players get the expected ending message.
| Clever that the programmer throught of these cases.
| twic wrote:
| Although there's just about time to make the middle of the
| message "fox".
| prostanac wrote:
| On the middle one they only check if you go backwards from the
| position of the key (I got it to work clockwise). If you
| continue on the intended path and then go back the clock won't
| go faster. You have to be fast though.
| mtmickush wrote:
| There's just barely enough time on the middle and last levels
| to double back even with the faster clock movement for going
| the wrong direction. Fun little challenge
| bravetraveler wrote:
| I don't know enough about web stuff, but I wonder how much
| this depends on the system
|
| I got past the second one, and oddly was able to 'sit still'
| in the middle while rearranging my fingers for a remarkably
| 'long' time (couple seconds or so, hard to guage)
|
| For anyone smarter than me: I'm on Linux with Wayland and a
| 144Hz display, output should be synchronized if this plays a
| part
| codetiger wrote:
| I didn't notice that. Good one!! Thanks for sharing.
| codeflo wrote:
| Hmmm. I tried about a dozen times before giving up. I thought
| the game was broken before reading your comment.
|
| Nothing in the game visually indicates that going back is worse
| than going forwards. As the level is symmetrical, the distance
| is literally the same. A one-way door, or crumbling floor,
| would have been easy solutions I think.
| koromak wrote:
| Theres momentum, turning around is much slower than moving
| forward like most games
| ackfoobar wrote:
| But that's not what this game is doing though. I fumbled
| and reversed direction picking up the key and still got to
| the door in time.
| Wowfunhappy wrote:
| IMO, the game design mistake here was having too little
| momentum. There should be an _excessive_ amount of
| momentum, so the player immediately understands that the
| levels will be impossible if they turn around.
| croisillon wrote:
| well you gain speed just picking the key underway instead of
| stopping and going backward
| djvu97 wrote:
| I tried to go wrong way and i was not able to do. Thanks for
| telling us
| phoe-krk wrote:
| "A good programmer is someone who always looks both ways
| before crossing a one-way street." -- Doug Linder
| troymc wrote:
| In tourist-filled parts of the world where they drive on
| the left side of the road (e.g. UK, Australia, Japan), you
| sometimes see signs reminding the tourists to look right
| before crossing the road.
| KineticLensman wrote:
| London in particular has the signs ("Look left", "Look
| right") written in words on the road surface itself at
| obvious crossing points, especially near stations etc. So
| pedestrians look down at them as they go to cross the
| road.
| csixty4 wrote:
| "Three programmers come to a one-way street. The academic
| looks to the right, doesn't see any oncoming cars, and
| crosses. The corporate programmer looks to the left, then
| looks to the right, and then crosses. The distributed
| systems engineer looks to the left, then looks to the
| right, then looks up to make sure there aren't any planes
| falling out of the sky..."
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| "... the hacker looks down to check for landmines and
| footguns, and then runs to catch up with the rest,
| grumbling something about computer scientists and off-by-
| one errors."
| st_goliath wrote:
| Well, I _do_ always look both ways when crossing the one-
| way street where I live.
|
| But not because of programming experience, but because of
| late-night Taxi drivers who drive like Doc Brown
| (https://youtu.be/vHake6w4Su0?t=17) and believe that
| "reverse" is some kind of cheat code that flips the
| direction _of the road_.
|
| Also, cyclists.
| the__alchemist wrote:
| I now have Braid theme music stuck in my head.
| hackerting wrote:
| wow. so simple but fun!
| beefsack wrote:
| It appears I succeeded incorrectly, and "I C U".
| mehlmao wrote:
| This was cute. It reminded me of The Looker, a parody of The
| Witness. It's available free on Steam:
| https://store.steampowered.com/app/1985690/The_Looker/
| greenie_beans wrote:
| I AM TRYING TO WORK RIGHT NOW
| makach wrote:
| clever! I was genuinely surprised!
| vinc wrote:
| I don't understand how to play, I seem to lose right after I get
| the key every time..
| dwringer wrote:
| If it's the second frame of the three-panel strip, then, as
| another commenter hints, the trick is _not_ to double back. You
| must complete a circuit around the map. I got frustrated and
| quit long before trying this until reading that comment, but it
| (arguably) pays off.
| vinc wrote:
| It's the first frame, I read the comments and still I don't
| understand. The game is too stressful for me, I give up haha
| drjasonharrison wrote:
| or before I get the key, or as I get the key...
|
| I don't play video games at all so playing a game where I have
| to figure out the goal. Ugh.
| [deleted]
| n1c00o wrote:
| This is awesome
| closewith wrote:
| This is real _best of the web_ stuff.
| arbitrage wrote:
| oh gosh this was so great. thank you!!!! you are awesome for
| putting this together.
| nyc_pizzadev wrote:
| I guess there is no way to play on mobile?
| nyc_pizzadev wrote:
| Was finally able to play it on a desktop. Maybe having a finger
| moveable joystick widget would give you an equal experience on
| mobile.
| finnjohnsen2 wrote:
| This is the link I am most happy I pressed today. Thank you for
| making this.
| 6451937099 wrote:
| [dead]
| 6451937099 wrote:
| [dead]
| smcl wrote:
| Very cute :)
| trizoza wrote:
| Love that!
| andy_ppp wrote:
| For some reason I assumed it was to do with https://ncases.com/ -
| it's unrelated!
| ciroduran wrote:
| Nicky Case has been doing these interactive experiences for
| quite a while, I love every single one of them
| jeron wrote:
| I was also wondering why an SFF PC case manufacturer was making
| minigames
| favorited wrote:
| Oh wow, I hadn't realized that the M1 EVO had an order form
| already. So tempting.
| Night_Thastus wrote:
| The art style reminds me of some classic games/animations from
| Newgrounds. Forgot what they were called. Pretty violent and
| heavy on social commentary, so it's a bit of a shock to see that
| style used in such an opposite way!
| makin wrote:
| I think you mean the Madness series? Nick Case here was part of
| the same Newgrounds zeitgeist that originated it, so good
| catch.
| afloyd wrote:
| It is very similar to the old newgrounds series :the game:,
| made by Nutcasenightmare. Because Nicky Case is
| Nutcasenightmare
| Night_Thastus wrote:
| That's the one!
| mogery wrote:
| awww!
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(page generated 2023-05-03 23:00 UTC)