/v/ - Video Games★

The histograms got fucked up in the last patch, so it's hard to compete against global records when they're not reporting the right numbers. Otherwise I've enjoyed it a lot, it's probably the only one of his games where I've spent as much time on post-game content as the main campaign.

>>13808226

I got a water purifier and glue solvent too.

>>13808241

Nice.

>>13808269

That's a nice optimization trick in the fourth one using the six-pronged arms to save yourself a cycle, but you can reduce it even further by having two arms working together. The histograms also say "Top Percentile" instead of "Global Record", so I think they might have patched it overnight.

>>13808307

Alchemy engines, it's based on an old game of his called The Codex of Alchemical Engineering.

>>13808312

Of course mine was also 10G cheaper. That's one of the stats I like to optimize for. Since mine is WHEELS it never has to reset to an initial position. I generally optimize for speed the least, though I like some balance.

I like wheels.

>>13808539

No way, man, low-cycle solutions are where it's at. Although if you like wheels, why aren't you using a wheel in the Surrender Flare solution?

If you like low-cost solutions I'd go and try that Resonant Crystal puzzle I posted from the Journal earlier, last I checked the top percentile solution was 30G. That's a single arm and a single bonding pad, no tracks, no pistons. No idea how that works out.

>>13808615

Yeah not sure why I didn't in the first place.

t. OP Because I have a VPN for remote work I must use

>that one level you get stuck on for over a year because you're a brainlet

fucking wish i could finish this game, makes me depressed as im on the last world.

>>13808941

magnet:?xt=urn:btih:24f8e08f7d17fa6e6ca24ba50855723482edb4fa

I don't think that's the most up to date version with all four pages of the Journal currently available, but it's the best I could find. There will be a DRM-free version after it's out of EA as well.

>>13808977

Are you sure? I usually keep an eye out for that sort of thing and I've only seen one Opus Magnum thread on 8/v/ since release.

>>13809013

In Opus Magnum? I kind of doubt it, the main campaign's not that tough. For SpaceChem I'd understand, the endgame is brutal.

Well that was a pain

looks great, probably going to buy it sooner or later. then again, i could still put more hours into factorio and i have yet to even touch the zachtronics shenzhen game, which also looked nice and tempting. too much choice.

there's simply too much games, i feel more overwhelmed than happy everytime a new interesting game comes out.

>>13809039

I remember that being my favorite planet. I don't exactly remember what was so difficult about working with the Omega element, I just like flip-flop switches. Prepare your anus for the final defense mission, by the way, that shit took me a solid week to figure out, and my solution barely worked.

>>13809296

I think the chain puzzles in the main campaign get a little repetitive, but the Journal has some really creative ones. I should go back and optimize, this is an old solution.

>>13809373

>i have yet to even touch the zachtronics shenzhen game

Do it, man, Shenzhen I/O is great, I definitely preferred it to Opus Magnum. Still haven't done the Avalon City bonus campaign yet, I've heard it's really challenging.

>>13809460

omega element don't have a set molecular mass, so you can just spin spam elements to build them up. but its not that that makes it hard its that is a "you have to use everything you've learned so far" end level thing.

>Prepare your anus for the final defense mission

I really sucked at the defense missions…

This game will make me feel retarded won't it?

I can already hear my brain crying just from looking at those gifs.

>>13809494

>its that is a "you have to use everything you've learned so far" end level thing.

Oh yeah, but that's what makes it great. I really appreciated how tough the main campaign of SpaceChem was and that you don't have to go to some optional bonus campaign for a real challenge.

>I really sucked at the defense missions…

Hey, I never finished the only defense mission in Infinifactory, you're not alone.

>>13809483

>where I'm stuck at on Shenzhen and TIS.

What stumped you? There's a lot of hard shit in the TIS-NET but I think the only soul-crushingly hard thing in Shenzhen I saw was the color-changing shoes puzzle.

>>13809507

>>13809502

I think the difficulty is kind of overstated, to be honest, you shouldn't be intimidated. They don't get really, really difficult until the very end.

a) SpaceChem isn't that bad until the last planet and the last two defense missions

b) Infinifactory isn't that bad until the (bonus) Resistance Campaign

c) TIS-100 isn't that bad until the (bonus) TIS-NET directory

and Opus Magnum isn't that bad until the (bonus) Journal of Alchemical Engineering campaign, and even then it's not as hard as his other games.

>>13809636

Anybody got a magnet for spacechem?

>>13809682

It depends, some of the more complex problems just end up requiring a lot of cycles. Definitely right about golfing being a lot harder though…. sometimes… it just works… I certainly enjoy it.

Vitae puzzles are fun. Another WHEEL scheme from me.

>>13809682

More or less, especially in Infinifactory and Opus Magnum. Those don't have any restriction on your workspace, so you can keep expanding your solution indefinitely and you'll never run out of room.

I made a couple but they're not very good.

>>13811234

That Alcohol Separation solution is actually pretty cool. The global record is 22 cycles, so apparently it's possible to do it crazy fast.

>>13811474

>where's the Loss edit?

here

Holy shit using two arms for one reagent is fast as fuck.

WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEELS

That was really a pain in the arse.

>>13812909

Told you

>>13812862

I'd wish for more novel games in the future like TIS and Shenzhen, since those two were my favorites, but trying to classify their other games as "generic industrial assembly line shit" is a pretty shallow view on it.

This was fun.

I'm enjoying this game immensely, thanks anons. Didn't realize this guy had another game out.

This was fun.

These turned out pretty good. The invisible ink one is very slow, but I like the symmetry.

And there we go, that's the last puzzle currently available in the Journal. I took a break for a couple days to play something else but I knew it had to come to an end eventually, until Page V comes out anyway. This one was genuinely a pain in the ass to get running because of how bottlenecked you are with reagents, but the sad thing is the cycle count is pretty decent, even with how high it is.

>>13818194

I'd look up some other similar solutions on YouTube, Infinifactory fans are out of their fucking minds. Might be the best autism blocks game out there.

Minimizing cost can be such a bitch sometimes.

TFW you surpass the 1 percentile in water purifier

>>13811474

The molecules are plain pngs in the folder so you can make a custom puzzle and make the molecules anything you want.

>>13827670

You're not really wrong, but SpaceChem was technically The Codex of Alchemical Engineering 2 when it came out, I think Zachtronics even said so on their website. And The Codex had an expansion pack called Magnum Opus, which would sort of make Opus Magnum a remake of The Codex 1.5

I remember them joking that TIS-NET should have been called TIS-200 when it came out, since it was longer than the main campaign.

>Personally, I prefer the programming games to SpaceChem, but that's just me.

Oh it's not just you, I prefer them too. More than wanting a new programming-based game I just want something that blew my mind as much as TIS-100 did. I think it might happen, too, Zach gave a talk earlier this year and mentioned a game they were working on, and it didn't sound like Opus Magnum.

>>13827712

Top Percentile isn't necessarily the global record, but that's still impressive

>>13827644

Jesus christ

>>13827644

I originally tried to make a giant schlong for that puzzle, but it was impossible to get all the arms synced. Might redo it with pistons. I think I already have the design in mind. But that looks infinitely more tedious than what I did here.

I made a puzzle onnaworkshop, actually took me a couple hours to solve my own puzzle. It's Fulminate of Quicksilver if any of you were interested.

>>13828973

All of your extra little pieces are going into the trashcan in my solution

completed the first challenge.

How the fuck does anybody get more condensed than this? I checked the histogram and a large slice of people got a smaller solution, although I was in the plurality.

>>13829211

>a large slice of people

Well, I think there's a pretty active Zachtronics subreddit where they share solutions with each other. It's definitely a problem with the histograms.

Also you can totally get it smaller than that, this was a quick pass I did to record a gif and it's still 1 more than the top percentile.

Yeah, there we go

>>13829258

I think yours is bigger because the algorithm isn't considering how many hexes have parts on them, but is counting how many hexes ever have overlap with moving atoms and parts. When your solution extends the second water atom and swings it around into the bonder, it touches these four tiles, which causes your score to go up.

>>13829276

>>13829293

I guessed that makes sense.

I finished refined gold for maximum efficiency (almost) in the time it took for you guys to post that.

Also fuck off >>13828973 those little red and green bonds are impossible to see, I had this all worked out nicely. Probably won't take too much tweaking to fix, but still

>picked up SpaceChem in a giveaway and played it off and on casually

>never got past Sleepless on Sernimir IV

>always thought I missed something incredibly obvious

>seeing this thread several years later reminds me of it so I googled someone else's solution

>glancing at it for a couple seconds made me realize I was right: it was obvious

I feel like a fucking idiot for somehow not trying to go over the same symbols multiple times in a loop. It's not on the same tier as pic related but still feels pretty fucking awful.

>>13829434

Here's the unoptimized proof of concept solution I tossed. It's a complete clusterfuck and I'll probably go back and make it a more efficient version of it someday, just wanted to get this shit out of the way.

>>13829434

>tfw remember that thread or a thread similar to the second pic

>remember OP claimed he had skipped 8 grades in school and was "under stress at the time" which somehow caused him not to be able to get out of the house

good times

Also, other solutions (not as good)

There we go, your move

>>13829460

Maybe I'm looking at it incorrectly but is that not functional? It's kind of circuitous but it should work fine, seems like your ratios might have a problem.

>It's a complete clusterfuck

You haven't seen a clusterfuck

>>13829464

>was "under stress at the time" which somehow caused him not to be able to get out of the house

I'm in a similar situation and some people who know me well think I'm suffering from brain damage of some kind, but I don't want this to turn into a blogpost.

>>13829478

It's functional, I've tested it.

Yeah, I'm fucking tired

>>13829526

>I'm in a similar situation and some people who know me well think I'm suffering from brain damage of some kind, but I don't want this to turn into a blogpost.

Well the story was that because he skipped all those grades that somehow affected his ability to play vidya.

Which is bullshit of course.

What I would believe is something like severe depression or drinking too much tap water

I ended up liking this puzzle a lot, actually, you should submit it to the Journal. Tell Zach he should include it so it can be the third puzzle to use those special bonds.

I probably could've done this better if I didn't care so much about adding in the WHEEL

Some more solutions I did just now.

>>13831773

>WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEL

My man.

>>13831821

>it_just_works.gif

>>13831891

my final one today, probably

>another autism game

>>13831942

had to fix this

>>13831967

reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

cut cycles down by a bit

>>13831967

Nice. I have poison lipstick.

>>13831701

>because the ratios are set up so that one of the air reagent with 2 alcohol makes 2 product with only 1 waste atom and yet somehow yours is faster despite trashing most of the molecule components.

I guess, but you'd have to double up your instructions to account for for that extra atom to be thrown away every other time an alcohol product is input. It's faster because I can do a 2:1 reagent:product ratio instead of the 3:1 you intended. You may as well try to balance out that initial 9:2 ratio to be 6:1 evenly, SpaceChem style. I'm a little surprised the histograms don't mention your instruction count.

>>13831773

What is it with you people and wheels? I actually made it through every puzzle without realizing that you can put Van Berlo's Wheel on a track and have it move across the board, which should be a useful wheel trick.

I was about to declare this the hardest puzzle in the game until I realized the 63Corvi-style portals could be moved. Still quite a bit tougher than the main campaign or the Journal. Currently have the lowest cycle count even with the shitty solution but I think maybe one other person is on the histogram so far.

Also, these ones don't have Area listed on the histograms, they count Instruction Count instead, which is really nice

>>13841079

I was really shocked that anyone was able to simulate any kind of computation in something as automated as Opus Magnum

Speaking of working in confined spaces

These new alchemy machines are really beautiful, man, the polished wood and ornamentation look great. The challenges are nuts, too, it's a way harsher space limit than usual even for Zachtronics and every piece you put down feels like you're backing yourself into a corner.

> tfw abandoned SpaceChem 3/4ths in.

> tfw didn't finish the last level of Infinifactory.

I have supreme respect for Zachtronics. This game, however, rubs me the wrong way. It looks like there's only one solution for every puzzle. I'm wrong, right?

On a scale from sloppy to mediocre, how is this elemental deatomizationizer-ometer?

I got an early magnet and didn't look for an updated one but I had fun with it.

I'm sure this can be done better but this is the lowest cycle solution in this thread for it.

Appendix is tough as shit but already has some really impressive low-cycle solutions on the histograms. Should have a pretty Infinifactory-style puzzle done in a minute if I hadn't made the product backwards

>>13845067

Thus far

Yeah, there. I had to waste a lot of cycles at the end because I had mistakenly made it so the vitae part would be on the bottom. The Heist missions in Infinifactory were my favorite, though, so I liked the callback a lot.

My attempt

Anyone got lower cycles than this?

broken it

>>13809296

It was a pain to time this properly so it didn't bind the next one in the middle.

>>13845398

>He didn't simply use another WHEEL to reduce cycles

>>13845437

Not bad

>>13845345

There's a way to save another 16 cycles, too, curious how that happens. Usually it's a matter of having two solutions running in parallel.

>>13846666

>this is what stole the quads

>>13846682

>how dare someone get digits on a legitimate post

>>13844085

Most of my solutions tend to have a lot of large spinning arms.

>>13846944

I might eventually buy it since I'm enjoying it quite a bit but not during EA.

>>13847332

>That spiral to form the chemical

>Then the swing around to bond it all together.

This is pleasing to my autism.

>you can only ever optimize at most two of the three measures

>the satisfaction of hitting the lowest bin of one histogram will always be tempered by being worse than average on another

I'm only a few puzzles in but I already know this is the sort of game where if you let yourself, you can end up never being satisfied.

>>13847451

> the histogram will only record your lowest score

Oh, I didn't know that. I thought it was specific to the solution.

I think I'll just refuse to let it bother me. Somehow I don't feel as interested in optimizing for cycles as for space and cost.

>>13847656

>>13847638

Well, to be clear, I'm talking about the final score it compares to the top percentile. It'll still have dotted lines to show the scores for each individual solution. If you like low-space solutions you'll like the Appendix.

I like wheels

I guess that's that, that's every puzzle currently available in the game done. The playtime snuck up on me, it's almost reached the point where I've played Opus Magnum for as long as it took to beat SpaceChem, it definitely doesn't feel like it's been that long.

I've burned through over fifty of these games so far and at first I thought the computer generated them in such a way that there was always a solution

Now I find that that isn't fucking true, as per pic related. In case you're wondering, no, I have not removed any of the 'marbles' from alongside those lines, that's how they were. As you can see, I need to get to the Tin proxy; I can't get there because all the "paths" to this proxy are fucking blocked by things that NEED the proxy to be removed.

It's like locking the key inside a room. Practically all the impossible situations I come across are explicitly because of the metal proxy cascade being unaccessible. Pisses me off.

>>13847693

That arm doesn't need to be a piston. Save you 20G right there.

>>13851643 (pic related)

>I like wheels

m a h n i g g a

>>13852295

>so that you could match salt with salt

Yeah that's the one I have, the version from the magnet posted in this thread.

Here's another example, taken far earlier in a game. I've hardly made any matches, maybe 2 or 3, you can see the original 3 corners where the puzzle started off. Again, I can't get to tin, because it's blocked by quicksilver. Since you can't get to something that's locked in a straight line, that means I would need to get tin as one of the very last pieces…which is not possible.

>>13851643

>Those two elements on the bottom left wheel that never get used.

This does not please my autism.

>>13857794

Can't confirm, but I thought that if there's a gap between bits of instructions, it will only repeat the later set? Play around with it.