Comment by JacksonGariety

11 years ago

I have some interesting results.

The first time I played the game I scored around 3000 points. After that, I tried to slow down and focus on keep the same kinds of numbers together, but after that, I couldn't get past 2250.

So I wrote a script that used Math.random() to hit the array keys continually, and the score was much lower: 1000.

Then I tried the sequence RIGHT UP LEFT DOWN over and over instead of Math.random() I scored significantly higher than all of them, in the 4000s.

Does anyone know why this might be?

8 comments

JacksonGariety

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valtron  11 years ago

Tried 3 games, and the scores were 2700, 1200, 5000. So maybe. But then I wrote a function to play it for me:

    var manager = new GameManager(4, KeyboardInputManager, HTMLActuator);
    
    function play() {
      manager.restart();
      var m = 0;
      while (!manager.over) {
        manager.move(m);
        m = (m+1)%4;
      }
      return manager.score;
    }

... and that gets scores between 500 and 3000.

(Edit) Histogram of 500 runs:

  0k: ***
  1k: *******************
  2k: ****************
  3k: *********
  4k: *
  5k: *
  6k: *

  • VMG  11 years ago

    Which is about the same score you get if you concentrate and really try hard to get a high score.

    I think this might be a "hacker" version of the slot machine - the player feels as if he's in control while in fact the outcome is pretty random.

    • mightybyte  11 years ago

      Hmmm, that wasn't my experience. I got a score of 7540 on my first try. Although I do suspect that the skill component might be less than we think.

    • cordite  11 years ago

      Yeah, when I tried a systematic approach, I was getting better results than when I tried thinking about it. Left Down Right Down repeat.

      1 reply →

    • db48x  11 years ago

      Nah, if I concentrate I can get to 14k. I haven't actually won yet, though; I keep making a mistake.