3,079! Got Threes a few days ago because of the great reviews and forum impressions and at first I was disappointed. While charming, there was a sense of "This is it?" But once I spent some time with the game, I saw the subtle depth of the puzzle solving. What appears to be a simple random sliding game becomes a puzzler where logic and long-term planning is key. Considering your board, thinking about how a swipe will change your board and the possible places the next tile could fill, weighing combining two like tiles or saving them for later. Being able to "see the future" and see what kind of tile is coming next makes the gameplay less about reacting to what the next turn brings and more about planning how to use that foresight to your advantage. The perfected touch interface and minimalist style only adds to the overall polish and combing two tiles into one is endlessly satisfying Some things I'd like to see: - A restart button. You can retry once you complete a game, but unless I'm missing it, there's no way to simply restart a new game while you're already playing one - Not having to confirm my name after every game - I'd rather only have my three highest scores shown, rather my current 16 and counting
I'd like an undo button, I totally understand why there isn't one but on many occasions I've accidently moved it the one direction, or when moving slowly to check the board I've released my finger too early and the tiles have moved. Maybe an undo button that only be used once during a game? Also I kind of love and hate there's no restart button. I think if they're was a restart button then I'd have used it a lot thinking that I had a bad board but actually some if the worst starts have ended as the best games.
You are missing something. During a game, you can hit "menu" (top left) and then hit "MAIN MENU" (big red button at the bottom). The game will then ask you "Are you sure?" to confirm you really want to drop your current game and after a confirmation, you are back at the welcome screen with all the cards you have unlocked so far. As far as I can remember, this is coming in an update. Personal preference. Maybe a more compact representation could be used. I am strongly opposed to an undo button. I understand the frustration with erroneous swipes but an undo button would do more harm than good in my opinion. You would have to limit it (either in number of uses per game or number of moves you can go back) to prevent silliness ("oh, I got myself stuck, better go back 5 moves and do something different"). Combine this with the random card draw mechanic and its placement an undo button would undermine the whole concept by allowing you to do and redo a move as often as you need to place the new card where you need it. In one interview a developer said something along the lines of "the game resisted complexity from day one." - an undo button is complex despite it looking so simple. I once appropriated a quote by Yoda in a similar discussion about an undo button in Outwitters: "Do or do not, there is no undo." And back to spoilery stuff. Spoiler I attempted to get a long game recorded but sadly ended with a high card of 384. Nevertheless this new sequence (#7) shows something really interesting. First, there is a 1 missing in the line with h:192. The real surprise is a stack near the end which looks like this: 1, 1, 2, 2, 3, 6, 1, 48, 2, 3, 3, 2, 1, (no colors because it would be visible outside the spoiler) I don't know about you but this is the first stack I see with 2 non-3 white bonus cards in it. It is also nicely framed by 1s and 2s on both ends so even with the 1 missing in the earlier stack, the borders of this one should be correct. What we can see is that now we have 3 3s and 2 bonus cards where we usually have 4 3s and 1 bonus card. This seems to be a very rare occurrence. Need more data!
Spoiler I may have another data point for you on that. In my previously submitted data, start at 192. Assuming a deck with no bonus is 12 cards, we have 1 non-bonus stack, then 1 13 card bonus stack (24), then 1 12 card non-bonus, then a stack with 2 bonus cards (12, 6) at positions 5 and 8 in the stack. Is it possible we have added 2 bonus cards to the stack, as opposed to replacing another 3 with a non-3?
I agree that there should be no undo button. I just wish that the swipe recognition was fixed, because at the moment it's oversensitive and it's very easy to trigger an unwanted swipe simply by touching the screen. It has happened to me so many times that I've lost count.
There is no 3079 tile. Do you mean instead 3072 (1536 + 1536)? Can you post a screenshot of your game leading to and after this special tile so we can see the surrounding tiles at the critical moment? Edit: It is 3072 not 3078.
He means that was his score, so probably a 192 tile max. Kamikaze, if you outline a sample setup, I will recreate it and we can see the stack algorithm from a higher max tile (aka, skip a lot of the game).
Maybe he meant his total score, even still 3079 isn't possible. Also it's very unlikely he took screenshots during his game
Are you sure? I thought all scores, which includes Bronxsta's supposed score of 3079, should be divisible by 3. 3079 is not even divisible by 3. If it is indeed a 3072 tile, then it is important Bronxsta shares the screenshots (and more importantly) the path of the tiles leading to it so kamikaze28 can verify his algorithm using his data. Edit: It is 3072 not 3078.
Score or tile? Kinda important. I reached the elusive 1536 tile yesterday, but not sure if I want to go on and risks losing this game. If you got the 3072 tile, can you post a screenshot showing the special tile and (most importantly) the tiles currently around that tile?
Thanks, Scorpion008, for the 3072 correction! Typo. It is OK. It is actually not the tile's graphics I am interested in. It is the surrounding tiles and the position of the special tile that I am most interested in. From these positions, you can sort of tell if there is a center/corner strategy being used as well as the "train" of tiles he made in preparation. For me, I did not use any because those discussions came long after I was at 768 already, so it was too late for me to apply them even if I want to.
Spoiler This is weird. So far almost all stacks with bonus cards had 4 3s in them and the bonus card was, well, a bonus. Now we have two stacks with two bonus cards: one with 3 3s and one with 4 3s. As far as I could tell, there was no mistake in your sequence (#1, please use these IDs when you reference specific sequences) but this does not have to mean that there are none. There could be multiple errors which cancel each other out from the viewpoint of the algorithm but shift the stack boundaries. It boils down to recording more sequences (with hopefully no errors) and seeing which of these behaviors emerges as the default. Or maybe there is logic at work with these bonus cards that we have not considered yet. You mean by altering the savegame file? I'm sorry but I can't trust that method. You said yourself that there are a lot of variables in those savegame files of which you don't know the purpose. We can therefore not assume that an artificially created late game behaves identically to a legitimately achieved late game.
Kamikaze28: Spoiler I now hypothesize that the game does NOT reshuffle the deck upon reaching a higher number card; or at least that not reshuffling is a POSSIBILITY, perhaps to prevent deterministic play like we're attempting. Here is the data from my current game: (3,2,1,3,3,2,1,2,3),h:6,1,2,1,3,h:12,1,2,3,3,2,1,h:24,2,3,1,1,2,1,2,1,1,1,2,2,3,3,3,3,2,2,2,3,1,h:48,3,1,3,1,3,1,2,2,2,2,1,2,3,1,3,1,1,3,2,2,3,6,2,2,3,h:96,2,3,1,3,2,1,3,1,1,12,1,1,3,1,2,2,1,2,3,3,3,2,2,2,3,1,1,3,3,3,1,2,2,1,2,3,1,2,6,2,1,3,3,2,1,1,3,1,3,2,1,3,3,3,2,1,2,1,2,1,2,h:192,6 While playing, I took notes assuming a reshuffle on reaching a higher card, adding line breaks to keep track visually, like so: (3,2,1,3,3,2,1,2,3), h:6,1,2,1,3, h:12,1,2,3,3,2,1, h:24,2,3,1,1,2,1,2,1,1,1,2,2,3,3,3,3,2,2,2,3,1, h:48,3,1,3,1,3,1,2,2,2,2,1,2,3,1,3,1,1,3,2,2,3,6,2,2,3, h:96,2,3,1,3,2,1,3,1,1,12,1,1,3,1,2,2,1,2,3,3,3,2,2,2,3,1,1,3,3,3,1,2,2,1,2,3,1,2,6,2,1,3,3,2,1,1,3,1,3,2,1,3,3,3,2,1,2,1,2,1,2, h:192,6 Actually, I stopped using this formatting method long before reaching h:96, since one can plainly see something is very wrong in h:24. 6 1s and 1 3?! So I went back and reformatted. Look at it like this, assuming NO RESHUFFLE once reaching a higher level, including the beginning cards in the sequence. (3,2,1,3,3,2,1,2,3),h:6,1,2,1, 3,h:12,1,2,3,3,2,1,h:24,2,3,1,1,2, 1,2,1,1,1,2,2,3,3,3,3,2, 2,2,3,1,h:48,3,1,3,1,3,1,2,2, 2,2,1,2,3,1,3,1,1,3,2,2, 3,6,2,2,3,h:96,2,3,1,3,2,1,3,1,1,12,1,1,3,1,2,2,1,2,3,3,3,2,2,2,3,1,1,3,3,3,1,2,2,1,2,3,1,2,6,2,1,3,3,2,1,1,3,1,3,2,1,3,3,3,2,1,2,1,2,1,2,h:192,6 Everything is explained perfectly by a 12 card deck with no reshuffling at higher levels, until the first shuffle after reaching h:48. Of course, that's where I posit that bonus cards first appear, which increases the randomness and complexity of the draws. Note the first stack after h:48 has 5 2s and 3 3s. As you noted earlier today, it seems that there are variations from the 4/4/4 distribution besides just the addition of bonus cards. Edit: not sure about the weird line breaks in the first data set or the spurious spaces in the second. Those are not in my original text. Edit: for those interested in strategy, my current game is my first to 768 and I've been using the corner strategy. I had a great setup along the bottom, with 384, 192, 96 in order. Upon forming 768 I had only 8 tiles on the board - one fewer than when the game starts! And they were along the left and bottom edges with one lone 2 in the upper right corner. I should have taken a screenshot...
Spoiler I ran that through the script (new sequence #8) and while the overal distribution of 1s and 2s seems right (41:42), their distribution baffles me. My script recognizes stacks in there with just one 2s or three 1s. Could it be that you missed some card draws? This is very strange.
Well actually it's only important to a few people here. I for one don't find it important that the algorithm is worked out. Also As I said, it's very doubtful he kept a record of what moves he made upto the point if getting the 3072 (if that's what it was)
@kamikaze I noticed pressing menu to retry thing but when the warning appeared saying that it will be as if you never played threes I worried that it meant all data would be lost, glad that's not the case.. I understand the potential for an undo to be abused which is why I suggested only being to undo one move per game. I guess if it will change the mechanics behind the game then it shouldn't be there, but to be honest I'm more of a casual player so I didn't think of the effect it would have. I've got some data for you but my highest card was only 192, you still want it?
