May. 10th, 2008 @ 12:22 am Links
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* You think arguing about what Narnia book is best to read first? Meet the Discworld reading order flowchart!

* How to toilet train your cat. Claims to do exactly what it says on the tin. (And you know, that's how to train your cat to use a water closet, not a litter box. The flushing is still being worked on, but has progress.)

* GLadOS ringtones! (The character-laiden computer from PORTAL.) They are amazing, produced from text-to-speech and audio editing software, they sound just like her announcing an incoming call "For the comfort and convenience of those around you, please acknowledge it. You're not going to answer it, are you?", in tone and phrasing, and so sweet and/or psychotic. For the first time ever in my life I am tempted to choose a ring tone because I want to, rather than to remove ring tones from life as completely as I am able.

* Kongregare.com/games/scarybug/chronotron

"You had me at time travelling robots!" This is amazing. It's like lemmings, but instead of lots of lemmings, you have a robot with a time machine, and have to keep looping in order to stand in the right places and operate the right buttons to get all copies of yourself back to the time machine!
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From:[info]arkannath
Date: May 10th, 2008 06:34 am (UTC)
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The flowchart doesn't know about Making Money, which should go in the bottom right corner with a strong connection from Going Postal.
From:[info]cartesiandaemon
Date: May 10th, 2008 01:07 pm (UTC)
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Oh yes, I didn't know if it would be at all useful, I was just amused by how complicated any attempt had to be at all.
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From:[info]atreic
Date: May 10th, 2008 10:09 am (UTC)
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'm not convinced by that. Where's the weak link between the wizards books and lords and ladies? The Ridcully backstory in there is fabulous, and it's where a lot of the wizards charactor development takes place.
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From:[info]d37373
Date: May 11th, 2008 11:36 pm (UTC)
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Mmm, not quite. For a start, Monstrous Regiment doesn't belong there (and if I had my was it wouldn't be on the chart, but that's another matter...); also what atreic said, no link between the witches and the wizards. Moving Pictures has far more minor links than that. Ok, I'll stop there.

I think I see the root problem. The chart is trying to do reading order as well as connections between the books, which forces an unnatural restriction on the connections. Even the author of the diagram knew something was wrong with the categorisation - Thief Of Time is *related* to the Death books, but it's not *in* them, hence it's different border. And I'm not sure "Industrial Revolution" is really a category.

Arg, stop now.
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From:[info]alextfish
Date: May 12th, 2008 05:04 am (UTC)
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Wheee. Chronotron is awesome. Just got to Level 21, but got stuck there due to not being able to work the seesaw. If anyone figures out how the seesaw works, let me know.

Off to bed now... (it's 1am here, not 6am, although having been in Cambridge 2 days ago it does feel a bit like 6.)
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From:[info]chess
Date: May 12th, 2008 11:32 am (UTC)
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I lost track of level numbers - 21 sounds quite high though so presumably it's not as simple as 'jump on it from a great height to propel the you on the other end to a great height' like the seesaw learning level?
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From:[info]alextfish
Date: May 12th, 2008 01:29 pm (UTC)
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Ahh, I see. I think I must have lucked out the seesaw learning level :) I assumed it was some kind of synchronised jumping between two robots, like "ping... pong... Ping... Pong... PING... PONG... Pow!" But it may well be just height. Thanks for the simple explanation :)
From:[info]cartesiandaemon
Date: May 12th, 2008 01:33 pm (UTC)
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One level I found I didn't need the see-saw at all, just one robot jumping carrying a block, and another jumping off the top of that block at the top of the vertical arc, reached the height without any see-sawing at all.

I'm not sure of the physics -- I think in real life ping-pong ought to work, but I'm not sure if it works in the game. (I always tried jumping when fired off a see-saw, but not sure if it makes any difference. It's probably easier to code it so it doesn't.)
From:[info]cartesiandaemon
Date: May 12th, 2008 12:56 pm (UTC)
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Sometimes I think I find unintended solutions, when clearly something clever is meant to happen, but enough robots can brute force a simple solution.

I just checked. Level 21, put robots on the left weigh-bridge to get one up to the button at the top-right via the right weigh-bridge (if you stand on a weigh-bridge and jump repeatedly, you add negligible weight).

Now, with that robot still on the button, put robots on the right weigh-bridge and have one jump off the left weigh-bridge onto the see-saw. Have another stand on the see-saw, and collect the chip at the top-left.

The home site (scarybuggames) has walkthrough videos if you get really stuck.