eric@whuxle.UUCP (Eric Holtman) (07/02/84)
Recently (August 84), Games Magazine ran a letter from a guy whose basic thought was "Gee, it's real easy to bust up some of your contests by having a PC do the dirty work for you." (FYI- Games Magazine has a contest or two in almost every issue. Some, like this month's "Word Marathon" are ideally suited to PC or VAX crunching (in fact I have several subprocsses running at this very moment working on them) ). My questions are: Are there many readers of Games magazine out there? Do you enter the contests? Do you use a computer? Do you wish people wouldn't use computers?? Do you want to discuss computer contest crunching, this current conttest in particular?? Thanks for yours time, eric holtman harpo!whuxle!eric ihnp4!whuxle!eric
esr@iheds.UUCP (E. Rieback) (07/03/84)
I am a devout puzzler and Games reader. I have considered using a computer to solve Games contests, but haven't attempted it for two reasons: 1. I don't have Webster's Unabridged in machine readable form 2. If I can find a maximum-score answer via computer, so can 500 other people, and the contest comes down to a random drawing. I also find it irritating when the winning contest entry, submitted by those 500 determined people, turns out to have such esoteric words in it that it doesn't seem fair to creative-minded people without access to a computer. I enter Games contests for the chance to use my creativity, and to work through a difficult challenge. Therefore, the only contests I enter are those that do not have a maximum answer, but rather those which use imagination and creativity and a hint of madness :-). Good examples of this type of Games contest are Chop Logic and Pic Tac Toe. While I have not won a Games contest yet, I did win two contests in Games Magazine's (now defunct) offshoot magazine, Four Star Puzzler. The satisfaction I felt in winning them could never even be approached by winning via a computer-generated entry. Any more comments from you letter-crunching Games contest addicts? Eileen Rieback ihnp4!iheds!esr
pizer@ecsvax.UUCP (07/04/84)
I fully agree with E. Rieback, the fun is in figuring the games out and not winning. I have come to use the computer to figure out cryptograms, and I once attempted using it to enter a contest. However, each time my goal was not to actually "win" but simply to see if I could apply my computer to the task. I have subscribed to games for quite a few years, have entered some contests, but never won. For me, it seems, the computer makes no difference! Billy Pizer (pizer@ecsvax) {happy 4th o'July}
gary@mit-eddie.UUCP (Gary Samad) (07/06/84)
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Ah, I had that same flash: "Why not use my PC to exaustively crunch
the possibilities in a Games contest to get the highest score in a
pseudo-pinball machine"
I feverishly constructed a program to do a depth first search and that
even allowed me to suspend it's work and restart it later (I really used
the machine!) I let it run for an entire weekend. On Monday with great
expectations I checked the results. Alas, it had done much work but
was not finished! After a quick calculation it dawned on me: if I
rewrote it to run on an IBM mainframe it would be finished in a mere
3 million years!
I've found that to be true with all Games contests so far. I believe that
they, in fact, conciously choose puzzles with a large number of permutations
and that are "not computable".
Now, a computer may be used as a tool to explore more deeply paths that
you, the human, have selected; but, an exaustive search is out of the question!
Gary Samad
{decvax!genrad,ihnp4}!mit-eddie!gary
gwyn@brl-tgr.ARPA (Doug Gwyn <gwyn>) (07/07/84)
The now-defunct British magazine Games and Puzzles was pretty good; look for back issues. It too had contests (I won several "Games vouchers", not that they are worth anything now).
eric@parallel.UUCP (Eric Griswold) (07/11/84)
"Oh Deep Thought! Can you answer latest contest in Games?" "I can. <pause> But I'll have to think about it." "How long?" "Two million years." Who wants to bet the answer will be 42? -- Go ahead, flame me -- Give this whole article one big :-) {sri-unix|sun}!parallel!eric