July 18, 2008

Build your own fantastic contraption

Stolen right from the Blue, natch. But what a find! Thanx, DU Ack! I don't ever ask me to engineer anything. Made it to Higher, so far, but it's pretty scary stuff I'm cobbling together here.

  • I think you want this. Says I have to upgrade my flash player. Back in a flash.
  • Seems to always say you have to upgrade flash, but you can choose the option to skip the flash check.
  • Ack, thanks Lara! Hmmm, I've got FF3, never upgraded Flash, went right to it. Trac, could you help me clean up my link. Thanx
  • It's fun. I made it to Higher relatively quick. The same basic tank construction worked that far, but won't get me Higher.
  • Awash is kicking my ass. It took me a while to figure this out, but "water" is incredibly useful. It is also nothing like water.
  • I lost on level 2.
  • Awash is a booger! I keep checking out the successes, but canna duplicate or recreate any of them!
  • Wow now I really hate you. I was up until 4am with this thing last night. Which would have been fine except for the 7am kayak adventure. Before I finally got past awash, one of my contraptions fought for almost 15 minutes before it got crushed. As the 3rd Eye notes above, I don't think you can get past awash without using the water rod.
  • I've got awash running as I speak. Maybe this time... ?
  • I think the trick with awash is to put a backwards-spinning wheel at the front of the contraption to force the balls overhead. Hey, we killed the guy's database!
  • So, did it work, Nick? I finally got mine banged through, but it was pretty ugly. Took forever. Guess I won't be designing for Detroit anytime soon.
  • No. No it didn't. I'd get down to a half dozen spheres and halfway up the hill and then- nothing.
  • And then my wife made me quit.
  • Ha! I got the bastard this time! Behold, the Victorious Victoriator!
  • Whoa! Nick, that's quite elegant. Very nice. I like how you used the water links. Uunnnnhh, is that your wife back there? Pretend you were reading email.
  • Now you have to pay ten bucks to see other people's levels.
  • Well those cheap buggers!!! Puts me off playing anymore.
  • God Damn Tube. That is all.
  • If they change it again, here's this solution to awash, using just 3 circles (4 including the one you want to rescue). I don't much care about the other levels, but I love playing awash. I'm going to try a 2 circle solution next.
  • Here it is. One yellow, One pink.
  • This is my favorite so far, my solution to Back and Forth. I don't care if I ever see Awash again, jesus that pissed me off.
  • And Knickerbocker, don't think I didn't notice the similarities to the Victorious Victoriator. You'll be hearing from my lawyers.
  • Unpossible is.
  • Urgh. No kidding. Any monkey that completes it is hereby ordered to post their solution.
  • ?! For some reason, it tries to charge me ten bucks to look at the Victorious Victoriator, but lets me see that Back and Forth solution. Hmmm. (That solution is very cool, btw. I never even bothered trying that level). And I posted a two circles solution here, but must have messed up my html somehow. The whole comment is gone. I've come so close to completing it with just one circle, but there seems to be a bug where if the solution takes to long, tiny miscalculations compound to suddenly launch my contraption off the screen.
  • They've been getting a lot of traffic over the past few days and the database seems to be in a continual state of near- or total-screwedupness. I wonder if the 10$ charge for the Victorious Victoriator is somehow related to that?
  • Which is to say, I think it may be a mistake.
  • Sort-of-solution to Unpossible. Okay, not actually a solution because I only won due to a bug, but that same bug foiled several previous attempts and it's about time it worked *for* me. Hope you can view this one.
  • Browsing the forum, I learned that the creator knows about the "bug" and considers it a valid property of the water rods. MY VICTORY STANDS
  • Hmmm, it seems it just charges to look at Nickdanger solutions. (your unpossible has the ten buck problem)
  • Still stuck on Tube. I can't even look and Nickies solutions for money. The url just brings me to the main screen.
  • WTF?
  • Hmmm, it looks like I can see the Back and Forth machine but not the Victorious Victoriator. VV just goes to the main page. But I don't want to see the Back and Fortherator because I haven't tried that one yet. Tube. Man. Do I climb or fling or make some sort of elevator? Wait. Don't tell me.
  • I'm having a heck of a time in FF all of the sudden, and that's what I played it in originally. It really wants me to play in IE, and I WON'T!
  • The secret to Tube is expansion. I've said too much.
  • Weird, my own links take me to the main page now, too. Except for the back and forth one. What's weird is that Bluehorse could see my VV contraption before.
  • >>"I've said too much." No, you haven't. I've been working that approach all evening. I've got a platform that holds tight to the bottom of the tube. I've got a couple of things that sort-of spring out to the walls. But so far everything eventually falls. Maybe it will come to me in my sleep.
  • I won by taking advantage of the (a?) "bug" with water rods: Popcorn Seems like cheating. Also, the bug seems nondeterministic. This one doesn't always win.
  • Hmmm, Kevvin, I tried to view that, and the little wheel spun around several times and then flew off into space. Is that the bug you're talking about? It seems like I can occasionally view someone's contraption if they've recently posted, but the majority are locked. If you beat the level, what about posting a screenshot to flicker? (Ashamed to say she's only on Tubes, and stuck, stuck, stuck. Even when I'm getting there, my machines are NOT PRETTY. Probably because I'm not mechanically inclined, NOT because I'm a girl!)
  • I think I figured out what's going on. Try these: Victiorious Victoriator Unpossible. I really like your solution, Kevvin, because it makes no sense whatsoever. I'd post my own Tube, but I didn't save it.
  • I was unable to see the early examples, but could see the latter ones. The difference? (For my browser at least) you need an upper case "I" in "designId". I don't think you need to pay the $10 to display your attempts. So...       http://fantasticcontraption.com/?designid=23548 fails, but...       http://fantasticcontraption.com/?designId=23548 works.
  • Yeah, since when are urls case sensitive?
  • Since always, somewhat. Domain names are not case sensitive. So SearsSucks.com will work as well as searssucks.cOM If the thing after the domain name is a simple filename (like "index.html") it will be case insensitive on a MS server (since MS filenames are matched insensitively in the OS) but might be case sensitive on a non-MS server. In this case the text after the "?" is a parameter list, to some default server app, whose tokens can be processed case sensitively or not depending on what program (unknown to us) is executing them. [/geekosity] But now that I can see them... God Nick! Your "Unpossible" is like some freakin' Medieval siege machine! Awesome!
  • In this case the text after the "?" is a parameter list, to some default server app, whose tokens can be processed case sensitively or not depending on what program (unknown to us) is executing them. So, what you're saying, if I follow you correctly, is that some sort of witch is to blame? Why, then, we must find this witch and burn her!