[Server] Inside The Box [Puzzles]

[sofar]

Builder ranking is now finished! All the score boards are now auto-updating and will refresh regularly with new data as players complete boxes and boxes get built and added.

In case of builders, we rank them on quality and quantity alike, so just making lots of boxes isn't good enough to end up high on the rankings. A lot of the score is dependent on how the boxes themselves do in the box ranking. If people rate the boxes high, the builder rank also goes up.

My hope is that it encourages builders who have previously only once or twice built a box. We really need you to come back and build more boxes. If your name isn't on the board, it's most likely because you've made only 1 box. Some of the builders on the board have only had one box accepted as well, so it's relatively easy to improve your ranking - just get more boxes accepted. Of course, I am still reviewing the boxes, so you still need to pay lots of attention to quality! :)

[v-rob]

Awesome! Things keep getting better and better.

[Stix]

wow! im somehow on the list and i only made two boxes!? error perhaps?
BTW next time im on Minetest i plan to come back to this wonderful server and build some more boxes :D!

[azekill_DIABLO]

yeah me too! i'd love to do an optical illuision box ... no one steals my idea, ok? :D

[sofar]

wow! im somehow on the list and i only made two boxes!? error perhaps?
BTW next time im on Minetest i plan to come back to this wonderful server and build some more boxes :D!

No error. The rankings are pretty early and we only have a very small amount of people using the rating system. A few players going through all the boxes and giving new star values is likely going to change the rating already.

[bewlay]

The code (which includes a few minor parts of minetest_game) will be LGPL-2.1 for those reused parts, and MIT-like for the new code, so, fully reusable by other projects. E.g. the skybox and frame mod is LGPL-2.1, etc. Most of the artwork is CC-BY, CC-BY-SA.

Until there are about 200-250 puzzle boxes (of good quality) I am not convinced that I should even release the code at all. I don't think the threshold for high quality content has been met for this project to sustain itself with new builders, at all. If you want this server, code, and project survive, you have to help by adding content.

So, are you planning to release the code at some point in the near future? Or only when some conditions are met?

Don't get me wrong, you have the (ethical and AFAIK legal) right to decide that as you please, and I won't attack the decision you make; but I interpreted the first quote as a statement to release the code at some point. Could you clarify that, please?

By the way, I had much fun playing and editing a first box myself. The reason I'm asking is not that I'm planning to personally reuse any of your code in another project, but I'll reconsider contributing boxes if you don't want to make this free software (at some point).

[sofar]

So, are you planning to release the code at some point in the near future? Or only when some conditions are met?

Yes, I will release the code.

I have been contemplating Open Sourcing the code when there are 100 boxes, and making it into a countdown/event of some sorts. This would exclude my own boxes, for obvious reasons. I think that doing it that way could encourage people building and have them work on something meaningful / rewarding at the same time. The current count is in the 40s, btw..

[sofar]

Quick list of updates, specifically the ones I haven't mentioned earlier.

- Placeholders can now contain more than one node. This would allow players to place more than just one type of node at a placeholder location.

- Remove tool restrictions: Need to remove lots of a specific node? You can now "fill" the remove tool with the node you want to remove, and it will only remove those nodes. Even in bulk remove node. Great for removing lots of water or something else you made way too many of.

- A very big fix for node sounds like fire/leaves/water. This is now properly capped and should no longer cause clients to lag out.

- We've dropped support for 0.4.15 entirely. It's no longer possible to connect with 0.4.15 to the server. More than 1/3rd of our textures are now in tilesheets.

- The reveal tool shows mech links when clicking on a mech node. You'll see particles travel from the source to the target of a link, so if you click a node that is a source, particles will move away from it, and if you click a node that is a target, particles will move to it. Of course, by extension, if a node is both a source and a target... particles will go both to it, and away from it.

- Last but not least, an incredible amount of coding time has gone into the score boards. You can see them also on our website, and they are updated every 20 minutes or so.

[sofar]

What a great weekend. 5 new boxes!

I'm really happy to see some new builders too finishing their first boxes, and I'm pretty happy with the quality of them as well. Thanks everyone who worked really hard!

Speaking of boxes, you can now see screenshots of boxes on the Boxes and Rankings webpages on the server. Just click on the Box name - if it's a blue link you'll see a screenshot show up. I've been collecting and listing screenshots, and I'll work on getting them all at least a screenshot in the upcoming days.

If you are a box builder, and you want me to use a specific screenshots for your box, please submit a 1080p resolution screenshot to imgur and give me the URL, and I'll consider adding it. Of course, I'd be happy to make one in a specific way according to your desires if you don't have the needed screen resolution.

[Wuzzy]

The boxes page is now broken w/o JavaScript. :-(
Also, I think you should clarify “1080p”. 1080 times what (just write the raw pixel count; people are lazy)?

But I'm glad to finally see new boxes after such a long time.

[sofar]

The boxes page is now broken w/o JavaScript.

Having the Boxes page use javascript allows me to have a much simpler method to use various bits of data and represent it in various ways. For instance, you can click on the box name in both the box rankings and the boxes page and get a screenshot.

EDIT: FWIW the webserver isn't running any PHP server or anything like that. Having the website be all static content yet still automatically update with changes to data of the server in the way it's done saves me a bunch of work and removes the need to run something like PHP. All in all it's a win for me. If you really don't want to enable JS in your browser, then that's your choice.

[Enrikoo]

Whats the channel of IRC? Or is it only for operators?

[sofar]

Whats the channel of IRC? Or is it only for operators?

It's listed both on the website, and in the top post of this topic:

Server chat is connected to #insidethebox on irc.freenode.net. Come join us and help out. It's OK to give clues to players that are stuck in a box.

Everyone is welcome. Server chat rules also apply to the IRC channel, obviously.

[GreenDimond]

Server chat is connected to #insidethebox

Do note, it's actually ##insidethebox. Every IRC channel starts with a #, so when it was specified with # in the name, it became ##insidethebox. Don't know if that was intentional or not.

[Nore]

Server chat is connected to #insidethebox

Do note, it's actually ##insidethebox. Every IRC channel starts with a #, so when it was specified with # in the name, it became ##insidethebox. Don't know if that was intentional or not.

IRC channels are usually specified with a '#' in the same, even though they all start with one. In case it starts with two, both are specified. In this case, the channel is #insidethebox and not ##insidethebox.

[GreenDimond]

Server chat is connected to #insidethebox

Do note, it's actually ##insidethebox. Every IRC channel starts with a #, so when it was specified with # in the name, it became ##insidethebox. Don't know if that was intentional or not.

IRC channels are usually specified with a '#' in the same, even though they all start with one. In case it starts with two, both are specified. In this case, the channel is #insidethebox and not ##insidethebox.

Oh, interesting. (I know they all have # in the name, that's what I said :P)

[Wuzzy]

You know what would be useful?

A special terminal in the game which opens up the list of all boxes and a start button (to enter the selected box).
This also could allow you to enter the box number directly. Since you often said you want to avoid depending on chat commands like /enter.

And the boxes you've completed are marked (maybe in green color, and/or the word “completed” or whatever.

This would be a simple and efficient way to see your progress in the game. This will also be useful if you somehow overlooked/missed a box for some reason.

I would add multiple of these terminals throughot the main islands. One on the Play island (obviously). One directly at the boxes scoreboard (so you can enter the top 10 boxes).

[sofar]

A special terminal in the game which opens up the list of all boxes and a start button (to enter the selected box).
This also could allow you to enter the box number directly. Since you often said you want to avoid depending on chat commands like /enter.

And the boxes you've completed are marked (maybe in green color, and/or the word “completed” or whatever.

This would be a simple and efficient way to see your progress in the game. This will also be useful if you somehow overlooked/missed a box for some reason.

I would add multiple of these terminals throughot the main islands. One on the Play island (obviously). One directly at the boxes scoreboard (so you can enter the top 10 boxes).

I've been thinking exactly along the same lines. Questions like "which boxes did I complete?", "I'm not in the top #10 but how did I do?" and "How well are my boxes rated" are data that I have, but isn't available, and the terminals that are scattered around the lobby are a great place to expose this information.

The terminal mod code also needs a bit of rework, but I don't know when I'll get to it. There's some significant amount of code needed to make this work well, but it'll be worth it.

[Inocudom]

The hardest box was box 120.

The last nexus is basically a matter of taking a wild guess. So many Zelda Classic quests have I never completed due to that. There are two pistons in that box, but one of them is clearly a red herring. Yeah, I think I will just humble myself, bow in defeat, and let that box keep its domination () against me. There is no way I will ever beat it.

[sofar]

The hardest box was box 120.

The last nexus is basically a matter of taking a wild guess.
...
There is no way I will ever beat it.

1) Put on headphones
2) Turn up your volume
3) flick the switches until you hear where the sounds are coming from

Boxes where you have to flip a switch often reveal where the door/piston is, because those make sounds, and those sounds can be heard throughout the entire box (on purpose). You can hear whether it was a door open of close sound, and / or piston up/down, and you can hear, clearly, the direction of the sound. In case of pistons, you most likely want to listen for the piston down sound, since that is often the way that pistons are used to reveal / open something.

[sofar]

viewtopic.php?f=3&t=18878

I've posted in the General Forum about the intent to release the code when we hit the 100 Community contributed boxes milestone. We're at 51 right now, and several more boxes are almost done soon, it seems. Feel free to post/ask about it here or in the other thread.

[Inocudom]

The hardest box was box 120.

The last nexus is basically a matter of taking a wild guess.
...
There is no way I will ever beat it.

1) Put on headphones
2) Turn up your volume
3) flick the switches until you hear where the sounds are coming from

Boxes where you have to flip a switch often reveal where the door/piston is, because those make sounds, and those sounds can be heard throughout the entire box (on purpose). You can hear whether it was a door open of close sound, and / or piston up/down, and you can hear, clearly, the direction of the sound. In case of pistons, you most likely want to listen for the piston down sound, since that is often the way that pistons are used to reveal / open something.

I finally managed to complete that box today. You can say that a dream showed me the way, even though I did use headphones to begin with. Always gotta watch out for those one-hit wonders.

Sokomine, PEAK, and solars really need to make creations for Inside The Box (and darkrose's Voxelands (she should make a puzzle/adventure subgame of her own for that game, since she did put circuits in it,)) because those three builders are truly of the elite kind.

[Wuzzy]

Sofar, I wonder how you managed to make sure that you can't jump over fences, even with sneak-jumping.

[Stix]

Sofar i wish you would change signs so that their contents arent deleted whenever i press escape. this just happened to me when i was reading the sign you put in my box, pliz fix.
Hint: on the tree you can cut the wood AND the leaves with the axe ;)
BTW: when you say it could still be improved you only mean the puzzle aspect, right?

[v-rob]

Sofar, I wonder how you managed to make sure that you can't jump over fences, even with sneak-jumping.

Just wait for the source code like everyone else ;) Or better yet, make some boxes so you can get it sooner.