I've heard some games have begun to arrive, so I'll keep this one short. Take pictures of your screen and post them, easy as that. We'll keep the thread open for a month or two, possibly until the next SGP release, but not likely. Game on!

Quick instructions (not in the manual)

  -START ends a game at any time, be careful
  -A game is not over at X, keep playing!
  -Select changes the music
  -To reset the high scores to their default, hold A when powering on or resetting the system


Shortest SGP thread ever  .

Top Scores:

1. X2, 13165 - dra600n
2. X2, 13087 - Kosmic StarDust
3. x2, 12,976 - arch_8ngel
4. X, 10976 - Fleck586
5. X, 10976 - JamesRobot
6. X, 10965 - AnalogNightmare
7. X, 10775 - monsterx
5. 
6. 
7. 
8. 
9. 
10. 

10652 with 1X. I will post higher scores soon, hopefully

Pics or it didn't happen  . Glad you're back! Don't make me start posting the testers' scores; it will not bode well for your confidence.

Lol! I will remind you that you have a pic. Can't figure out how to do it from my phone. Thanks for the welcome! We had a blast. Many pints of Guinness went down nice and smooth.

Do i need to send my pic again too? Oh man someone got 10,000 I was happy just to get to 9 and call it quits.

I made it to 9 once. I'll look up the high score table when I get home.

You're playing to my soft spots, I know what it is like trying to post pictures from a phone. Anyways, now everyone can know that you are the reason why I made a big deal about not stopping at X. Don't get excited and press Start when "Champion" appears  .



This will probably get overlooked down here, but I added a note to the OP. Hold A on Power or Reset to reset the default high scores. This will erase your saves, if that isn't clear.

Let me and Brad bask in glory one more time    

 

Highest score so far: 8875pts Level 9. Got some bad luck with the little ends...  

@Fleck: Looks like you were having an awesome game. Why'd you stop?  

@SoloGoose: is there a warning screen before it erases the high score or does it silently wipe them?  
  What was your score Hero? Seems like we're equaly yoked. We got nothing on those beta testers though, using emulators with save states!  

l

Lol! I'm the guy that didnt know it kept going. I saw champion and thought it was over. I will get a 2x. Don't know if I have the patience to get a 3x...

No warning screen, you simply hold down A when resetting or powering on. I've never known anyone to hold buttons down when doing these two things, unless they are weirdly holding the controller in one hand, but I'm sure someone will. Ah well, you've been warned. Think of it as a chance to re-challenge yourself.

As for the testers using save states, all of their scores were legit. The cheater score you posted was mine  . The game has been reprogrammed a few times in the last year and a half, and I wasn't going to drag the testers through it all again. I can't touch their scores, so I cheated! Plus I was curious if it would break. User built in a lot of redunancy to the code, things that will never be seen like a tilt function, but you'd certainly have to cheat to trigger those things. Plus, the high score screen, which was my doing, only uses a 16-bit value. Thanks to tokumaru for his hex to decimal routine posted over on NESDEV, and to for KHan for coming up with a decimal to hex routine. Not that it matters, since you cannot legitmiately go past 62k+ anyways, though I need to figure out a 32-bit routine for the next game's scoring system, since that will have 100 levels or so. Other projects first!

Well maybe someone powers on the system and before they realise they are sitting on the gamepad or something. A defect controller could also result such input.  

***Wait, there's a "Tilt" function!?   What must one do to trigger it?***

One fun thing about this game, in the early period before you get serious numbers, you can just hit random inputs rapidly in the beginning. If I do rapid circles on the Dpad, I can quickly get up to 5 within a few seconds. After 5 appears, I start playing normally. Fun fact, the first time I played, I just randomly twerked the Dpad and got the #4 spot on the leaderboard.  

Go for it dude!  

 

Just from examining the code and looking at user's comments, since I converted it all to NESASM by hand, you'd have to hit 99,999. Not going to happen, but he built it in anyways. I guess I could mod it to test and see, like I did with the titles that appear at the bottom, but I think that it is time to move onto other projects.

But anyways, enough picking apart the possibilities and the code, just go play it!!! I'm still not seeing an X out of you  .

Working on it...

5573 I can't get past 7. I feel dumb.

Im with you, bot.

Ouch JamesRobot. Keep working at it. Yeah this game gets exponentially more challenging with each level, and I am very methodical with my moves. 9 appears to be my current limit, having only hit it twice so far, but I can hit 8 with regularity. X seems out of reach sadly...

Here's a new way to play. Try to get the lowest score possible. The board must be locked with no matching tiles remaining. Here is my lowball submission, 1255pts...  

A pretty solid basic strategy is to try to keep the highest tile on the board in a corner of the board. Also, a bit of patience helps: X is far from impossible, however is not easy to get each time, it takes a bit of practice; get a 2X is a really tough challenge, unlikely to happen regularly.  

Finally past the real B known as 5500 point teir!!

I tend to earn most of my high tiles clustered in the middle. This has caused frustration sometimes I'll get a pattern like
[6][7][6][2] on a row or columb and for instance, I'll try to sort how best to manipulate the 6 tiles to get them side by side to mate together and form a 7 which combines with the other seven to form an 8. The 1s and 0s more often than not like to form checkerboard arrangements with themselves or other numbers, leading to gridlock. And I am constantly working to combine the little ends which keep on coming whilst trying to combine the mediums to for the next largest step. One strategy that works is I'll get say a 2 and a 3 together, well I start stacking 0s which become 1s which then combine to for a 2 then I can chain reaction up the ladder. But two many medium numbers in odd arrangements when I really need a next-highest can be devastating too. It's all well and good to clear out the 1s and 0s to generate a few 3s, 4, and 5s, but I've already got two 6s, a 7, and an 8 in awkward posistions that need to be combined to 7-8-9. Rarely reaching 9, it is now necessary to built up the chain 6-6-7-8-9 again to ultimayely form X, but with one less space on the board, all while guggling the constant onslaught of fresh 0s and 1s. Multiples of any intermediary denomination posistioned such that they cannot readily combine can quickly lead to gridlock. And when I get two targets adjacent to each other, say side by side, a decision whether to combine left vs right or up vs down requires serious consideration: will this move bring other matched pairs closer or futher apart? And there is always the random nature of the board. Will I get a 0 or a 1? Will a randomly inserted low end potentially block my next planned out move?

Things to consider, but keeping high ends to a single corner pocket is not something I've dwelled on. To the contrary, my posted 8875 high score had the big ends clustered in the middle, and a devastating checkerboard formation to the lower left.  


EDIT: if need to capture my userid to make it oficial, I can screengrab the high score table with the name card. AJW-8875-[9] is still the #2 spot on my cartridge but I hope to do better next time...  

Nice, and within reach to 9! With 6+6+7+8, there is enough material on board. Keep trying!  

There are at least two of us from the test team that managed to get 2X + X-and-change.

But the first legitimate 3X that happens is going to be a BIG DEAL, since even a 2X is a rare occurence and requires quite a bit of good fortune.




In terms of the "TILT"... maybe the scoring was updated since the concept first came up in development, but I had the impression that  "5X" equated to a "TILT", and respectively a score of 99,999.

Extremely, extremely unlikely to actually be possible in any practical sense.
To the point that it may be of ludicrous difficulty to even cheat it with save states, given what would need to happen in what order.

That's what I mean.  I will keep playing until I get a 2X.  I know I can do it (cue choo choo sounds), but I don't know if I have the patience or skill or luck to go for a 3X