Hugo Simoes
simple living, careful thinking, collective fun
Today is a special day...
It has been 30 years since my wife and I shared our first kiss and she managed to put up with my foolish endeavours ever since.
I dedicate my latest project to her loving endurance: Cross-Pollinator – a daily challenge.
The puzzle is the same (BZB bee would still like to bring the most pollen to the hive), but in this new game mode, a challenge is created every day.
It is a global challenge: everybody is looking at the same garden, searching for a path to the hive, before the 24-hour limit runs out.
The first to find a solution of a given length (counting the number of flower bed patches visited) will enter the leaderboard with an anonymous cryptographic secure identifier called a-id.
In such case, remember to bookmark/copy the link in the address bar, so that you are able to build a reputation using your a-id. Just be careful not to share the 32 characters that follow your a-id in the web address, otherwise other people could also add entries to the leaderboard using the same a-id.
I have designed these a-ids to be difficult to forge. One player can have multiple a-ids, but each a-id should belong to one player only.
I have also implemented a hint system, to ensure that each challenge is never frustrating.
After six hours have passed since the start of the active challenge, the system will gradually show an optimal path without the final 10 steps.
If someone feels a challenge is too difficult, they just have to return to it within less than an hour remaining and get the maximum available hints.
Once the time runs out, an optimal solution is always provided (to learn/inspect), but new leaderboard entries are no longer accepted for that challenge.
Looking forward to see your a-id when browsing the ephemeral leaderboards of recent challenges!
Most importantly, I hope you have fun... :)
EDIT 2022/05/03: Cross-Pollinator link updated; changed challenge frequency; BZIDs are no longer needed/used.
EDIT 2024/02/12: Cross-Pollinator link updated; daily challenges are now the only mode available; BZIDs are back in use, but replaced with a-ids; Added link to the a-id implementation on GitHub.
February 12, 2022
Cross-Pollinator