Tanks Will Fix Everything.
August 14th, 2008Tonight my brother showed me 2D physics-based game Fantastic Contraption, more-or-less a Flash version of The Incredible Machine, but for adults. You have a small area to build a machine, and you have to effect some goal outside that area. I rapidly found my style of play.
Here are my solutions. I may have got some of the level names wrong.
- The Grabber (Back and Forth) — similar to this solution, really.
- Flailey Tank (Up The Stairs) — as you can see, by now I was getting pretty into building little carts to move stuff about.
- Spatula Tank (Big Ball) — tanks made this level easy. Other players went for speed. Some went for Sling It And Hope. I went for Power!
- Serious Tank (Awash) — Serious Tank will take all comers.
- Kamikaze Tank (Mission to Mars) — I had done this in the Normal Boring Way, but that didn’t involve nearly enough tanks for me to get really excited by it.
- Short Work Tank (The Wall) — Short Work Tank rolls over the wall with such consummate ease that the Chinese government will probably block this link.
- Train Tank (Full Up) — I’m sure I was supposed to do this by knocking the big ball into the hole, but instead I built another tank.
- Oil Thing (Higher) — I did this using a tank as well, but this is so much better.
- Junktank (Junkyard) — About half of Junktank is pointless, but why on Earth would I remove it?
- Hill Tank Light (Up the Hump) — I did remove about half of Hill Tank. The big square block was Man enough for this.
- Scorpion (Down Under) — There are hardly any tanks at all in this one. But there are more than there are in this player’s solution. This one is also good (no tanks, though).
- Uptank (Tube) — Which isn’t really a tank at all, but if I call it “tank” it may become one. (Tanks are only called tanks because they were originally disguised as tanks of water.)
- Freight Tank (Handling) — This calls for flexibility and precision. The obvious solution is therefore another tank.
- Tank on a Chain (Unpossible) — Nothing is unpossible if you have a large enough tank.
- Slavedriver (Four Balls) — This is the only level I didn’t manage to complete using at least one tank. But don’t think that means I’m going easy on it. I’m getting Ancient Egyptian on its ass, Ancient Egypt apparently being the theme for this evening. I did consider this approach, but couldn’t get it to work.
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30 Responses to “Tanks Will Fix Everything.”
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August 14th, 2008 at 12:27
That’s quite clever.. I can only see your results if I have completed the level myself.
Very clever..
August 14th, 2008 at 12:30
Yeah, but completing them all isn’t that hard really.
Just build tanks.
August 14th, 2008 at 15:04
The links are annoyingly not working for me. Whatever I click, it just opens some kind of default map with nothing in it. Highly annoying. Everything worked brilliantly yesterday. Also, I did Four Balls just now using a kind of tank.
August 15th, 2008 at 11:36
It’s working again. Here’s Four Balls with a tank.
There’s no chance I got those tags right just now.
August 15th, 2008 at 11:39
I did The Wall the other day by building a walking robot, but it didn’t seem to save properly. I shall have to rebuild it.
(Tags fixed.)
August 15th, 2008 at 12:31
Here’s The Wall done without harming the wall: http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=429761
August 15th, 2008 at 14:02
http://fantasticcontraption.com/?designId=431184 (Big Ball)
I’m all about the flingers now.
August 15th, 2008 at 14:04
You make me feel a lot better about how much work I’m getting done here.
Also, some of the Google ads appearing on this page are frankly terrifying.
August 15th, 2008 at 15:04
Attempting to start some kind of Tanks v. Flingers Holy War, here’s four more done with flingers of varying unlikeliness:
http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=431700
http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=431776
http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=431877
http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=432335
August 15th, 2008 at 15:09
I think that tanks will have an inherent advantage in any kind of warfare.
August 15th, 2008 at 16:34
Well, since playing on this, I decided to download The Incredible Machine.
It’s as fantastic as I remember it 15-or-so years ago.
August 15th, 2008 at 17:51
I can never wrap my head around these things. Pity really, because they’re a lot of fun when you get ‘em working.
August 15th, 2008 at 19:29
Punting On Land:
http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=438400
A neat solution to Around the Bend:
http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=438458
This is how to solve On A Roll going for aesthetics rather than efficiency and ending up with both:
http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=438551
A roof to protect from Big Ball:
http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=441075
August 15th, 2008 at 20:21
A Robot Arm: http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=441593
August 16th, 2008 at 02:25
A chute:
http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=453006
An unpowered seesaw:
http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=453298
August 16th, 2008 at 14:05
All hail the Angle Car
http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=468549
August 16th, 2008 at 14:20
I’m not even completely sure how this works. But it does.
http://fantasticcontraption.com/?designId=453006
August 16th, 2008 at 16:49
I’m bloody proud of this one. Took me ages to figure out:
http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=473046
August 16th, 2008 at 18:32
The way this one ends amuses me:
http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=476561
This thread has some damn genius answers in it:
http://fantasticcontraption.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=37&start=20&st=0&sk=t&sd=a
August 16th, 2008 at 18:35
Oh, and THIS is how you do Rolling Away:
http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=477067
August 16th, 2008 at 22:24
This wins the “Uh.. well, that didn’t work. Why is he… oh.. hang on… ha! Brilliant!” award*
http://fantasticcontraption.com/?designId=134546
*Yes, the UWTDWWIHOHOHB
August 16th, 2008 at 22:27
Amazing.
August 19th, 2008 at 12:56
I’ve started working out how few parts are needed to solve puzzles.
I’ve done On A Roll with three parts: (http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=606212)
I also managed Mission to Mars with just one part, but the damn thing keeps freezing on me whenever I try and save it.
August 19th, 2008 at 14:02
And Tube with Four Pieces:
http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=607833
August 19th, 2008 at 22:25
I did On A Roll in three differently:
http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=429271
August 19th, 2008 at 23:29
I’ve done Mind The Gap in two, and Higher and Full-Up in three each. Since the save function isn’t playing right now, I leave them as an exercise to the reader. If we’re going to take this seriously though we’ll need some kind of a wiki arrangement. Get on it, Andrew.
August 19th, 2008 at 23:53
Mind the gap in two: http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=629758
I’m working on the others..
August 23rd, 2008 at 18:16
My strategy seems to be TRIANGLES FIX EVERYTHING: http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=785639
August 23rd, 2008 at 18:19
Seriously they’re unstoppable: http://FantasticContraption.com/?designId=785739
September 30th, 2008 at 00:31
If you still want a wiki for this, here:
http://www.apathysketchpad.com/wiki/wiki.php?id=front.page
For the sake of basically copying a folder I figured I may as well.