Feature Suggestions

[PrincessChess]

Hi, in the statistics, I'd like to know, at any one time, how many of the puzzles I have the fastest time. Not sure how difficult that would be to program as the number would be constantly shifting, but I would love to see if possible. Oh and how many of the total possible I have solved or how many there are remaining that I haven't.

[N1ghtChicken]

Think this is a great idea above!

I also think a good feature would be to a puzzle check. Not a hint per se, but just a check whether the puzzle is correct or not to that point in solving, not necessarily identifying what is wrong but saying whether if something is incorrect. Other puzzle baron puzzles have a similar feature.

[PrincessChess]

Think this is a great idea above!

I also think a good feature would be to a puzzle check. Not a hint per se, but just a check whether the puzzle is correct or not to that point in solving, not necessarily identifying what is wrong but saying whether if something is incorrect. Other puzzle baron puzzles have a similar feature.

Maybe like a how many are stars are correct and how many are wrong?

I wouldn't mind a history of puzzles too - like seeing a list of all puzzles, how many I have played each puzzle and my best score for each or where I sit outside the top 10 (X placement out of 100 attempts). Maybe an option to replay puzzles outside of being scored.

[Anachronismatic]

Imagining the number of puzzles across all the games and what is currently tracked, I think the leaderboards are attached to the puzzles themselves, and only at a depth of what's displayed (which can vary among puzzles). There's no record of how you did on a particular puzzle, aside from a time-limited list which must be attached directly to your account. All these suggestions sound great to me, too, but I wonder about the factor at which the database size would grow, and would searching this database dynamically in this manner slow down the entire site, given the number of people playing. So I would guess that any feature that requires a permanent record of how you did or even if you played any puzzle isn't viable.

The most you ever learn is whether you were on the leaderboard for a puzzle, solved it again, and failed to beat your own time. And then you only know because you see yourself on the leaderboard again, only with a much better time, mocking you, and you worry about how much gray matter you've lost in the intervening time. The leaderboard will remove your old time if you were on it before and beat that time. No sense telling you about that because the implication is that you see that when you've done a puzzle before, no matter what, and that isn't information kept in the database. I think. Apologies if I'm wrong.

Puzzle checks. An interesting thought, as long as it's a choice you can make before starting a puzzle. I would play very differently if I didn't have to worry about the risk of making a mistake and chasing myself into a logical hole I can't get out of. If you choose it, you can't score for the game. It would be great training, but it would change the puzzle considerably.

I was wondering a lot about a "degree of difficulty" for puzzles. I want to "graduate" to the three-star puzzles. When doing the two-stars, I note when there's a very high average time, but for fairness reasons, I can only choose not to do the puzzle once I see that and it still counts against my percentage. I find myself wanting to be a 100%er, whatever that means. I am sure that resonates with many here. So I slog away anyway and get stuck or unstuck. What I really like about this new puzzle type is that there are so many ways to look at the grid, and train yourself to quickly move between a variety of methods. That gets me through the 12x2 stars.

I see that even the really brilliant solvers, far beyond me, who have "graduated", and I can see that a good number of them seem to want to be 100%ers, but aren't, and the average solving times goes way, way up for those who try (I've had a few 20-minute, "why didn't I see that" moments with the 12x2s myself). So, with life interrupting at times and not wanting a 12-hour puzzle weighing down my average, how do I graduate and not spoil my day trying to stay at 100%?

Two different concepts, but I wonder what makes one of these more difficult than another? Is it the number of times you have to switch methods to come to a conclusion, modified by the number of options for making a logical deduction at any one time? It would be interesting to take stats on puzzles in this manner and see the correlation between those measurements and average time required, though what seems to matter most this early in the game is who amongst has tried a particular puzzle, so you'd need to analyze almost the entire database of puzzles to make any real conclusions.

I do like these, kudos to the designer. They take what's best of the Numbergrids and make it accessible on a smaller scale. The Numbergrids are fun, but any puzzle large enough to be challenging takes too long.

[Unikittycornastegasaurus]

I am SOOOOOOooo glad that I am not the only person who ever gets annoyed at my previous self for beating my time! And of course if you're ever doing a puzzle that you had previously done, and you beat your old time, you can never know about it. Only your new time will show up on the score board.

I still on occasion have trouble seeing the empty squares with all those dots on the board. They did make the dots bigger, which helped quite a lot, but I still miss rows/columns where there are very few empty squares. I wrote suggesting a toggle button to allow you to color in completely the squares with dots. Then you could really see when there was a space. The administrator didn't want to add any more toggle buttons. I can understand that.

I also suggested the check button. It would not be a hint--it would just tell you if your puzzle is wrong. The administrator did say they were thinking about how to actually do that one.

My third suggestion had been a pause button. But the answer for that is that the pause option was ruined by too many people who would take a picture of the screen, pause the puzzle, work the puzzle, and then unpause, filling the puzzle in a ridiculously short amount of time. So all those really long solve times for the 2 star puzzles? Um, yeah, some of those are my fault. Sorry. I blame my 3 cats and all the craziness that goes on in my house for the occasional 3000+ second times.

The 100% thing? That's how many puzzles you solved out of how many tried, right? I would love to do that too, but an end was put to that the first time my web browser froze up. I wish you could replay the puzzles you didn't solve and then you could fix your percentage. That would be really cool.

Finally, I just absolutely LOVE these star puzzles. I used to love Minesweeper many years ago on what is now an ancient version of Windows. And I have always loved Sudokus. To me, the Star Battle puzzles are a sort of cross between these other two types of puzzle. IMO, the Star Battle got the best of both worlds! Huge thanks to the developers for this puzzle!!!!!

[Acustatic]

I get that there need to be ads, and that I can pay to get rid of them. I’m fine with the ads, but NOT the full page pop up ads that block the game and make it impossible to complete. Can you all get rid of those please?

[admin]

I get that there need to be ads, and that I can pay to get rid of them. I’m fine with the ads, but NOT the full page pop up ads that block the game and make it impossible to complete. Can you all get rid of those please?

Ads should never impinge on the game board - if you could send me a screenshot of exactly what you're seeing I will have our ad manager remove it ASAP. You can email it to me at puzzlebaron@gmail.com - thank you!

[Acustatic]

Will do, thank you. I will say that the ads have been McDonalds and Toyota.

[tricksyfox]

I also suggested the check button. It would not be a hint--it would just tell you if your puzzle is wrong. The administrator did say they were thinking about how to actually do that one.

I would also love a check for errors button! It seems to me that right now, if you ask for a hint, it'll tell you if you've incorrectly eliminated a square or incorrectly placed a star if there are errors on the board, and will give you an actual hint if there aren't any errors. So maybe they could use whatever logic is underlying that to implement the "check" button?

[J2BPuzlin]

I would also love a check for errors button! It seems to me that right now, if you ask for a hint, it'll tell you if you've incorrectly eliminated a square or incorrectly placed a star if there are errors on the board, and will give you an actual hint if there aren't any errors. So maybe they could use whatever logic is underlying that to implement the "check" button?

The check errors is a great idea. So many times I don't want a hint, just to confirm I haven't made a mistake.

[admin]

I would also love a check for errors button!

Great idea - will be adding this to the next update. Thanks!