[sagely] the real exponential sequence is the powers of *you*
April 11, 2025 1:25 PM Subscribe
If you're anything like me you're going to accidentally lose several hours to simple sliding tile matching game Exponentile, which will remind some folks of iOS classic Threes and the raft of thematically similar web-based games of which 2048 was a standout example.
I missed something about the instrcutions and now I can't get them back and I have no idea how this works.
posted by jacquilynne at 1:53 PM on April 11 [2 favorites]
posted by jacquilynne at 1:53 PM on April 11 [2 favorites]
I had the same problem. "Open link in private tab" showed me the instructions again. You're trying to make rows or columns of three or more identical numbers.
posted by Western Infidels at 2:13 PM on April 11 [2 favorites]
posted by Western Infidels at 2:13 PM on April 11 [2 favorites]
Got 18,080 and now I need to return to whatever I was doing about 20 minutes ago.
posted by klausman at 2:20 PM on April 11
posted by klausman at 2:20 PM on April 11
I am at 19,432, with two 512 blocks, and I keep waiting for this thing to stop, but... nope! I am apparently lucky.
posted by mrphancy at 2:22 PM on April 11
posted by mrphancy at 2:22 PM on April 11
When I swap tiles they immediately unswap. Am I missing something?
posted by doubtfulpalace at 2:22 PM on April 11
posted by doubtfulpalace at 2:22 PM on April 11
DAMN YOU TO HELL CORTEX!!!!
posted by ashbury at 2:37 PM on April 11 [5 favorites]
posted by ashbury at 2:37 PM on April 11 [5 favorites]
It's a combo of match 3 and 2048 -- so swap to match at least three of the same number (I do agree the instructions aren't the clearest).
I got a 1024 block and a score of 22,412 and decided that was enough of that for now. I did not expect it to be that addictive. I'll go back to see if I can make it to 2048 (or beyond ...).
posted by edencosmic at 2:39 PM on April 11
I got a 1024 block and a score of 22,412 and decided that was enough of that for now. I did not expect it to be that addictive. I'll go back to see if I can make it to 2048 (or beyond ...).
posted by edencosmic at 2:39 PM on April 11
Final score: 36,392
1 - 1024 block
3 - 512 blocks, but I couldn't quite get the third one over to the other two
posted by mrphancy at 2:45 PM on April 11
1 - 1024 block
3 - 512 blocks, but I couldn't quite get the third one over to the other two
posted by mrphancy at 2:45 PM on April 11
This is nice. Only small thing I'd add is an animation while you're dragging a tile to swap it. It also bugs me a bit there's no way to choose which way the tiles collapse when they match but it seems predictable so you can work with it. A lot of Match 3 games have the same tension.
I didn't play enough to get a sense of whether the puzzle is solid. Does it have to come to a natural end where you are stuck? I would say so.
posted by Nelson at 2:48 PM on April 11 [1 favorite]
I didn't play enough to get a sense of whether the puzzle is solid. Does it have to come to a natural end where you are stuck? I would say so.
posted by Nelson at 2:48 PM on April 11 [1 favorite]
i’m too stupid to plan ahead and strategize because MATH so i’m just going for matches
but
oh man i can’t stop
I feel like I work in Macrodata Refinement at Lumon now
why
posted by chococat at 3:21 PM on April 11 [8 favorites]
but
oh man i can’t stop
I feel like I work in Macrodata Refinement at Lumon now
why
posted by chococat at 3:21 PM on April 11 [8 favorites]
I enjoyed this! I'm not good at these games but this one felt less stressful than 2048. Seeing other people's scores, I won't reveal mine, which was only four digits long. The rest of you kind of amaze me.
posted by Well I never at 3:28 PM on April 11 [1 favorite]
posted by Well I never at 3:28 PM on April 11 [1 favorite]
When I swap tiles they immediately unswap. Am I missing something?
It undoes your swap unless it would complete a row of 3 or more. I'm inclined to think it would be more interesting if you could swap whatever you like and really line up some big scores.
posted by polecat at 3:44 PM on April 11 [1 favorite]
It undoes your swap unless it would complete a row of 3 or more. I'm inclined to think it would be more interesting if you could swap whatever you like and really line up some big scores.
posted by polecat at 3:44 PM on April 11 [1 favorite]
O god I can’t stop. I’m at 44k points and I’m justifying ordering takeout for dinner instead of cooking tonight because… reasons.
CURSE YOU, CORTEX!
posted by onehalfjunco at 3:46 PM on April 11 [3 favorites]
CURSE YOU, CORTEX!
posted by onehalfjunco at 3:46 PM on April 11 [3 favorites]
Ugh 74,828 and I am never playing this again.
posted by aubilenon at 4:07 PM on April 11 [6 favorites]
posted by aubilenon at 4:07 PM on April 11 [6 favorites]
do you think it's better to focus more on the bottom of the board or the top? or am i over thinking this?
posted by LegallyBread at 4:37 PM on April 11
posted by LegallyBread at 4:37 PM on April 11
I'd say this is more of the Bejeweled family of games than Threes or 2048. The key is how you can only make moves that immediately cause a match, and how pieces fall in from the top and can immediately make new matches. It doesn't have the combo mechanic of Bejeweled, but it does have that feeling that the game is sometimes playing itself, when matches get made with random blocks falling in, repeatedly.
Since all moves must immediately make matches, and there's only so many of those on the board at a time, it's very easy, I think, to get done in by bad luck, or by not making the right move because of unforeseeable effects several matches down the chain. Speaking of that, any hope of successfully planning ahead relies on knowing how matches clear out blocks. When you make a swap, the swapped pieces take priority of location, all the matched blocks disappear except the ones in the move you made. After that, the rules for removing later matches in the combo are less clear, but there seems to be a bias towards removing the blocks to the right within horizontal matches.
The difficulty goes up, as in Threes and 2048, in that higher order blocks are much harder to make into matches, since no new blocks get introduced over 16. Threes will generate higher-numbered blocks two or three ranks beneath the highest block on the board, but this game only generates 2, 4, 8 and 16, which would seem to limit advanced progress (>512) unless you're both very careful and very lucky.
A question that comes to mind: why powers of 2? The numbers don't play any role, except to provide an ordering. The doubling isn't necessary to the game, and actually, since you're finding triples, not doubles, they're a little misleading. They could just be 1, 2, 3 etc., or even letters of the alphabet.
posted by JHarris at 5:10 PM on April 11 [3 favorites]
Since all moves must immediately make matches, and there's only so many of those on the board at a time, it's very easy, I think, to get done in by bad luck, or by not making the right move because of unforeseeable effects several matches down the chain. Speaking of that, any hope of successfully planning ahead relies on knowing how matches clear out blocks. When you make a swap, the swapped pieces take priority of location, all the matched blocks disappear except the ones in the move you made. After that, the rules for removing later matches in the combo are less clear, but there seems to be a bias towards removing the blocks to the right within horizontal matches.
The difficulty goes up, as in Threes and 2048, in that higher order blocks are much harder to make into matches, since no new blocks get introduced over 16. Threes will generate higher-numbered blocks two or three ranks beneath the highest block on the board, but this game only generates 2, 4, 8 and 16, which would seem to limit advanced progress (>512) unless you're both very careful and very lucky.
A question that comes to mind: why powers of 2? The numbers don't play any role, except to provide an ordering. The doubling isn't necessary to the game, and actually, since you're finding triples, not doubles, they're a little misleading. They could just be 1, 2, 3 etc., or even letters of the alphabet.
posted by JHarris at 5:10 PM on April 11 [3 favorites]
LegallyBread, my naive assumption is to work starting from the top, going down, then return to the top, going in waves from top to bottom. Removing lower blocks upsets the ones above, which removes possible matches and makes new ones possible, so I'd get the upper blocks while those matches are possible, then do lower blocks that will freshen up the top of the board with new matches.
posted by JHarris at 5:12 PM on April 11
posted by JHarris at 5:12 PM on April 11
It’s kinda like Bejeweled with numbers
posted by toodleydoodley at 6:05 PM on April 11
posted by toodleydoodley at 6:05 PM on April 11
This is insanely addictive!!
posted by supermedusa at 6:50 PM on April 11
posted by supermedusa at 6:50 PM on April 11
> The numbers don't play any role, except to provide an ordering.
Bigger numbers mean bigger numbers. "I got to 1024!" feels more impressive than "I got to 10!" even though it's functionally the same. Score inflation happens because of this too, and that's something as old as video games - why's the cheapest target in Asteroids a 20-pt Large Asteroid instead of a 1-pt?? Why's a dot in Pac-Man worth 10pt instead of 1?
posted by egypturnash at 7:21 PM on April 11 [2 favorites]
Bigger numbers mean bigger numbers. "I got to 1024!" feels more impressive than "I got to 10!" even though it's functionally the same. Score inflation happens because of this too, and that's something as old as video games - why's the cheapest target in Asteroids a 20-pt Large Asteroid instead of a 1-pt?? Why's a dot in Pac-Man worth 10pt instead of 1?
posted by egypturnash at 7:21 PM on April 11 [2 favorites]
I feel like I work in Macrodata Refinement at Lumon now
That was my first thought as well when I started- this is what an innie must feel like.
posted by SirOmega at 7:22 PM on April 11 [3 favorites]
That was my first thought as well when I started- this is what an innie must feel like.
posted by SirOmega at 7:22 PM on April 11 [3 favorites]
I got 26,000 on the first game and my one criticism is that it takes forever. I had to play like half an hour before I started running low on moves. Needs to ramp the challenge faster. Cool game though!
posted by caviar2d2 at 8:48 PM on April 11 [1 favorite]
posted by caviar2d2 at 8:48 PM on April 11 [1 favorite]
You can turn the animation speed up to make it go faster.
posted by aubilenon at 9:14 PM on April 11 [1 favorite]
posted by aubilenon at 9:14 PM on April 11 [1 favorite]
Very much an "I'm closing this tab now so this doesn't ruin my life" game
posted by potrzebie at 1:06 AM on April 12 [5 favorites]
posted by potrzebie at 1:06 AM on April 12 [5 favorites]
Thank goodness this doesn't have audio, because it's a few satisfyingly clicky sound effects away from eating the entire weekend.
posted by lucidium at 5:42 AM on April 12 [4 favorites]
posted by lucidium at 5:42 AM on April 12 [4 favorites]
To revise my above strategy: I now think it's best to focus on the bottom as much as you can, and try to concentrate the highest-value blocks as low as possible, by making matches beneath them. Especially if you can get them on the bottom row.
Since all the new blocks coming in are random, a single match low in the grid often create several matches higher up. You don't have much control over them, but you can try to make subsequent matches to lower the high-numbered results of those matches. Getting the high numbered blocks out of the top increases the chance that incoming blocks will find more new matches, and working to lower them puts them all in the same area, increasing the chances that you can match them as well.
posted by JHarris at 6:20 AM on April 12 [1 favorite]
Since all the new blocks coming in are random, a single match low in the grid often create several matches higher up. You don't have much control over them, but you can try to make subsequent matches to lower the high-numbered results of those matches. Getting the high numbered blocks out of the top increases the chance that incoming blocks will find more new matches, and working to lower them puts them all in the same area, increasing the chances that you can match them as well.
posted by JHarris at 6:20 AM on April 12 [1 favorite]
To revise my above strategy: I now think it's best to focus on the bottom as much as you can, and try to concentrate the highest-value blocks as low as possible, by making matches beneath them. Especially if you can get them on the bottom row.
This is where I've landed, too; specifically I tend to spend the opening trying to migrate matches to small block on the bottom end fairly aggressively (while also doing some cleanup up top on 2 and 4s to avoid migrating a ton of them downward in the process and erasing most of that progress). I haven't quite gotten to a satisfactory run where the bottom was ENTIRELY clear of small digits, but I've done pretty well and it hasn't hurt anything at least.
One tactic there is explicitly holding off on a vertical match until I've cleaned up the column directly above it for the most part to avoid like PLUNGING 2s and 4s down into the resulting ravine. Can't do anything about whatever might come out of the spigot after the clear, but I can at least avoid giving myself trouble on purpose.
I got 26,000 on the first game and my one criticism is that it takes forever.
It definitely falls into a loose category of what I think of as "busywork puzzles"—it's not taut, and its too random to be really logically satisfying, but it is pleasant enough to just Do The Thing for a while with it that it is satisfying to spend some time with. It is probably possible to play it very well, but there's a bit too much to keep track of for me to really plan long-term rather than just try to make short- and medium-turn good decisions.
posted by cortex at 8:11 AM on April 12 [3 favorites]
This is where I've landed, too; specifically I tend to spend the opening trying to migrate matches to small block on the bottom end fairly aggressively (while also doing some cleanup up top on 2 and 4s to avoid migrating a ton of them downward in the process and erasing most of that progress). I haven't quite gotten to a satisfactory run where the bottom was ENTIRELY clear of small digits, but I've done pretty well and it hasn't hurt anything at least.
One tactic there is explicitly holding off on a vertical match until I've cleaned up the column directly above it for the most part to avoid like PLUNGING 2s and 4s down into the resulting ravine. Can't do anything about whatever might come out of the spigot after the clear, but I can at least avoid giving myself trouble on purpose.
I got 26,000 on the first game and my one criticism is that it takes forever.
It definitely falls into a loose category of what I think of as "busywork puzzles"—it's not taut, and its too random to be really logically satisfying, but it is pleasant enough to just Do The Thing for a while with it that it is satisfying to spend some time with. It is probably possible to play it very well, but there's a bit too much to keep track of for me to really plan long-term rather than just try to make short- and medium-turn good decisions.
posted by cortex at 8:11 AM on April 12 [3 favorites]
I too have been doing the "focus on the bottom" strategy and my score has continued to creep up, but it's pretty low compared to some here (my top score is 29k~) hopefully I will NOT spend too much time this weekend trying to up that :P
posted by supermedusa at 10:53 AM on April 12
posted by supermedusa at 10:53 AM on April 12
I don't understand why the game ends. Does it think i ran out of moves?
posted by tofu_crouton at 11:21 AM on April 12
posted by tofu_crouton at 11:21 AM on April 12
Yeah, it’s a very abrupt ending, but I think it’s just because there are no possible moves available.
posted by nickmark at 11:31 AM on April 12
posted by nickmark at 11:31 AM on April 12
I finally cracked 20k and I think I'm done. I saw 512s forming spontaneously in the top row, and somehow that didn't end my game right away. I can't maintain any illusion that my score had anything to do with my skill or cleverness.
posted by Western Infidels at 12:08 PM on April 12
posted by Western Infidels at 12:08 PM on April 12
I had a "game over" flash before a match fell in to the puzzle and I could keep going!
I really like the colours in this one. I got 40,000 or so on my first round and haven't managed to top that yet with strategy.
It's a pick up put down one for me which is nice.
posted by freethefeet at 3:23 PM on April 12
I really like the colours in this one. I got 40,000 or so on my first round and haven't managed to top that yet with strategy.
It's a pick up put down one for me which is nice.
posted by freethefeet at 3:23 PM on April 12
cracked 30k this morning, not sure I'm done. halp...
posted by supermedusa at 3:31 PM on April 12
posted by supermedusa at 3:31 PM on April 12
57k.
I got 50k real early, but then hit a wall at around 30k and couldn't get past it. Then I stopped focusing exclusively on the bottom and it opened up for me again.
I think the lower the number, the more worried you should be that it's closer to the bottom.
posted by jonnay at 7:46 AM on April 13
I got 50k real early, but then hit a wall at around 30k and couldn't get past it. Then I stopped focusing exclusively on the bottom and it opened up for me again.
I think the lower the number, the more worried you should be that it's closer to the bottom.
posted by jonnay at 7:46 AM on April 13
Jesus, man, stop matching damn chickens and do something productive.
Damn you. Damn you straight to hell.
posted by deeker at 9:46 AM on April 13 [1 favorite]
Damn you. Damn you straight to hell.
posted by deeker at 9:46 AM on April 13 [1 favorite]
Jesus, man, stop matching damn chickens and do something productive.
oh that's right i never finished the chicken one, brb
posted by mittens at 1:21 PM on April 13
oh that's right i never finished the chicken one, brb
posted by mittens at 1:21 PM on April 13
68,556, using jonnay's strategy.
aliens_kill_me.gif
posted by The genius who rejected Anno's budget proposal. at 5:42 PM on April 13 [1 favorite]
aliens_kill_me.gif
posted by The genius who rejected Anno's budget proposal. at 5:42 PM on April 13 [1 favorite]
If I'm going to hell then I'm taking y'all with me.
Dragonsweeper got an update since it was last posted on the blue and now it's even more addictive.
posted by The genius who rejected Anno's budget proposal. at 5:52 PM on April 13 [1 favorite]
Dragonsweeper got an update since it was last posted on the blue and now it's even more addictive.
posted by The genius who rejected Anno's budget proposal. at 5:52 PM on April 13 [1 favorite]
Dragonsweeper got an update since it was last posted on the blue and now it's even more addictive.
I somehow missed it on Metafilter and found out about it in mid February. I cannot discern any difference to how it was then (I beat the dragon just to make sure).
posted by aubilenon at 7:41 PM on April 14
I somehow missed it on Metafilter and found out about it in mid February. I cannot discern any difference to how it was then (I beat the dragon just to make sure).
posted by aubilenon at 7:41 PM on April 14
Oh there's a version history. Yeah last update was Feb 7.
posted by aubilenon at 7:43 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]
posted by aubilenon at 7:43 PM on April 14 [1 favorite]
I just got a 2048 tile after a single move, which was... strange. And probably a better excuse to not feel so addicted than chasing the dragon of my clearly-an-outlier high score.
posted by dick dale the vampire at 12:13 AM on April 19 [1 favorite]
posted by dick dale the vampire at 12:13 AM on April 19 [1 favorite]
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