PATHOS - A puzzle game like Psychopath

[AutotelicBrown]

Re: PATHOS - A puzzle game like Psychopath

Goddamn, finally solved Musical Chairs and got the all stressful levels achievement. I agree it's pretty hard for the point it's presented although what really made me waste a lot of time was missing a very simple optimization after getting the core of the solution down.

Thanks for those! And yeah, in terms of plain puzzle without a gimmick/red herring Six Bits is way too easy for world X.

Time to test my luck on world XII.

[Brett]

Re: PATHOS - A puzzle game like Psychopath

holy moly @AutotelicBrown

Really good finds -- especially China Shop, we all felt there was a 38 solution in there somewhere :/

I'll have an update ready to go by the time you read this with fixed solutions, as well as a small change to Cruel Chamber since it had some old colors.

Also swapped Musical Chairs and some other small stuff too. We didn't have the ability to swap levels because of how we built the game but we recently changed some of it and this swap was definitely overdue.

*another tester shaved 2 steps off of Moonbud and an additional 2 steps off Frigid Engine, down to 148, since I read your posts. This is in the update as well.

[Reach]

Re: PATHOS - A puzzle game like Psychopath

Game is going to be absolutely savage with all of the steps updated.

In the meantime I'm 2 off'ing pretty much the entirety of what I have left of world 10. There's some real soul crushers in there. The good ol "Oh, yep that's it" to 2 off

Lockmess monster in particular is the first one I feel like I've already exhausted my options and got stuck with off by 2 solutions.

Yeah...what the hell is up with this one? lol

First traditional level I can't solve. Was like two off third try and I've walked through each move and don't see any optimizations.

Must be blind. Old age

[AutotelicBrown]

Re: PATHOS - A puzzle game like Psychopath

World XII is brutal damn. Barely managed to unlock world XIII and cleared its first level. Only glanced at the remaining ones and I'm already pleased with what I see, looking forward to attempt them later.

Lockmess monster still baffles me and I feel I'll be pretty mad once I realize what I'm missing.

Great to see quick updates, I'll have to revisit Moonbud and Frigid Engine then.

A couple more optimizations for good measure.
Spoiler for Magic Bullet solution:

Spoiler for Warehouse Duty solution:

Spoiler for Wellspring solution:

Spoiler for Four's a Crowd solution:

Edit: Moonbud was simple but still no idea about Frigid Engine.

Edit2: One more, spoiler for Karst solution:

[Frevett]

Re: PATHOS - A puzzle game like Psychopath

I like the increased complexity with the additional blocks. Looking back at Psychopath 2, most of my preferred levels are on the smaller end (something like duke's Level B). Hopefully we'll get more small tough levels like that. Something like Bonefish - looks really simple. I was stuck at 110 for days - hardest level in the first 14 worlds imo.

Lockmess Monster has a really good two-cut, but definitely a facepalm moment when you do see it.
Looking forward to seeing what the final step counts for The Beast's Belly and Chaos Machine are.
PP1 vets should like world 13.

Do we have an ETA on a level editor?

[hi19hi19]

Re: PATHOS - A puzzle game like Psychopath

Okay exams done.

Will get game by the end of this week probably.

ETA on a level editor? lol

[AutotelicBrown]

Re: PATHOS - A puzzle game like Psychopath

Lockmess Monster has a really good two-cut, but definitely a facepalm moment when you do see it.

Finally solved it and can confirm. I'm particularly mad because I toyed with the right idea early on but forgot a crucial detail.

Bonefish is indeed deceptively hard, have yet to solve that one.

Slowly progressing through world XIII - Four's a Crowd, Hallways, Circuit Board, and Nexus down - and surely, making things harder for everyone!

Optimized solution for Circuit Board:

Optimized solution for Nexus (probably improvable if I could keep track of what I'm doing):

[Reach]

Re: PATHOS - A puzzle game like Psychopath

Still curious about Lockmess monster. Closing down the office for Christmas next week so I should have time to really sink my teeth into some of these harder puzzles. In the meantime Mr. Brown here appears to be breaking the game, lol @ 10 off on one of those puzzles. I'm sure I'll enjoy that one when I get there now D:

Bonefish is indeed brutal. I got fairly close to a solution early on and now everything I try is a hot mess and not even close. Another one in w10 was driving me similarly crazy and involved 3 ice blocks and an orange movable piece. I'd like to talk to whoever forgot the other like 10 moves needed there thank you.

Edit: W12 Orchid, Holy shit Bravo.

W12 Wellspring 183. I'm reasonably certain this is optimal but testing for 181 before I send solution.

**Yep Wellspring 181 and I'm not convinced this is optimal either so I'll be back if I hit 179.

[AutotelicBrown]

Re: PATHOS - A puzzle game like Psychopath

Nice catch, managed to find 181 as well but I don't think it's improvable from there.

Orchid is indeed very cool, haven't revisited it yet but I'm at +12 steps from solution. Got down three more from world XIII (Into the Depths, Crawl Space and Amok), those traditional levels are so pleasant to work on.

For now I'm having a lot of trouble with some escort missions: Trash Heap on X, Bunker Buster and Spelunking on XII. Up to world XII I'm only missing those, Bonefish and Orchid.

[Reach]

Re: PATHOS - A puzzle game like Psychopath

Yeah I think 181 is the ticket, there are two ways to do it but I don't think any other iterations yield a 179. I'll check it again when I get time but I'll probably just get back to working on world 10 and 12. I've finished pretty much everything else but have a lot of 2 off in world 10 and haven't even touched much of 12 (spent all my time on Orchid).

[Frevett]

Re: PATHOS - A puzzle game like Psychopath

Wellspring is doable in 166

[AutotelicBrown]

Re: PATHOS - A puzzle game like Psychopath

Yeah, just realized there was a very simple optimization left lol

There rest of the solution is the same though so I'm guessing that's optimal.

[Reach]

Re: PATHOS - A puzzle game like Psychopath

The optimizations in some of these open ended stages are absolutely wild.

Warehouse is absolutely busted, I got 353 but I don't think that is even close to optimal, another 10+ moves can probably be shaved off easily.

My only concern is that some of these levels are going to be scary difficult to beat for people when completely optimized. Thankfully you can leave many levels incomplete and still move onto the next world later in the game, which is great design imo.

[Brett]

Re: PATHOS - A puzzle game like Psychopath

Pushed an update with these new routes minus Warehouse Duty. Got Wellspring down to 164 as well.

[AutotelicBrown]

Re: PATHOS - A puzzle game like Psychopath

Warehouse is likely improvable, I got 349 without really trying to optimize. Some other more open-ended and/or ice block levels with larger optimizations that I posted are probably improvable as well for the same reason (Magic Bullet, Four's a Crowd, Karst and Nexus). They are super annoying to optimize without a clear goal though (which I guess is the reason they didn't have great solutions in the first place) so I'll only revisit those if I clear the rest of the game or someone else posts a better solution like just happened for Wellspring.

Interesting to know it's possible to shave 2 more on Wellspring, I'll see into it later alongside Frigid Engine.