Brickception

https://brickception.xyz/

by duck • 3 years ago

579 88 3 years ago

brickception.xyz

jstummbillig• 3 years ago

The amount of anxiety that imagining playing this game gives me is considerable. Very cool idea though.

burrish• 3 years ago

Very original, can't wait to play this at work

Karliss• 3 years ago

Very original

It's a copy of someone else doing exactly the same thing (2 layers of breakout played by moving window) but in C++ (which the author credits) both years before the following. Although the general concept of having games creatively use windows is probably much older. I assume it showed up now because of recent trend of people rediscovering that this concept works in (some) browsers and making various non breakout variations of it of it https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38413660

matsemann• 3 years ago

Just make it Excel themed!

tibanne• 3 years ago

Only one level deep?

Does time go faster in the smaller one?

traveler1• 3 years ago

Unfortunately doesn't work on the Arc browser and presumably Orion, or any other browsers which put pop-up windows into a new tab instead.

vladvasiliu• 3 years ago

Doesn't work on Edge 119.0.2151.93 either.

Initially it doesn't open the pop-up. Once I allow it, it opens correctly in a new window, but the smaller window doesn't move with the mouse.

mft_• 3 years ago

Great idea!

(It doesn't seem to allow 'steering' of the ball by varying where it hits the bat, though?)

bestouff• 3 years ago

Doesn't work here (Firefox 115.2)

Paddle doesn't move.

pedrogpimenta• 3 years ago

Same here. On Linux with KDE, if it matters.

shmde• 3 years ago

The inner browser top(acting like a paddle) is not detecting collision with the ball

Firefox Version 120.0

alt2273• 3 years ago

Works fine for me on firefox 120 on windows

xlogout• 3 years ago

I think it might be a Xorg vs. Wayland thing rather than browser version. IIRC Wayland does not report coordinates of the window relative to screenspace.

levodelellis• 3 years ago

Hitting the last brick was the worst. Instead of pausing the top maybe swap the playing fields so I have more control over the paddle/ball? It took over 2 minutes just to hit one brick in the smaller one

ranting-moth• 3 years ago

Linux/Firefox: Paddle doesn't move and the paddle popup doesn't bounce the ball.

Linux/Chrome: Paddle doesn't move but the paddle popup does bounce the ball.

Retr0id• 3 years ago

Same Linux/Firefox experience here, and I'm on Wayland, which I have a feeling might be relevant.

Edit: also GNOME 45

remedan• 3 years ago

To add another data point, it works for on me on Linux/Firefox/X. So the Wayland theory might be correct.

Prunkton• 3 years ago

works fine for me on:

  KDE 5.27.9
  Qt 5.15.11
  Wayland 1.22.0-1
  Firefox 120.0

upper bound of the inner window is not perfect though

focusedone• 3 years ago

Linux/Firefox: Works fine here. KDE Neon 5.27

Only issue is the low resolution screen on my old Thinkpad makes it difficult to see the entire game area.

Super cool game! Plays great on higher res screens, just wanted to test on Linux.

_lnrx• 3 years ago

Game is working fine for me.

Linux/Chrome on gnome with enabled wayland ozone.

Jnr• 3 years ago

Linux/Wayland/Firefox: it doesn't interact with the window since wayland probably doesn't provide location data.

Linux/Wayland/Chromium: chromium crashes as soon as I click "launch game" :))

Self-Perfection• 3 years ago

Linux/Xorg/Firefox/KDE Paddle coordinate gets updated only when I release the paddle window.

alt2273• 3 years ago

This idea is amazing yet completely evil at the same time.

seabass-labrax• 3 years ago

This is absolutely wonderful! I didn't think it would work with my setup (bspwm and Firefox 115), but it did. I consider myself pretty good with these kinds of games, but this really does take Breakout to a new dimension, with a difficulty to match!

fisian• 3 years ago

I had a similar idea using two windows for a game. One large window with an overview map and a popup window you can move around as a magnifying lens that shows details and lets you interact.

However, I never tried implementing it.

omnibrain• 3 years ago

Reminds me of reYal, a game with "recursive" controls a friend of mine created: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1080780/reYal/

olejorgenb• 3 years ago

Cool concept. As a reviewer said - if you get into the flow it's interesting. But the chunkiness of the controls kinda ruins the experience and make it harder than necessary to get into that flow.

trizoza• 3 years ago

This is soooooo gooooood! Love it! :D:D

WindyMiller2• 3 years ago

Wildly annoying that this isn't called 'Brickursion'.

dylan604• 3 years ago

If you've missed the reference to Inception, then that's on you. I think it is aptly named.

WindyMiller2• 3 years ago

Don't worry, I get it. I just think it's a bit daft that the title is now so thoroughly associated with a fairly mechanical part of how the film functions, when it's not only a pre-existing word but also refers to a much more significant idea within the film itself. Plus, the 'rick' of 'brick' sounds a bit like the 'rec' of 'recursion'.

But I think I was a bit harsh in this case, the way the two parts of the game interact is more reminiscent of the dream layers in the film than is often the case with such Inception references.

pacfish• 3 years ago

Hard crashes Chrome for me (all windows instantly disappear on pressing 'LAUNCH GAME') - Chrome beta (120.0.6099.35) on Wayland (not using X) on Ubuntu 23.04. I wasn't expecting it to work due to Wayland, but the crash was impressive!

edfletcher_t137• 3 years ago

Frustratingly difficult: I love it! The cleverness here is excellent. Well done!

NietTim• 3 years ago

Hahaha genius. Doesn't work on safari/mac os for me for some reason (console says "maximum stack size exceeded") but works fine on chrome

matthewiiiv• 3 years ago

This is simultaneously, amazing and terrible. Congratulations!

stevage• 3 years ago

Wow, this is clever. And for once, it's cleverly weird in a way that is interesting to play.

Not only do you have to deal with playing two games of breakout at once, but the same mouse controls two paddles simultaneously, but at different scales.

The interesting challenge is when the two balls are briefly in sync but you can't hit them at once. You have to move the window paddle up so you hit its ball earlier, then go and get the tiny ball. Easier said than done though...

layer8• 3 years ago

Make it a two-player game by making the paddle of each player the brick wall of the other player. This is also easily extended to N > 2 players.

humanfromearth92• 3 years ago

This could just be crazy, given that brick walls may be composed of various types of bricks that break with various numbers of hits and also given that the walls will have various shapes depending on which bricks you break first.

This drastically changes the game in the sense that as a player, you can't decide precisely which bricks of the opponent you break (as opponents move their walls): you have some influence on which one of your bricks you break and you most fundamental goal is to make sure that the ball just bounces against your own paddle/wall to send it back and not lose a life.

And the more you touch the ball with your paddle, the more the paddle's size shrinks (because of all the broken bricks), which contributes to make the game harder for you and might give your adversary some chance to come back.

That's a terrific idea, even without the brickception (just a simple brick-wall-paddle).

goldenkey• 3 years ago

Might as well just include everyone's games inside of everyone else's game as nested entities whose microstates determine the above games macrostates.

This is very similar to Reflective Towers Of Interpreters: https://blog.sigplan.org/2021/08/12/reflective-towers-of-int...

Uptrenda• 3 years ago

I love it, OP. Really creative take on the original game and this is a totally unique use of windows as an input. It's smart on many levels.

I wonder if this game could be used as a benchmark for alternating attention (switching between tasks.) People with disorders like ADHD and others that effect executive function are supposed to have difficulty with this. So it would be interesting to see if ones score increased off medication vs on medication. Or even if a healthy person saw an increase with stimulants.

Psychologists love games like this because it lets them study isolated aspects of cognition in a standardized way. It's honestly a cool project.

metabagel• 3 years ago

It's smart on many levels.

Two levels. ;-)

brcmthrowaway• 3 years ago

Can someone write an RL bot to play this game?

vaxintar• 3 years ago

Completely broken with my i3 setup

askiiart• 3 years ago

It works with my sway setup [1], but only on Chromium, not Librewolf. I'm pretty sure it's just a Librewolf/FF issue, since it seems to open pop-ups in new tabs, not as windows.

[1] https://git.askiiart.net/askiiart/dotfiles/src/branch/main/s...

Nav_Panel• 3 years ago

same but I didn't expect anything different from a TWM for a game that relies on floating windows

KMnO4• 3 years ago

I opened the link, and laughed at how dumb I am to think this would work in i3

myself248• 3 years ago

Have we completely decided as a culture that "inception", which once meant "beginning", now means "recursion"?

I liked to think that words had meaning.

madeofpalk• 3 years ago

It does have a meaning. It's a pop culture reference.

dahart4• 3 years ago

No, we haven’t decided that inception is synonymous with recursion, but even if we had, lots and lots of words have always had multiple meanings, and meanings that come and go, and meanings that change over time. Language is fluid and is defined by its usage and not by static prescription, which is one of the fun aspects of language. Embrace it and enjoy the ride! ;)

ryukoposting• 3 years ago

If language never evolved, then most of us would be "instructors of the sentient hunks of distilled sand."

account42• 3 years ago

Doesn't that sound so much cooler than software engineer or programmer though?

vinberdon• 3 years ago

This is beautiful.

sonicanatidae• 3 years ago

Very clever. Well done!

passion__desire3• 3 years ago

Reminds me of Gettier Problems in Epistemology :

A desert traveller is searching for water. He sees, in the valley ahead, a shimmering blue expanse. Unfortunately, it’s a mirage. But fortunately, when he reaches the spot where there appeared to be water, there actually is water, hidden under a rock. Did the traveller know, as he stood on the hilltop hallucinating, that there was water ahead?

Here's a real world example :

https://www.instagram.com/p/CzWlxkbp0vT/

Imagine a video feedback loop version of gettier problem where the problem is resolved only at the Nth nested level.

Sort of like this short story : https://qntm.org/responsibility

iamgopal• 3 years ago

Once I changed half my working code ( and wasted an Hour of time ) before realising that I was testing different code. On the other hand, now newer code had 10 times more testing points.

8n4vidtmkvmk• 3 years ago

I'm going to say no, he didn't know. But I don't think I can properly articulate why which just get me into trouble with an even more nuanced variant of that question.

passion__desire3• 3 years ago

Let me illustrate a probable story which might muddy the waters and expand the surface area of belief.

Consider a woman whose child is suffering from a disease. She has gone to all the doctors she was recommended and found no success. She is told to visit Church and pray to Jesus. After the sunday mass, she tells her story to few random church goers. They immediately recognize the medical condition and tell her to visit a particular doctor. Doctor sees her child and provides medication. Her child is cured after few years. Now the question is did she know going to church would solve her medical problems?

ChrisArchitect• 3 years ago

(2019)

Blast from the past, the author had a Show HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20126142

nialv7• 3 years ago

Why stop at depth 2? ;-)

SamBam• 3 years ago

I tried changing the size of the smaller window, and it worked briefly to allow the ball to bounce off the now-larger size, before the game snapped the window size back to the original.

It made me think that changing the window could be part of the game somehow. Perhaps as you drag it bigger the playing field of the smaller game increases in width, so that game becomes harder (and also you can't move the paddle as far because your new window is too big to drag).

Or maybe you should be able to capture the ball in the big window into the smaller window, and the size and position of the smaller window determines its entry point.

chungy• 3 years ago

The ball in the lower window only bounces off the browser's chrome and not the title bar. This is making the game harder than it could be (and possibly an unfixable problem?).

Also I have wobbly windows and that makes the game hard too.

smittywerben• 3 years ago

This game is so silly it makes me laugh. It works great on Windows 10. I don't have that fancy trimmed chrome titlebar just the regular box style.

It reminds me of a program my brother wrote in high school that would spawn invading spaceships (Java Triangles) onto your desktop and they would bonk your mouse around.

Meanwhile, I was in the corner of the lab playing Starcraft.

adam12• 3 years ago

Reminded me of this pong inside a sprite tutorial for the c64:

https://youtu.be/C_J4dSAWqY4?si=BQN90pEFjOaGtOxj&t=1118

xer0x• 3 years ago

Neat! I didn't know this was possible!

mck-• 3 years ago

Reminds me of a thread on HN from 2013 that turned tic-tac-toe into something much more interesting and in a same way meta [1]

I made a simple online playable game of it back then: http://mck-.github.io/T3/

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5898506

neilparikh• 3 years ago

wly_cdgr• 3 years ago

I absolutely don't want to play it all the way through but that is irrelevant, love it

eshack94• 3 years ago

This reminds me of an old PC game called DX-Ball that my uncle and I used to play back in the late 90s/early 2000s.

Super cool project, OP!

rpdillon• 3 years ago

DX-Ball was really great! The block breaking animations and overall polish are very memorable for me.

You sent me searching for it with your comment, and it's still around: https://gamesnostalgia.com/game/dx-ball

File size: 380k. I miss those days.

signatureMove• 3 years ago

I would like to see additional windows spawned after a certain point for a true 'brickception' experience.

kderbe• 3 years ago

If this gives you an appetite for more block-breaking, check out Pippin Barr's BREAKSOUT, a collection of 36 wacky variants of Breakout: https://pippinbarr.com/breaksout/info/

sva_• 3 years ago

It is rather difficult with a tiling window manager

riwsky• 3 years ago

Reminds me of one of my favorite games of all time: The Mountain and the Motorcycle: https://achewood.com/2004/07/13/title.html

dragontamer• 3 years ago

The paddle seems buggy.

It seems like the "right" side of a paddle always increases the speed, while the "left" side of the paddle always decreases the speed.

This behavior should be direction dependent: ie: the left-side of the paddle should push the ball to the left, while the right-side of the paddle should push the ball to the right. Classic breakout controls.

For the first 2 or 3 games, I thought you couldn't control the speed. I was wrong, its just that the speed-control in this game is very small (it requires about 6 or 7 bounces to go from minimum speed to max speed), while also having a very non-intuitive speed/direction control scheme for the paddle.

Brickception

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