Wicked Mines
This is played like classic Minesweeper, but with one key difference: Exactly six squares are lying about the number of nearby mines.
Here's how it works:
- Exactly six squares that report 3 or more mines are lying - they are reporting a count which is exactly one more than the truth. For example, a lying 4 means there are really 3 nearby mines.
- You can trust a square if it reports a 1 or 2 nearby mines.
- There is no more than one lie in any given row or column. So once you find a lie, you know there aren't any other lies in that row or column of the grid.
Controls:
- Left click an unopened square to reveal it. If you click a square with no mines in neighboring squares, then squares around it will also be revealed.
- Right click to mark an unopened square with a flag.
- Right click an square with a count to mark it as a lie.
Winning:
- You win when you've flagged all mines and marked all lies.
Thanks for playing.
Comments
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This is definitely a clever twist on an old game (and a little nerve-wracking! That feeling of "OK, so I know there can't be a mine...wait! There can! That might be lying!").
The main problem I encountered is that, because anything 3 or higher can't be trusted, it was very easy to get to a point where there was basically no information and nothing left to do but guess. I wonder whether a slightly stricter constraint, e.g. "two lying squares cannot touch", would help (because then, say, two adjacent threes can't both be lying, so that gives you a little more information than just "none at all").
Thanks for the feedback! I hope you enjoyed playing with it.
And you're right - it is quite easy to get stuck and have to guess. I've toyed with permitting a single "free click" or "reveal non-lethal square" option, but haven't figured out what would help. Your suggestion of "two lying squares cannot touch" would be pretty easy to implement, I believe, and could lead to another step in the deduction...
And - again - thanks!