Minesweeper.
Not many games are as ubiquitously familiar, standing right alongside Solitaire as one of the
popular "casual" games in existense
The kind of game you play when you are wasting time at work
Wasting time ignoring schoolwork. Wasting time just to waste time
It's pretty much the definition of a time waster, right?
WRONG
Under that minimalist facade of squares and smileyfaces
Minesweeper is one of the most misunderstood hardcore games ever.
Seriously! And if you are raising an eyebrow at that, then just keep watching.
Minesweeper is a logic game. Where the goal is to sweep for mines, and you do this by clicking the squares on the grid.
The idea is to open all safe squares without uncovering a mine and blowing yourself up.
Of course, all the mines are hidden at first, so you'll use logic and pattern recognition
to figure out where the mines are before clicking them.
That's where all those colored numbers come into play.
With each one of them signifying the number of mines within the surrounding immediate 8 tiles.
Simple enough, except that's just the beginning.
Not only can you increase the difficulty to ludicrous levels
but the strategies of playing are nothing short of obsessive.
That ticking timer at the top is the key.
As is the number of moves it takes to clear a board
For instance you have the ability to flag squares you belive contain mines
But since the game only ends when all safe squares are cleared
this only wastes time, so you may want to ignore flags alltogether.
This is known to player as the "No Flags" style, or "NF".
Of course you are playing using chording then you'll want to use flags which makes pure NF play impossible.
"What is chording?" you ask.
Well it's a strafe performed with the mouse cursor, where you flag a square by pressing
but not releasing the right mouse button.
Then drag the mouse with the right mouse button still pressed to a number that is fully flagged
Then with the right mouse button still down, press and release the left mouse button
to clear the fully flagged number.
This is not always the best choice though since chording on a 1 only requires 1 flag
and clears up to 7 empty spaces.
Chording on a 7 requires 7 flags
But an NF player can click just once on the empty square, so a mixture of both methods
will end up in a better time, and an optimal 3BV.
"Now what is a 3BV?" you ask, heh,
A 3BV, or Bechtel's Board Benchmark Value is the minimum number of left clicks needed to win a game
using NF style play.
For instance, this board takes 39 clicks to clear.
However, this number is always balanced with the time that it takes to actually clear the board.
There are even utilities to analyze these boards to calculate its 3BV, not to mention the other methods
such as IOE - RQP - IOS - Zini and OBV.
In fact, this stuff got so complex that for serious Minesweeper players
Microsoft version of the game are no longer accepted for official world rankings
due to the numerous bugs, cheats, boardcycles and solvers out there.
In fact, competitive Minesweepers are now such a serious subject, there are multiple websites and forums
dedicated to board strategies, and documenting the game and the communities history.
And the Clay Mathematics Institute is offering a 1 million dollar prise for an efficient solving algorythm for Minesweeper.
You still think this is just a casual time waster?
Heh yeah, I don't think so.
Another interesting facet of the game is how it came to be in the first place
since the inspiration is up for some debate.
There have been no shortage of games featuring mines, bombs and hidden traps over the decades
going all the way back to mainframe programs and games written in B asic in the 1970´s.
And then you got games from the 80´s which came even closer, such as Minefield in 1982,
and Mined-Out in 1983.
And these inspired their own clones and permutations, such as Relentless Logic in 1985,
for MS-Dos.
Then in 1989, Curt Johnson wrote a clone of Relentless Logic for IBMs OS/2 operating system.
He began working at Microsoft that same year, and a coworker of his named Robert Donner
expressed interest in making a version of the game for Windows, as a programming exercise.
Kirk supplied Robert with the source code, and this resulted in a game he called Mine.
Over its various versions it included things like collecting hidden coins and a mouse cursor shaped like a foot.
Which would turn into a bloody stump when you stepped on a mine.
Then in the summer of 1990 Microsoft asked its employees to submit games for its newly released Windows 3.0 operating environment.
Robert submitted 2 games, one was Mine, now called WindMine and TicTactics
Both of which ended up being released in the first Microsoft Windows Entertainment Pack
in October of 1990.
Microsoft removed the exploding foot cursor
and tweaked some of the graphics and stuff and the game was renamed to MineSweeper.
It was an instant favorite among those that bought the collection, but it wasn't until 1992
that MineSweeper rose to super stardom with its inclusion in every copy of Windows 3.1
and then the subsequent versions of Windows thereafter.
Of course, if you're like me, it's still just a game that you open up every so often to screw around with
because you got nothing else to do.
I've never cared about 3BV, NF, IOE, FBI, NBC, DICK or any of those complex initialisms.
But I can totally see why some people do.
Especially if you are logically inclined and the standard faire just doesn't satiate your Vulcan desires.
That however you play it, whether by going all X, Y, Z, Z, Y on it or playing it on a pro level
Minesweeper is a legendary game, and one that deserves to be mentioned alongside the greats.
Maybe that will never happen, but hopefully this video has at least opened your eyes
to the surprising possibilities of Minesweeper.
Maybe if you enjoyed this, then you might enjoy some of my other videos.
Eeeh... I've done one on the entire best of Windows Entertainment Pack, which doesn't include MineSweeper
but includes a bunch of other things, as well as lots of other videos on similar subjects, and what not, sooo...
If you want to browse my channel, that´s a good idea.
As is subscribing, because that exists too.
You can also follow and interact with me on Twitter, and Facebook, AND do the while Patreon thing
if you like the Patreon thing.
It lets you see videos like this early and help support the show.
And as always, thank you very much for watching!