12 ms·

Shenzhen I/O

456 points by yumaikas 10y ago

danso 10y ago
Feels like an auto-buy for me. Any developer that can make Assembly into a fun, polished game (TIS-100) is probably going to hit this one out of the park.
- jsmthrowaway 10y ago
  Zachtronics became auto-buy with me around the time of SpaceChem. Check out Infinifactory too for a different, yet familiar, feel. Zach Barth is like the nerd whisperer. His games speak to me. Good guy, too: I've corresponded with him over something as pedestrian as Steam keys and he responded and solved it in mere minutes, if I recall.
  - qwertyuiop924 10y ago
    If you're a programmer, you owe it to yourself to check out Zach's games. They very much focus on the same skills: if you like one, you'll like the other.
    - lfowles 10y ago
      They are all at amazingly different levels of abstraction too. This game is probably my next buy. I have to admit I saw it yesterday and dismissed it as "some amateur is making Yet Another Programming Game that's going to be unbalanced and unfun" until I saw it was Zachtronics.
      - qwertyuiop924 10y ago
        Which is to say, "some expert making Yet Another Programming Game that's going to be unbalanced and extremely fun" Because let's face it, masochism is what programming is about.
        lfowles 10y ago
        >Because let's face it, masochism is what programming is about. True, but Zach is good at pulling out a simple representative subset for each game. There's no arcane syntax for using registers vs IO in TIS-100 for example. It's just another dest/source that works with MOV. Then he adds something outlandish and gamey like adjacent core communication. I've played some other attempts at the programming masochism genre and they struck me as fiddly attempts to cram complexity into the instructions vs the problem.
        qwertyuiop924 10y ago
        This is why I like ZT games more than other excercises in masochism like BrainFuck. They're ultimately more about using a simple, well-understood set of tools to solve difficult problems than they are about using a deliberately obstructive set of tools. The fact that the tools are so easy to understand is what draws me to it over real asm programming: nothing's worse than trying to solve a puzzle when you have the sneaking suspicion that there's a few pieces you're missing that would make your job easier if you were to only learn them. Let the complexity emerge naturally. Because it will. By the way, if you like ZT games, and haven't checked out the work of Eric Wastl (The Synacor Challenge, and The Advent of Code) you should do so immediately. It's not as fun now that everyone else has done it, but it's still a blast.
        lfowles 10y ago
        Funny you bring up Braunfuck, I've toyed with making a brainfuck game[0], but gave up because working with terminal IO is the pits .... [0]: https://github.com/lfowles/brainporn https://github.com/lfowles/brainporn
        thaumasiotes 10y ago
        > This is why I like ZT games more than other excercises in masochism like BrainFuck. They're ultimately more about using a simple, well-understood set of tools to solve difficult problems than they are about using a deliberately obstructive set of tools. I tend to feel the opposite way -- the games are written to be deliberately obstructive; that's why we call them "games". It gets frustrating pretty quickly. Spacechem is a series of exercises in writing Befunge. I don't see how that could be characterized any other way than as "obstructive for the sake of obstructive".
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]
  - lfowles 10y ago
    I'm still barely past the first set of multifactory stages in spacechem. Multithreading is hard.
stephenmm 10y ago
Looks interesting but its not clear to me what it is... Anyone have more noob friendly introduction?
- jameskilton 10y ago
  Basically, the programming from TIS-100 and the factory layout game of Spacechem. It's awesome, probably crazy hard further on, and I'll never actually finish it, but I am happy to give Zachtronics more money!
- HCIdivision17 10y ago
  You get to build and program circuits! Think of it as a steppable debugger for a computer that has modular components. Your goal is to build circuits out of chips that are little blocks of code. Also there is a real pritable manual (which was one of the most celebrated bits from TIS-100). To get an idea of where the game is going, it helps to have played some of the earlier works, like SpaceChem and TIS-100. http://www.zachtronics.com/spacechem/ http://www.zachtronics.com/spacechem/ http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/ http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/ EDIT: You know, looking at some of the other earlier work, he may have been building up to this for a long time. I have n't played it, but Ruckingenur 2 sure looks like a spiritual precursor to this. http://www.zachtronics.com/ruckingenur-ii/ http://www.zachtronics.com/ruckingenur-ii/
  - qwertyuiop924 10y ago
    It looks like a spiritual sucessor to TIS-100, which Zach himself described as, "kind of a throwback to the kinds of games I used to make, [...] Before I started Zachtronics, before I worked with other people; just these really rough, kind of abusive engineering games." The source article (http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/244969/Things_we_create_tell_people_who_we_are_Designing_Zachtronics_TIS100.php http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/244969/Things_we_create_t...) is worth reading. All of Zach's games are worth playing, but if you're not familiar with his games, this may not be the best introduction. You should probably start with Infiniminer, which is the most inviting of his games, instead. If you're a fan of Zachtronics' work, you're probably opening your wallet already. Much like From Software, Zachtronics is always making variations on the same game. However, they're the only ones making it, and they're really good at, so they have a dedicated fanbase. Many of these are programmers, because the skills and thought processes required are similar to those required in programmers: if you like one, you'll likely like the other.
makmanalp 10y ago
Interesting and cool to see Shenzhen getting a shoutout in popular culture. edit: popular meaning "relating to the populous", not "widely supported"
- winkywooster 10y ago
  I wouldn't classify this as popular culture. It's a very niche game.
  - qwertyuiop924 10y ago
    Interesting and cool to see Shenzhen getting a shoutout in unpopular culture.
contingencies 10y ago
Title of the post is wrong. Shenzhen (深圳) is a city in China spelt Shenzhen not Shenzen. (Edit: Looks like someone just fixed it.) An interesting game concept. Honestly though, even there virtually nobody codes ASM anymore... as a hardware startup founder in China I just bought the game anyway. :) (Edit: This game is really quite good. I never could be bothered with assembly, but now I am entertained. I don't think it's super accessible to people who haven't at least dabbled in assembly before though, but it's certainly a good way to learn.)
- daveloyall 10y ago
  Even the URL of the OP spells it with an h. Don't downvote this poor user! Update: maybe you got auto-whacked for using non-latin characters?
- xir78 10y ago
  Fwiw Shenzhen is the Silicon Valley of China, Tencent and Huwei etc
  - bogomipz 10y ago
    I thought Shenzhen was more hardware than software no?
    - colordrops 10y ago
      The biggest internet company in China, Tencent, is in Shenzhen.
      - contingencies 10y ago
        Also one of the most modern banks, China Merchant's Bank (招商银行 / CMBC) is headquartered there.
        optforfon 10y ago
        I need to open a bank account in China next month - out of curiosity, in what way are they one of the most modern? :)
qwertyuiop924 10y ago
Let's see. A new game from Zachtronics, which is a clear spritiual successor to TIS-100, one of my favorite games from the comapany, an actual printable manual, and looks like it's really cool? I hate to use memes in most cases, but... SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY!
- TeMPOraL 10y ago
  Indeed. I saw "Shenzhen I/O" on HN, clicked because "ooh Shenzhen!" (been there, place of dreams for hardware hobbyist!) wondering what weird startupy thing it will be. Then saw Zachtronics. That's insta-buy for me, as it has been since SpaceChem and the flash games on his website.
alcari 10y ago
This was released about 26 hours ago. Steam says I've played 15 hours. Send hel--more microelectronics. It's TIS-100, but with a native multiply! and unsynchronized broadcast! and digit get/set! Still supremely difficult.
- db48x 10y ago
  That is exactly the correct ratio.
jbverschoor 10y ago
Suprt cool
amelius 10y ago
Is this an educational game?
- maket 10y ago
  I haven't played it yet, but I've played several of Zachtronics games in the past. They generally don't teach you technologies that exist in the real world. Real-world concepts are usually just used as a way to make the mechanics of the game more accessible (Spacechem and KOHCTPYKTOP are good examples of this) However, their games are very programming-centric, having programming skills makes them much more accessible. Their game TIS-100 is literally just assembly programming on a made-up architecture. I wouldn't call them "educational games", but they're certainly very mentally involved. --- Spacechem: http://www.zachtronics.com/spacechem/ http://www.zachtronics.com/spacechem/ KOHCTPYKTOP: http://www.zachtronics.com/kohctpyktop-engineer-of-the-people/ http://www.zachtronics.com/kohctpyktop-engineer-of-the-peopl... TIS-100: http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/ http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/
  - qwertyuiop924 10y ago
    They teach you and allow you to practice skills highly relevant to programming.
  - drivers99 10y ago
    KOHCTPYKTOP seemed like building things with transistors should work about the same way, but I've only built things with logic gates (and that, only a little). Could you not actually build circuits the way you do in the game? I've actually been thinking of buying a few thousands of transistors (2N3904) (and resistors as needed, which aren't used in the game) to see how far I could get building a (tiny) computer.
    - abecedarius 10y ago
      It is close to real CMOS circuits, but idealized -- I don't remember all the idealizations (and I'm really not an expert), but e.g. it'd accept a solution that depends on a race condition working out deterministically.
veganjay 10y ago
FYI - TIS-100 is on sale (50% off) on humble bundle: https://www.humblebundle.com/store/tis100 https://www.humblebundle.com/store/tis100 I only heard about this game recently after I read the HN submission: "My Most Important Project was a ByteCode Interpreter", which led to an article about other simulators, which led to CoreWars, which led to an article about programming games, which mentioned TIS-100 :)
- qwertyuiop924 10y ago
  If you haven't bought TIS-100, you should do so right now. If you read HN, and are a programmer, than you're probably the sort of person who would enjoy it.
Udo 10y ago
I just happened to watch a Shenzhen I/O unboxing on Scott Manley's channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpJU3wIf-v0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpJU3wIf-v0 Looks very, very compelling :)
- watmough 10y ago
  I'm watching that Scottish guy reviewing the data sheets, and I'm just laughing. Absolutely hilarious.
bogomipz 10y ago
This is really interesting. Could someone who is familiar with this answer whether this might be a decent resource to teach students assembly language?
- qwertyuiop924 10y ago
  I'd take Corewars for that. It's even more realistic than TIS-100, the last game by the company that made this, which focused on programming assembly for an imaginary computer with an instruction set designed by evil jerks, build specifically for massively parallel computation. So, yeah, Corewars, if not actual asm.
- dimfeld 10y ago
  Depending on the age and programming knowledge of your students, Human Resource Machine may also be worth a look. It's simpler and more removed from real assembly than Shehzhen and similar games, but still teaches the concepts needed to "think in assembly".
- RodgerTheGreat 10y ago
  Motivated pupils might be interested in Octo, a high-level assembler and IDE I wrote which targets the CHIP-8 virtual machine: https://github.com/JohnEarnest/Octo https://github.com/JohnEarnest/Octo The documentation includes tutorial materials aimed at complete novices: https://github.com/JohnEarnest/Octo/blob/gh-pages/docs/BeginnersGuide.md https://github.com/JohnEarnest/Octo/blob/gh-pages/docs/Begin...
  - qwertyuiop924 10y ago
    That sounds like a good idea. I've got to check out Octo some time...
    - RodgerTheGreat 10y ago
      No time like the present- this month we're hosting an Octo game jam! http://www.awfuljams.com/octojam-iii http://www.awfuljams.com/octojam-iii
niedzielski 10y ago
Is this open source or are there any notable similar simulations with source available?
- niedzielski 10y ago
  This seems like a reasonable and constructive question and not one I was expecting to be downvoted. Care to leave a response with your vote?
  - qwertyuiop924 10y ago
    Because it is a video game, which are usually not OS, and is available on all platforms. It it was OS, you would know, and the maker wouldn't be charging for it on Steam.
    - niedzielski 10y ago
      Thank you for your response. I know open source games aren't the norm, but they do exist and are something to be encouraged and discovered. For example, consider Quadrilateral Cowboy[0], which is a recent game made available on all platforms, for sale on Steam, and open source. In particular for SHENZHEN I/O, this is a game all about coding! It's seem reasonable to consider that it might be open source and if not, to want strongly for it as a natural extension of the game and so to wonder what similar games exist that are modifiable. Regardless, I do disagree with discouraging discussion around open source software, original or alternative, commercial or otherwise, and was a little saddened to be downvoted for it on Hacker News. I appreciate your civility and consideration. [0] http://blendogames.com/qc/ http://blendogames.com/qc/
      - HCIdivision17 10y ago
        I wouldn't read much into the downvote. People tend to get tired of what has been coloquially termed the "middlebrow dismissal" which plagues HN a bit. No doubt your comment was misinterpreted as such. If we're lucky, we'll see some open source on this, but probably only in as far as it directly makes the game more fun. Or harder. You can likely mod the game quite a bit though, as the Content folder is full of plain text code. (I'm assuming .cso files are compiled glsl code?) And thanks for the reminder for Quadrilateral Cowboy; I have no idea why I don't have this in my library yet. I don't think I've heard anything negative about it from anyone, and it looks like an absolute blast!
jordache 10y ago
how realistic is this game's portrayal of circuit building?
- nickff 10y ago
  Very unrealistic; they left out the part where you have to read a few dozen different specification sheets and reference manuals, only to discover that the parts aren't compatible. In reality, circuits are built by making a schematic drawing, then laying out the circuit; many different decisions have to be made, and each of those steps takes days or weeks. In addition, you are probably prototyping important parts of the circuit while doing the schematic or layout; these early tests may be with physical hardware or in some simulation software. Spice simulators are more like an IDE than a video game, but they are very limited.
  - HCIdivision17 10y ago
    I am really excited for future games though. If the pattern holds up, we may just get dozens of badly written manuals and specs to decode! ... It's a bit silly that I'm excited at the prospect for properly terrible docs, but it really would add some fun to it. Just imagine if the components have undocumented features, and once in a while you get one that simply doesn't work as advertised. Beat the game? Get certified!
    - nickff 10y ago
      It'll be great when you have to read all the errata sheets, and discover that your parts don't do what the data sheets say.
    - Tarean 10y ago
      Actually, I think untranslated features are already lart of the game.
      - db48x 10y ago
        Yea, I laughed heartily when the boss sent me an (in-game) email saying that features X, Y, and Z aren't actually undocumented; they're right there in the Chinese version of the manual.
sowbug 10y ago
I almost missed that yes, it is available on Linux. When did the penguin icon get replaced with "Steam Play" on the Steam site? Are all Steam Play games Linux-compatible?
- bumblebeard 10y ago
  Steam Play is their one license = all platforms thing. I think the little Steam icon means SteamOS and therefore Linux.
  - qwertyuiop924 10y ago
    Yes, and yes.
    - TeMPOraL 10y ago
      And to answer the original question, it's been like this for quite long; I'd say at least 3-4 years - that's how long I've been paying actual attention to Steam, and I don't remember ever seeing a different icon for Linux.
      - qwertyuiop924 10y ago
        And having been on steam since The Bad Old Days of Wine (not all that long ago, really), I can say that we used to have a penguin, and then it got replaced with the steam logo a few months after steamos and the steam machines went on the market.
ah- 10y ago
This needs a vim mode.
Paul_S 10y ago
Why doesn't real embedded development work this way?! This is awesome and I want it to be real. This is the distilled greatest moments of embedded development because in reality I spent today ~2 hours doing a code merge, ~2 hours of work logging and other bureaucracy, ~1 hour of helping testers and ~2 hours of reading schematics and hunting down hardware issues with an oscilloscope and spectrograph.
- danharaj 10y ago
  Ok but for real that last bit sounds fun to someone not in the field :)
  - Paul_S 10y ago
    I can see why it sounds fun. 40 pages later of dense schematics that you're desperately trying to match to what you have on your desk you'd realise it's 90% frustration and 10% headache. It's like navigating a city with a map showing cracks in the pavement split into 1000 individual one page puzzle pieces and written in Chinese (sometimes literally). God forbid someone made some modifications along the way at which point you might as well call it a day and bugger off to the pub. Now THAT last bit is actually good.
    - pavel_lishin 10y ago
      Hang on, are you describing work or the game?
      - maxander 10y ago
        Work, I gather, though the game also includes a bunch of (to laymen) dense schematics, one of which is indeed in (what looks like) chinese. So. All of this talk about how miserable embedded development is makes it sound like these guys need more automated tools. Is there not a fuzz testing machine for embedded electronics prototypes?
    - jwhite 10y ago
      I'm with you. I once spent days trying to figure out why a 10 hour timer on a battery charger chip was going off hours too early, leading to the device draining its battery instead of charging it. Turned out the manufacturing partner had substituted another part, functionally equivalent except for the one feature we were relying on... I can't remember what it was that made me actually look at the chip to check the part number.
green7ea 10y ago
I really liked TS-100 but it refreshed the screen 60 times a second even when nothing was changing which made my laptop really hot (my normal text editors don't do that ;D). I think they used unity which probably limited their optimization options. Having said that, I'm buying this game, Zach makes the best geek games.
- lfowles 10y ago
  Very few game engines throttle other than to meet monitor refresh rate. I thought it was ridiculous to play visual novels that made my laptop heat up as well.
Filligree 10y ago
There was a bug in the game, which collaborated with a bug in NixOS to stop it from working at all. I mailed the backtrace to support. Three minutes later, he'd mailed me back saying he'd release a patch shortly. The problem was simple, admittedly, but — Nice going!
imranq 10y ago
As a side note, I've been working through all the MAKE electronics books posted here a little while ago. Will this game help me in designing real life circuits? Still impressive, didn't know you could make assembly programming into a game!
- qwertyuiop924 10y ago
  Probably not. And Zach already made asm into a game with TIS-100, which you should totally play.
shostack 10y ago
Can someone comment on how playable this would be for someone with no background in embedded systems or electronics?
itgoon 10y ago
Saw this, bought it...and now it's past midnight.
yzh 10y ago
This really reminds me of this super fun flash game Manufactoria: http://pleasingfungus.com/Manufactoria/ http://pleasingfungus.com/Manufactoria/ A Turing machine game.
- ygra 10y ago
  A queue machine, actually. You don't get free movement on the tape.
em3rgent0rdr 10y ago
I love Zachtronics games!
emeraldd 10y ago
This is going to eat my weekend! Sheesh those time issues are tight. I'm about 90% certain that the only way I've made this stuff function is via carefully crafted race conditions ...
- p1mrx 10y ago
  Race conditions actually seem pretty rare in this game, because the CPUs run infinitely fast, relative to the SLP clock. If two CPUs get out of sync with each other and try to communicate via XBus, the simulation just halts.
  - db48x 10y ago
    I've got a proper race condition in my current solution to the kill-switch puzzle. The output from my timeout circuit that turns off the power if no commands arrive in time is getting mixed in to the command stream in the wrong order, causing it to shut off power unnecessarily. It's a wonderful puzzle.
guiomie 10y ago
This looks fun. Too bad its not on ps4, and I highly doubt steam works on my chromebook c300.
k_sze 10y ago
I wonder if it will make you debug and identify shady counterfeit components from time to time, since it has a backstory of being based in Shenzhen. (I'm Chinese and I love to make fun of my own people.)
- ah- 10y ago
  Even better, you can build shady counterfeit circuits yourself that happen to pass the test cases but don't really do what the customer requested.
0x54MUR41 10y ago
It's cool. I think the games that developed by Zachtronics are mainly puzzle game. I have never played TIS-100 before. It's interesting game, though. I have played other game from Zachtronics. It's called SpaceChem [1]. SpaceChem is a puzzle game which you play as a reactor engineer. The main task is transform materials into chemical products. At first glance, it's very hard to construct chemistry reactions. You know there is a pattern. I really would recommend the games from Zachtronics. [1]: http://www.zachtronics.com/spacechem/ http://www.zachtronics.com/spacechem/
maplechori 10y ago
Great game, already bought it.
blacksteel 10y ago
I was scammed a few times till i met this real and neat hacker. You need a real hacker to go to for all of your cyber issues, then pauleta.steelbreaker on gmail is the one you should consult or text +1 928-323-3115
em3rgent0rdr 10y ago
Device 2A27 mentions a "Decentralized Autonomous Corporation" mining operation...that's quite a easteregg! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decentralized_autonomous_organization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decentralized_autonomous_organ...
em3rgent0rdr 10y ago
what's makes this game fun is the quality of the simulation environment and the instant feedback with verification. I wish I had tools like this back in computer engineering lab.

456 points by yumaikas 10y ago

danso 10y ago

Feels like an auto-buy for me. Any developer that can make Assembly into a fun, polished game (TIS-100) is probably going to hit this one out of the park.

jsmthrowaway 10y ago
Zachtronics became auto-buy with me around the time of SpaceChem. Check out Infinifactory too for a different, yet familiar, feel. Zach Barth is like the nerd whisperer. His games speak to me. Good guy, too: I've corresponded with him over something as pedestrian as Steam keys and he responded and solved it in mere minutes, if I recall.
- qwertyuiop924 10y ago
  If you're a programmer, you owe it to yourself to check out Zach's games. They very much focus on the same skills: if you like one, you'll like the other.
  - lfowles 10y ago
    They are all at amazingly different levels of abstraction too. This game is probably my next buy. I have to admit I saw it yesterday and dismissed it as "some amateur is making Yet Another Programming Game that's going to be unbalanced and unfun" until I saw it was Zachtronics.
    - qwertyuiop924 10y ago
      Which is to say, "some expert making Yet Another Programming Game that's going to be unbalanced and extremely fun" Because let's face it, masochism is what programming is about.
      - lfowles 10y ago
        >Because let's face it, masochism is what programming is about. True, but Zach is good at pulling out a simple representative subset for each game. There's no arcane syntax for using registers vs IO in TIS-100 for example. It's just another dest/source that works with MOV. Then he adds something outlandish and gamey like adjacent core communication. I've played some other attempts at the programming masochism genre and they struck me as fiddly attempts to cram complexity into the instructions vs the problem.
        qwertyuiop924 10y ago
        This is why I like ZT games more than other excercises in masochism like BrainFuck. They're ultimately more about using a simple, well-understood set of tools to solve difficult problems than they are about using a deliberately obstructive set of tools. The fact that the tools are so easy to understand is what draws me to it over real asm programming: nothing's worse than trying to solve a puzzle when you have the sneaking suspicion that there's a few pieces you're missing that would make your job easier if you were to only learn them. Let the complexity emerge naturally. Because it will. By the way, if you like ZT games, and haven't checked out the work of Eric Wastl (The Synacor Challenge, and The Advent of Code) you should do so immediately. It's not as fun now that everyone else has done it, but it's still a blast.
        lfowles 10y ago
        Funny you bring up Braunfuck, I've toyed with making a brainfuck game[0], but gave up because working with terminal IO is the pits .... [0]: https://github.com/lfowles/brainporn https://github.com/lfowles/brainporn
        thaumasiotes 10y ago
        > This is why I like ZT games more than other excercises in masochism like BrainFuck. They're ultimately more about using a simple, well-understood set of tools to solve difficult problems than they are about using a deliberately obstructive set of tools. I tend to feel the opposite way -- the games are written to be deliberately obstructive; that's why we call them "games". It gets frustrating pretty quickly. Spacechem is a series of exercises in writing Befunge. I don't see how that could be characterized any other way than as "obstructive for the sake of obstructive".
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
- lfowles 10y ago
  I'm still barely past the first set of multifactory stages in spacechem. Multithreading is hard.

stephenmm 10y ago

Looks interesting but its not clear to me what it is... Anyone have more noob friendly introduction?

jameskilton 10y ago
Basically, the programming from TIS-100 and the factory layout game of Spacechem. It's awesome, probably crazy hard further on, and I'll never actually finish it, but I am happy to give Zachtronics more money!
HCIdivision17 10y ago
You get to build and program circuits! Think of it as a steppable debugger for a computer that has modular components. Your goal is to build circuits out of chips that are little blocks of code. Also there is a real pritable manual (which was one of the most celebrated bits from TIS-100). To get an idea of where the game is going, it helps to have played some of the earlier works, like SpaceChem and TIS-100. http://www.zachtronics.com/spacechem/ http://www.zachtronics.com/spacechem/ http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/ http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/ EDIT: You know, looking at some of the other earlier work, he may have been building up to this for a long time. I have n't played it, but Ruckingenur 2 sure looks like a spiritual precursor to this. http://www.zachtronics.com/ruckingenur-ii/ http://www.zachtronics.com/ruckingenur-ii/
- qwertyuiop924 10y ago
  It looks like a spiritual sucessor to TIS-100, which Zach himself described as, "kind of a throwback to the kinds of games I used to make, [...] Before I started Zachtronics, before I worked with other people; just these really rough, kind of abusive engineering games." The source article (http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/244969/Things_we_create_tell_people_who_we_are_Designing_Zachtronics_TIS100.php http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/244969/Things_we_create_t...) is worth reading. All of Zach's games are worth playing, but if you're not familiar with his games, this may not be the best introduction. You should probably start with Infiniminer, which is the most inviting of his games, instead. If you're a fan of Zachtronics' work, you're probably opening your wallet already. Much like From Software, Zachtronics is always making variations on the same game. However, they're the only ones making it, and they're really good at, so they have a dedicated fanbase. Many of these are programmers, because the skills and thought processes required are similar to those required in programmers: if you like one, you'll likely like the other.

makmanalp 10y ago

Interesting and cool to see Shenzhen getting a shoutout in popular culture. edit: popular meaning "relating to the populous", not "widely supported"

winkywooster 10y ago
I wouldn't classify this as popular culture. It's a very niche game.
- qwertyuiop924 10y ago
  Interesting and cool to see Shenzhen getting a shoutout in unpopular culture.

contingencies 10y ago

Title of the post is wrong. Shenzhen (深圳) is a city in China spelt Shenzhen not Shenzen. (Edit: Looks like someone just fixed it.) An interesting game concept. Honestly though, even there virtually nobody codes ASM anymore... as a hardware startup founder in China I just bought the game anyway. :) (Edit: This game is really quite good. I never could be bothered with assembly, but now I am entertained. I don't think it's super accessible to people who haven't at least dabbled in assembly before though, but it's certainly a good way to learn.)

daveloyall 10y ago
Even the URL of the OP spells it with an h. Don't downvote this poor user! Update: maybe you got auto-whacked for using non-latin characters?
xir78 10y ago
Fwiw Shenzhen is the Silicon Valley of China, Tencent and Huwei etc
- bogomipz 10y ago
  I thought Shenzhen was more hardware than software no?
  - colordrops 10y ago
    The biggest internet company in China, Tencent, is in Shenzhen.
    - contingencies 10y ago
      Also one of the most modern banks, China Merchant's Bank (招商银行 / CMBC) is headquartered there.
      - optforfon 10y ago
        I need to open a bank account in China next month - out of curiosity, in what way are they one of the most modern? :)

qwertyuiop924 10y ago

Let's see. A new game from Zachtronics, which is a clear spritiual successor to TIS-100, one of my favorite games from the comapany, an actual printable manual, and looks like it's really cool? I hate to use memes in most cases, but... SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY!

TeMPOraL 10y ago
Indeed. I saw "Shenzhen I/O" on HN, clicked because "ooh Shenzhen!" (been there, place of dreams for hardware hobbyist!) wondering what weird startupy thing it will be. Then saw Zachtronics. That's insta-buy for me, as it has been since SpaceChem and the flash games on his website.

alcari 10y ago

This was released about 26 hours ago. Steam says I've played 15 hours. Send hel--more microelectronics. It's TIS-100, but with a native multiply! and unsynchronized broadcast! and digit get/set! Still supremely difficult.

db48x 10y ago
That is exactly the correct ratio.

jbverschoor 10y ago

Suprt cool

amelius 10y ago

Is this an educational game?

maket 10y ago
I haven't played it yet, but I've played several of Zachtronics games in the past. They generally don't teach you technologies that exist in the real world. Real-world concepts are usually just used as a way to make the mechanics of the game more accessible (Spacechem and KOHCTPYKTOP are good examples of this) However, their games are very programming-centric, having programming skills makes them much more accessible. Their game TIS-100 is literally just assembly programming on a made-up architecture. I wouldn't call them "educational games", but they're certainly very mentally involved. --- Spacechem: http://www.zachtronics.com/spacechem/ http://www.zachtronics.com/spacechem/ KOHCTPYKTOP: http://www.zachtronics.com/kohctpyktop-engineer-of-the-people/ http://www.zachtronics.com/kohctpyktop-engineer-of-the-peopl... TIS-100: http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/ http://www.zachtronics.com/tis-100/
- qwertyuiop924 10y ago
  They teach you and allow you to practice skills highly relevant to programming.
- drivers99 10y ago
  KOHCTPYKTOP seemed like building things with transistors should work about the same way, but I've only built things with logic gates (and that, only a little). Could you not actually build circuits the way you do in the game? I've actually been thinking of buying a few thousands of transistors (2N3904) (and resistors as needed, which aren't used in the game) to see how far I could get building a (tiny) computer.
  - abecedarius 10y ago
    It is close to real CMOS circuits, but idealized -- I don't remember all the idealizations (and I'm really not an expert), but e.g. it'd accept a solution that depends on a race condition working out deterministically.

veganjay 10y ago

FYI - TIS-100 is on sale (50% off) on humble bundle: https://www.humblebundle.com/store/tis100 https://www.humblebundle.com/store/tis100 I only heard about this game recently after I read the HN submission: "My Most Important Project was a ByteCode Interpreter", which led to an article about other simulators, which led to CoreWars, which led to an article about programming games, which mentioned TIS-100 :)

qwertyuiop924 10y ago
If you haven't bought TIS-100, you should do so right now. If you read HN, and are a programmer, than you're probably the sort of person who would enjoy it.

Udo 10y ago

I just happened to watch a Shenzhen I/O unboxing on Scott Manley's channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpJU3wIf-v0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpJU3wIf-v0 Looks very, very compelling :)

watmough 10y ago
I'm watching that Scottish guy reviewing the data sheets, and I'm just laughing. Absolutely hilarious.

bogomipz 10y ago

This is really interesting. Could someone who is familiar with this answer whether this might be a decent resource to teach students assembly language?

qwertyuiop924 10y ago
I'd take Corewars for that. It's even more realistic than TIS-100, the last game by the company that made this, which focused on programming assembly for an imaginary computer with an instruction set designed by evil jerks, build specifically for massively parallel computation. So, yeah, Corewars, if not actual asm.
dimfeld 10y ago
Depending on the age and programming knowledge of your students, Human Resource Machine may also be worth a look. It's simpler and more removed from real assembly than Shehzhen and similar games, but still teaches the concepts needed to "think in assembly".
RodgerTheGreat 10y ago
Motivated pupils might be interested in Octo, a high-level assembler and IDE I wrote which targets the CHIP-8 virtual machine: https://github.com/JohnEarnest/Octo https://github.com/JohnEarnest/Octo The documentation includes tutorial materials aimed at complete novices: https://github.com/JohnEarnest/Octo/blob/gh-pages/docs/BeginnersGuide.md https://github.com/JohnEarnest/Octo/blob/gh-pages/docs/Begin...
- qwertyuiop924 10y ago
  That sounds like a good idea. I've got to check out Octo some time...
  - RodgerTheGreat 10y ago
    No time like the present- this month we're hosting an Octo game jam! http://www.awfuljams.com/octojam-iii http://www.awfuljams.com/octojam-iii

niedzielski 10y ago

Is this open source or are there any notable similar simulations with source available?

niedzielski 10y ago
This seems like a reasonable and constructive question and not one I was expecting to be downvoted. Care to leave a response with your vote?
- qwertyuiop924 10y ago
  Because it is a video game, which are usually not OS, and is available on all platforms. It it was OS, you would know, and the maker wouldn't be charging for it on Steam.
  - niedzielski 10y ago
    Thank you for your response. I know open source games aren't the norm, but they do exist and are something to be encouraged and discovered. For example, consider Quadrilateral Cowboy[0], which is a recent game made available on all platforms, for sale on Steam, and open source. In particular for SHENZHEN I/O, this is a game all about coding! It's seem reasonable to consider that it might be open source and if not, to want strongly for it as a natural extension of the game and so to wonder what similar games exist that are modifiable. Regardless, I do disagree with discouraging discussion around open source software, original or alternative, commercial or otherwise, and was a little saddened to be downvoted for it on Hacker News. I appreciate your civility and consideration. [0] http://blendogames.com/qc/ http://blendogames.com/qc/
    - HCIdivision17 10y ago
      I wouldn't read much into the downvote. People tend to get tired of what has been coloquially termed the "middlebrow dismissal" which plagues HN a bit. No doubt your comment was misinterpreted as such. If we're lucky, we'll see some open source on this, but probably only in as far as it directly makes the game more fun. Or harder. You can likely mod the game quite a bit though, as the Content folder is full of plain text code. (I'm assuming .cso files are compiled glsl code?) And thanks for the reminder for Quadrilateral Cowboy; I have no idea why I don't have this in my library yet. I don't think I've heard anything negative about it from anyone, and it looks like an absolute blast!

jordache 10y ago

how realistic is this game's portrayal of circuit building?

nickff 10y ago
Very unrealistic; they left out the part where you have to read a few dozen different specification sheets and reference manuals, only to discover that the parts aren't compatible. In reality, circuits are built by making a schematic drawing, then laying out the circuit; many different decisions have to be made, and each of those steps takes days or weeks. In addition, you are probably prototyping important parts of the circuit while doing the schematic or layout; these early tests may be with physical hardware or in some simulation software. Spice simulators are more like an IDE than a video game, but they are very limited.
- HCIdivision17 10y ago
  I am really excited for future games though. If the pattern holds up, we may just get dozens of badly written manuals and specs to decode! ... It's a bit silly that I'm excited at the prospect for properly terrible docs, but it really would add some fun to it. Just imagine if the components have undocumented features, and once in a while you get one that simply doesn't work as advertised. Beat the game? Get certified!
  - nickff 10y ago
    It'll be great when you have to read all the errata sheets, and discover that your parts don't do what the data sheets say.
  - Tarean 10y ago
    Actually, I think untranslated features are already lart of the game.
    - db48x 10y ago
      Yea, I laughed heartily when the boss sent me an (in-game) email saying that features X, Y, and Z aren't actually undocumented; they're right there in the Chinese version of the manual.

sowbug 10y ago

I almost missed that yes, it is available on Linux. When did the penguin icon get replaced with "Steam Play" on the Steam site? Are all Steam Play games Linux-compatible?

bumblebeard 10y ago
Steam Play is their one license = all platforms thing. I think the little Steam icon means SteamOS and therefore Linux.
- qwertyuiop924 10y ago
  Yes, and yes.
  - TeMPOraL 10y ago
    And to answer the original question, it's been like this for quite long; I'd say at least 3-4 years - that's how long I've been paying actual attention to Steam, and I don't remember ever seeing a different icon for Linux.
    - qwertyuiop924 10y ago
      And having been on steam since The Bad Old Days of Wine (not all that long ago, really), I can say that we used to have a penguin, and then it got replaced with the steam logo a few months after steamos and the steam machines went on the market.

ah- 10y ago

This needs a vim mode.

Paul_S 10y ago

Why doesn't real embedded development work this way?! This is awesome and I want it to be real. This is the distilled greatest moments of embedded development because in reality I spent today ~2 hours doing a code merge, ~2 hours of work logging and other bureaucracy, ~1 hour of helping testers and ~2 hours of reading schematics and hunting down hardware issues with an oscilloscope and spectrograph.

danharaj 10y ago
Ok but for real that last bit sounds fun to someone not in the field :)
- Paul_S 10y ago
  I can see why it sounds fun. 40 pages later of dense schematics that you're desperately trying to match to what you have on your desk you'd realise it's 90% frustration and 10% headache. It's like navigating a city with a map showing cracks in the pavement split into 1000 individual one page puzzle pieces and written in Chinese (sometimes literally). God forbid someone made some modifications along the way at which point you might as well call it a day and bugger off to the pub. Now THAT last bit is actually good.
  - pavel_lishin 10y ago
    Hang on, are you describing work or the game?
    - maxander 10y ago
      Work, I gather, though the game also includes a bunch of (to laymen) dense schematics, one of which is indeed in (what looks like) chinese. So. All of this talk about how miserable embedded development is makes it sound like these guys need more automated tools. Is there not a fuzz testing machine for embedded electronics prototypes?
  - jwhite 10y ago
    I'm with you. I once spent days trying to figure out why a 10 hour timer on a battery charger chip was going off hours too early, leading to the device draining its battery instead of charging it. Turned out the manufacturing partner had substituted another part, functionally equivalent except for the one feature we were relying on... I can't remember what it was that made me actually look at the chip to check the part number.

green7ea 10y ago

I really liked TS-100 but it refreshed the screen 60 times a second even when nothing was changing which made my laptop really hot (my normal text editors don't do that ;D). I think they used unity which probably limited their optimization options. Having said that, I'm buying this game, Zach makes the best geek games.

lfowles 10y ago
Very few game engines throttle other than to meet monitor refresh rate. I thought it was ridiculous to play visual novels that made my laptop heat up as well.

Filligree 10y ago

There was a bug in the game, which collaborated with a bug in NixOS to stop it from working at all. I mailed the backtrace to support. Three minutes later, he'd mailed me back saying he'd release a patch shortly. The problem was simple, admittedly, but — Nice going!

imranq 10y ago

As a side note, I've been working through all the MAKE electronics books posted here a little while ago. Will this game help me in designing real life circuits? Still impressive, didn't know you could make assembly programming into a game!

qwertyuiop924 10y ago
Probably not. And Zach already made asm into a game with TIS-100, which you should totally play.

shostack 10y ago

Can someone comment on how playable this would be for someone with no background in embedded systems or electronics?

itgoon 10y ago

Saw this, bought it...and now it's past midnight.

yzh 10y ago

This really reminds me of this super fun flash game Manufactoria: http://pleasingfungus.com/Manufactoria/ http://pleasingfungus.com/Manufactoria/ A Turing machine game.

ygra 10y ago
A queue machine, actually. You don't get free movement on the tape.

em3rgent0rdr 10y ago

I love Zachtronics games!

emeraldd 10y ago

This is going to eat my weekend! Sheesh those time issues are tight. I'm about 90% certain that the only way I've made this stuff function is via carefully crafted race conditions ...

p1mrx 10y ago
Race conditions actually seem pretty rare in this game, because the CPUs run infinitely fast, relative to the SLP clock. If two CPUs get out of sync with each other and try to communicate via XBus, the simulation just halts.
- db48x 10y ago
  I've got a proper race condition in my current solution to the kill-switch puzzle. The output from my timeout circuit that turns off the power if no commands arrive in time is getting mixed in to the command stream in the wrong order, causing it to shut off power unnecessarily. It's a wonderful puzzle.

guiomie 10y ago

This looks fun. Too bad its not on ps4, and I highly doubt steam works on my chromebook c300.

k_sze 10y ago

I wonder if it will make you debug and identify shady counterfeit components from time to time, since it has a backstory of being based in Shenzhen. (I'm Chinese and I love to make fun of my own people.)

ah- 10y ago
Even better, you can build shady counterfeit circuits yourself that happen to pass the test cases but don't really do what the customer requested.

0x54MUR41 10y ago

It's cool. I think the games that developed by Zachtronics are mainly puzzle game. I have never played TIS-100 before. It's interesting game, though. I have played other game from Zachtronics. It's called SpaceChem [1]. SpaceChem is a puzzle game which you play as a reactor engineer. The main task is transform materials into chemical products. At first glance, it's very hard to construct chemistry reactions. You know there is a pattern. I really would recommend the games from Zachtronics. [1]: http://www.zachtronics.com/spacechem/ http://www.zachtronics.com/spacechem/

maplechori 10y ago

Great game, already bought it.

blacksteel 10y ago

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em3rgent0rdr 10y ago

Device 2A27 mentions a "Decentralized Autonomous Corporation" mining operation...that's quite a easteregg! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decentralized_autonomous_organization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decentralized_autonomous_organ...

em3rgent0rdr 10y ago

what's makes this game fun is the quality of the simulation environment and the instant feedback with verification. I wish I had tools like this back in computer engineering lab.