4 ms·

Why tho? Cheating just takes away from the cheater's experience and doesn't affect anyone else. It's pretty much like any physical game. You can play (or cheat)

Why tho? Cheating just takes away from the cheater's experience and doesn't affect anyone else. It's pretty much like any physical game. You can play (or cheat) it any way you like even though the game is designed to be played in a certain way.

the_af 5y ago
I agree with your philosophy against cheating, but still, games must implement some sort of anticheat, just like they must implement some sort of game rules. Imagine not implementing blocking walls in Counter Strike, "just don't walk through walls, it would make the game less fun and why would you ruin the experience for yourself like that?". This is a case where not hiding the word list was done because it was easier to implement Wordle this way. Engineering-wise, it's not elegant, it's a cop-out.
- compiler-guy 5y ago
  With Wordle, you only play against yourself, so cheating only cheats yourself. So no need for anti cheating. Client side dictionary isn’t a cop out at all. It’s a terrific solution for a single player game that helps keep the code base elegant.
  - the_af 5y ago
    > so cheating only cheats yourself Well, cheating is less important than in Counter Strike, but not entirely unimportant either. Playing Wordle has a social component. I think this solution is neither elegant nor terrific. It's simply completely ignoring the problem and claiming that it doesn't matter anyway. I obviously disagree. PS: when I was a kid, I learned programming on my C64 with BASIC. Like many kids, the first programs I wrote were "guess the thing" kind of games. Usually "guess the number", but occasionally "guess the word". Even back then I understood that hardcoding the word in the program listing was less than ideal, but I just didn't know how to do better. Let's say that 8-year old me would not have been positively impressed if told that Wordle had the "elegant" solution of storing the list of words in its source code.
    - Linosaurus 5y ago
      I think cheating would matter if there was individual words tied to an account. But not when the design says every browser session on the planet gets the same word.
      - the_af 5y ago
        Fair enough, but then it's not an "elegant" decision we should be in awe of (as in the title "Wordle is pretty damn smart"). It's just the default of "I decided not to tackle this problem because it's hard and not a priority for my design". This was also what I defaulted to with my C64 BASIC games when I was a kid, "I don't know how to hide this, so I won't".
        compiler-guy 5y ago
        Rather, the conclusion is, "I don't _need_ to hide these, so I won't."
    - sangnoir 5y ago
      > Playing Wordle has a social component. ...and it's trust model extends there too. It copies your "Achievements" into your paste buffer and you paste them to share. One could easily edit their results, but they'd be cheating themselves too. There's not need for technical restrictions on a player ruining their own satisfaction.
- nigma1337 5y ago
  Not at all the same as in counter strike, as if one person was walking through walls, it'd break it for everyone else not walking through walls. My wordle doesn't get worse from you cheating, but my game of CS sure would.
  - the_af 5y ago
    Replace Counter Strike with a single player FPS then. "I don't need to implement wall blocking, the player should just refrain from walking through walls". It's not elegant, it's lazy.
    - sangnoir 5y ago
      > Replace Counter Strike with a single player FPS then. Single player games included cheatcodes hard-coded in them since forever. Those that didn't had "trainers" which fiddled with game memory with the same effect. Howver, invincibility and infinite ammo tend to ruin the game for most people.
    - dvirsky 5y ago
      But the equivalent analogy to Wordle in this case would be not implementing the letter check or not hiding the correct answer until you figure it out. That mechanism exists.

the_af 5y ago

I agree with your philosophy against cheating, but still, games must implement some sort of anticheat, just like they must implement some sort of game rules. Imagine not implementing blocking walls in Counter Strike, "just don't walk through walls, it would make the game less fun and why would you ruin the experience for yourself like that?". This is a case where not hiding the word list was done because it was easier to implement Wordle this way. Engineering-wise, it's not elegant, it's a cop-out.

compiler-guy 5y ago
With Wordle, you only play against yourself, so cheating only cheats yourself. So no need for anti cheating. Client side dictionary isn’t a cop out at all. It’s a terrific solution for a single player game that helps keep the code base elegant.
- the_af 5y ago
  > so cheating only cheats yourself Well, cheating is less important than in Counter Strike, but not entirely unimportant either. Playing Wordle has a social component. I think this solution is neither elegant nor terrific. It's simply completely ignoring the problem and claiming that it doesn't matter anyway. I obviously disagree. PS: when I was a kid, I learned programming on my C64 with BASIC. Like many kids, the first programs I wrote were "guess the thing" kind of games. Usually "guess the number", but occasionally "guess the word". Even back then I understood that hardcoding the word in the program listing was less than ideal, but I just didn't know how to do better. Let's say that 8-year old me would not have been positively impressed if told that Wordle had the "elegant" solution of storing the list of words in its source code.
  - Linosaurus 5y ago
    I think cheating would matter if there was individual words tied to an account. But not when the design says every browser session on the planet gets the same word.
    - the_af 5y ago
      Fair enough, but then it's not an "elegant" decision we should be in awe of (as in the title "Wordle is pretty damn smart"). It's just the default of "I decided not to tackle this problem because it's hard and not a priority for my design". This was also what I defaulted to with my C64 BASIC games when I was a kid, "I don't know how to hide this, so I won't".
      - compiler-guy 5y ago
        Rather, the conclusion is, "I don't _need_ to hide these, so I won't."
  - sangnoir 5y ago
    > Playing Wordle has a social component. ...and it's trust model extends there too. It copies your "Achievements" into your paste buffer and you paste them to share. One could easily edit their results, but they'd be cheating themselves too. There's not need for technical restrictions on a player ruining their own satisfaction.
nigma1337 5y ago
Not at all the same as in counter strike, as if one person was walking through walls, it'd break it for everyone else not walking through walls. My wordle doesn't get worse from you cheating, but my game of CS sure would.
- the_af 5y ago
  Replace Counter Strike with a single player FPS then. "I don't need to implement wall blocking, the player should just refrain from walking through walls". It's not elegant, it's lazy.
  - sangnoir 5y ago
    > Replace Counter Strike with a single player FPS then. Single player games included cheatcodes hard-coded in them since forever. Those that didn't had "trainers" which fiddled with game memory with the same effect. Howver, invincibility and infinite ammo tend to ruin the game for most people.
  - dvirsky 5y ago
    But the equivalent analogy to Wordle in this case would be not implementing the letter check or not hiding the correct answer until you figure it out. That mechanism exists.