An important thing to know: You can make three different solutions to go for the three kinds of high-score (speed, cost, size), so just focus on solving it first, then make a new solution that's as (e.g.) fast as possible, then one that's as cheap as possible, then one that's as small as possible (including arm swing area, hit "2" to see the area taken while it's running). Your solutions aren't bad, they're just balanced across all three highscores, which is absolutely expected for a first solution! Also: Use the hotkeys for placing symbols, and (imo) turn on the quick hotkeys option in Options! This has inspired me to go back to the game and optimize my solutions more :D
I feel like I say "we're so back" a lot, but I mean it when I say: we're so back Zachlikes are so freaking good, can't wait to see how this series pans out \o/
Thank you for not taking a break in January, you put a lot of work into youtube and you definitely deserve a break. But your my one of my favorite TH-camrs i look forward to your video everyday, it means a lot that you continue to give us content
He was so close to cooking with that 6-sided arm!!!!!! The benefit to those many-armed mechanisms is that they don't need to reset after each cycle. For instance, to move a single reagent one tile to the right, you can place a one-arm below it and you'd need four instructions: grab, rotate right, drop, rotate left (to go back where you started). If you instead use a six-arms, you only need three instructions: Grab, rotate right, drop. You don't need to turn back as it's already in the starting position! (There are more aplications to them than that, but I don't want to melt anyone's brain too much quite yet haha)
love the game. but a quick note for the leaderboards, for your own sanity. Do not try to optimize all of them at the same time, as one will suffer for optimizing the others. It should save your best scrore for each.
@@holisticreviews it's been a few years since i played but iirc, cost and area optimization often go hand in hand, but optimizing for cycles obliterates the other two.
If you wind up doing workshop puzzles, "Rust to Silvered Mirror" was one of mine that stayed on the front page of the game's workshop for many years. I also recommend my "Quantumly Entangled" puzzle after.
@Blatant.Obscurity I can see that. I made my comment before I watched the video and remembered this was Olenky. Brilliant at roguelikes, but awful at reading and spatial logic. No worries, I believe he will learn.
A procedural tip: find spacing-patterns to both speed up and improve your solutions. For example: - a source and a sink (any pick-up point and drop-off point) can be transferred between as efficiently as possible by a single rotating arm on any tile that's the same distance from both - 2 arms that have instructions that don't overlap time-wise can often be replaced with a single arm - your solution and/or the output slot can often be rotated so as to remove the need for one or more pivot instructions - etc.
Shenzhen IO is fun if you like the idea of programming in assembly. I was going to add a "but" to that, but then I realised that that's the long and short of it.
@@OlexaYT And that describes like 3? Zachtronics games. Shenzhen IO, Exapunks, and TIS-1000. And Shenzhen isn't even the one I'd recommend of the 3, Exapunks is.
This was great… Thanks for doing this video. I have this game, Shenzhen Io, and Barkeep BBS and I’ve not really played any of them… I just installed them to give them a bit of attention. This is very motivating.
Zachtronics' SpaceChem opened up a totally new world for me. Before that, I'd played PopCap's casual puzzles (like Mummy Maze and Seven Seas). But SpaceChem showed me that I wasn't the only one who liked hard puzzles. It was a great discovery! And Opus Magnum is - I think - the most accessible entry point into a wonderful world of programming games.
@roseravus4908 Factorio is fun, this game gets a little too close to my actual work when you are trying to solve the motion conflicts, etc. It's just not very relaxing for me because it uses similar mindspace to my real work haha.
Thanks for the video! I think you could have moved the arm up top to just be where the third arm was originally and it could do both jobs. Having an arm up top wasn't necessary.
a couple of things if you decide to keep playing i would highly reccomend getting to know the hotkeys for the tiles. and you can see step by step by hitting Tab
hopefully this helps you with the rotation counting, each rotate command is 1/6th of a rotation, and you already noticed that the grid makes almost a circle around your arm tile, that "circle" is conveniently exactly 6 tiles, so just imagine a straight line going from the center of your arm tile outwards through the center of each of those first circle tiles and extending outwards, each rotation command will move from 1 of those imaginary lines to the next one in whichever direction you are trying to go, tough to explain it how i want to via text but hopefully i explained it well enough to be of use to you
If you do another zachtronics game, I'd like to see you do Molek-Syntez. It's underrated, imo; probably overshadowed by Opus Magnum for molecule building.
I told you (probably 😅) that you would love it. I prefer SpaceChem tbh, but this is just taste probably, they are really similar in a lot of ways. Shenzen I/O have special place in my heart, since it is basically simulation of designing electronics with coding in assembler, it learn me more than few years in school about this topic :D
Definitely want cube chaos back. Too few creators with commentary making videos on that game! I understand that it's probably better to just play cube chaos rather than watching cause sometime there's way too much things going on. Because I doubt I could understand everything happening or Olexa would be able to explain it all... But I hate the fan noise on my laptop everytime the AI do crazy shit so a video would be nice lol
Wait, you've never played Last Call BBS? It was like, a mini precursor to UFO50! You should really give it a shot. (No idea if you'll like it, but it should at least be fun to see)
When open beta starts I will but I’m not nearly good enough at it to make quality content on it honestly. It’s a tricky game where being bad at it and not knowing literally everything makes for a terrible video
The best part is when you said you think of it as a circle, and all I could think about was how, no, it's a hexagon and you just have to look at which side the thing lines up with.
Maybe you could check out Uncle Chop's Rocket Shop. Its a Rogue Lite Mix of Papers Please and Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes. It just released in December I think but it hasnt got the attention it deserves
Ooh, nice. I like Zach-likes, but writing optimized Assembly grates on me quickly (especially the way Shenzhen IO makes comments count for the punishing line length and number limits). I might have to figure out if I got this one in a bundle at some point like I vaguely seem to remember...
That thumbnail is so silly for making me squint to read the small fonts, optometrist-style, now I half expect you to ask of we find picture 1 or 2 to be more easy to see.
i have opus magnum and wow is it fun! until you come to the levels with the spinny element thingies and i just cant comprehend how to beat then stages pmq
So, I'm 1:32 in and I've just facepalmed because I realised that Opus Magnum is magnum opus backwards....this is not my first time staring at this title screen at the start of a video...I feel stupid
Its kinda weird to me that January is bad for creators, im guessing its cos of like new years resolutions and stuff? Like new year new me less screen time? Just a bit odd personally tho. I activly enjoy watching the youtubers i watch i woudnt want to stop just cos screen time bad waa. I dunno lol.
I've heard its more that ad companies rarely spend in January because the push is in december for xmas gifts, etc. Less overall ad spending = less ad revenue other factors aside
Yeah I've never really understood it myself from the angle of views. Like sure, people are going back to work and school and all that, but I wouldn't think it'd be lower than the rest of the year (barring Christmas/sumer for vacation = free time reasons) where it's already like that.
this is a great example of how you manage to sell games. you get me interested then your scatterbrain does a horrible job and I just wanna do it better than you, so that means I have to buy the damn game
LMAO Hell yes I'm salty! A fire atom? 🤣 You noted that a glyph of calcification isn't exactly how things work but you let the fire atom slide as if every chemist has that in their cupboard? 🤣 But eh, I'll buy the whole box if you've got some 🤣
An important thing to know: You can make three different solutions to go for the three kinds of high-score (speed, cost, size), so just focus on solving it first, then make a new solution that's as (e.g.) fast as possible, then one that's as cheap as possible, then one that's as small as possible (including arm swing area, hit "2" to see the area taken while it's running).
Your solutions aren't bad, they're just balanced across all three highscores, which is absolutely expected for a first solution!
Also: Use the hotkeys for placing symbols, and (imo) turn on the quick hotkeys option in Options!
This has inspired me to go back to the game and optimize my solutions more :D
"comment section is sitting on a glyph of calcification" 😂😂😂
I feel like I say "we're so back" a lot, but I mean it when I say: we're so back
Zachlikes are so freaking good, can't wait to see how this series pans out \o/
With pain and suffering Jack, almost certainly
two fundamental ingredients for any at least half decent project
We’re so Zach!
Thank you for not taking a break in January, you put a lot of work into youtube and you definitely deserve a break. But your my one of my favorite TH-camrs i look forward to your video everyday, it means a lot that you continue to give us content
He was so close to cooking with that 6-sided arm!!!!!!
The benefit to those many-armed mechanisms is that they don't need to reset after each cycle.
For instance, to move a single reagent one tile to the right, you can place a one-arm below it and you'd need four instructions: grab, rotate right, drop, rotate left (to go back where you started). If you instead use a six-arms, you only need three instructions: Grab, rotate right, drop. You don't need to turn back as it's already in the starting position!
(There are more aplications to them than that, but I don't want to melt anyone's brain too much quite yet haha)
love the game.
but a quick note for the leaderboards, for your own sanity.
Do not try to optimize all of them at the same time, as one will suffer for optimizing the others.
It should save your best scrore for each.
It should also save your sanity to optimize only for one score at a time.
@@holisticreviews it's been a few years since i played but iirc, cost and area optimization often go hand in hand, but optimizing for cycles obliterates the other two.
If you wind up doing workshop puzzles, "Rust to Silvered Mirror" was one of mine that stayed on the front page of the game's workshop for many years. I also recommend my "Quantumly Entangled" puzzle after.
Mans can barely do what the game has already, no need to suggest him do workshop stuff already.
@Blatant.Obscurity I can see that. I made my comment before I watched the video and remembered this was Olenky. Brilliant at roguelikes, but awful at reading and spatial logic.
No worries, I believe he will learn.
A procedural tip: find spacing-patterns to both speed up and improve your solutions. For example:
- a source and a sink (any pick-up point and drop-off point) can be transferred between as efficiently as possible by a single rotating arm on any tile that's the same distance from both
- 2 arms that have instructions that don't overlap time-wise can often be replaced with a single arm
- your solution and/or the output slot can often be rotated so as to remove the need for one or more pivot instructions
- etc.
Super happy this is a series!!
Tho I do hope he notices he can rotate everyhing (including the spot for the final product) before the next episode...
9:00 that's the magic of zachtronics!
it really makes you feel smart when you figure stuff out
Shenzhen IO is fun if you like the idea of programming in assembly. I was going to add a "but" to that, but then I realised that that's the long and short of it.
I hate programming in assembly which is why I have steered clear LOL
@@OlexaYT And that describes like 3? Zachtronics games. Shenzhen IO, Exapunks, and TIS-1000. And Shenzhen isn't even the one I'd recommend of the 3, Exapunks is.
@@TheBalthassar they're just different, exapunks is about cool algorithms, shenzhen is about getting away with absolute jank
And TIS-100 is pure hard-core assembly programming. Nothing but a black and white terminal screen and your code.
@@TheBalthassar I love their Solitaire Collection 😅
A video as soon as you come back home oh my goodness, and a thinking one too, thank you Tyler
I loooove Opus Magnum so much that I don't even get mad when it fries my brain.
24:10 You can rotate the output if you grab the gold pin on it (like you extend / rotate the initial length / rotation of the arms)
This has been my number 1 biggest want to see you play, so excited to see more
This was great… Thanks for doing this video. I have this game, Shenzhen Io, and Barkeep BBS and I’ve not really played any of them… I just installed them to give them a bit of attention. This is very motivating.
Yessss! I am obsessed with zachtronics. I play his solitaire collection literally every morning
I actually forgot the intro music and Olexa thinks isn't just for lingo
0:25 Hahah, new years resolution: "I'm gonna stay off my phone more" January passes and it's as if nothing happened
Olexa and one of my favorite puzzle games in January? We're so back. We never even left.
I played through Opus Magnum a few months back, it's so good. I hope to see much more of it!
Zachtronics' SpaceChem opened up a totally new world for me.
Before that, I'd played PopCap's casual puzzles (like Mummy Maze and Seven Seas).
But SpaceChem showed me that I wasn't the only one who liked hard puzzles. It was a great discovery!
And Opus Magnum is - I think - the most accessible entry point into a wonderful world of programming games.
AAAAAAAA YESSSS A ZACHTRONICS GAME!!!!!!
you NEED to play a bunch of other games from this developer!
and more games in the zach-like genre!
This game is a classic fun one, my only personal gripe with it is it's a little too close to work for me as an automation engineer haha.
I hear you there automation engineer brother
You must either love or hate factorio
@roseravus4908 Factorio is fun, this game gets a little too close to my actual work when you are trying to solve the motion conflicts, etc. It's just not very relaxing for me because it uses similar mindspace to my real work haha.
Have you tried infinifactory? It's basically assembly line automation: the game
Olexa I wanted to make sure you know the Zachtronics solitaire collection exists, definitely worth checking out for some chill solitaire content
Thank you for refreshing this amazing game.
I hope it will burst among puzzle lovers
This is very serendipitous for me; just a month ago I was trying to remember the name of this game
Ooooh i cannot wait to see if you play TIS-100, my favorite zachtroinics game
1st puzzle really is the puzzle of "Recognizing the word: Preceding"
This game is so good, I think it'll be a blast to watch you play it. 😁
Ah the classic streamer frustration machine. Very efficient Olexia.
Watching you put loop at the front multiple times, then saying, "Why don't you work, I don't understand," made me yell at my phone.
Dude, Tyler, you’re fuckin awesome. Very happy that this is gonna be a series
no u
i love how you explain the January thing every year
Thanks for the video! I think you could have moved the arm up top to just be where the third arm was originally and it could do both jobs. Having an arm up top wasn't necessary.
My little brother got me into this one back when it came out. Still amazing.
I'm a big Zachtronics fan, right now I have 17.1 hours on Opus Magnum but more in other games.
1:30 you could say it is their opus magnum if you will
never expected to see this pop back up in 2025. Such an amazing game
I'm sad I played it on Gamepass cause I don't have it anymore and really want to play the solitaire type thing again
Happy January.
Much love thanks!
a couple of things if you decide to keep playing i would highly reccomend getting to know the hotkeys for the tiles.
and you can see step by step by hitting Tab
22:30 how to make things more complicated 101
You convinced me to try this again. I also have Shenzen IO and never played it lmao.
Lil’ Olenky is SO BACK
hopefully this helps you with the rotation counting, each rotate command is 1/6th of a rotation, and you already noticed that the grid makes almost a circle around your arm tile, that "circle" is conveniently exactly 6 tiles, so just imagine a straight line going from the center of your arm tile outwards through the center of each of those first circle tiles and extending outwards, each rotation command will move from 1 of those imaginary lines to the next one in whichever direction you are trying to go, tough to explain it how i want to via text but hopefully i explained it well enough to be of use to you
If you do another zachtronics game, I'd like to see you do Molek-Syntez. It's underrated, imo; probably overshadowed by Opus Magnum for molecule building.
I told you (probably 😅) that you would love it. I prefer SpaceChem tbh, but this is just taste probably, they are really similar in a lot of ways. Shenzen I/O have special place in my heart, since it is basically simulation of designing electronics with coding in assembler, it learn me more than few years in school about this topic :D
27:14 The importance of reading commas.
we stay winning, god-tier series
6:55 PIVOOOOOT!!! 😂😂
Pls do an series out of this xD
in games like this you should never try to optimize all 3 at the same time. you pick one graph and push it to its limits.
I love seeing me some Zachtronics!
hell yeah opus magnum, love this game
Brother, it is ffriday night and im pretty drunk, eve thought i cant undersstant anything, it helps me sleep
Me hears 'weird messed up series'
...
Cube Chaos???
lol
Definitely want cube chaos back. Too few creators with commentary making videos on that game!
I understand that it's probably better to just play cube chaos rather than watching cause sometime there's way too much things going on. Because I doubt I could understand everything happening or Olexa would be able to explain it all... But I hate the fan noise on my laptop everytime the AI do crazy shit so a video would be nice lol
I don’t hate the idea of doing more cube chaos during January honestly.
I consider Infinifactory to be the best Zachtronics game.
Wait, you've never played Last Call BBS? It was like, a mini precursor to UFO50! You should really give it a shot. (No idea if you'll like it, but it should at least be fun to see)
34:09 not me screaming you can just use arm 3
I kinda think you forgot about counter clockwise movement in this game!
I’d love to see you get back into Bazaar
When open beta starts I will but I’m not nearly good enough at it to make quality content on it honestly. It’s a tricky game where being bad at it and not knowing literally everything makes for a terrible video
I got the physical patch from beating the game in early access, so this series should be nice and painful
Thank you for the videos, can i get more of that digging sim or what ever the scale game is called please
The best part is when you said you think of it as a circle, and all I could think about was how, no, it's a hexagon and you just have to look at which side the thing lines up with.
I completely forgot that intro song isn't "Olexa plays Lingo" but "Olexa plays puzzle games", it's just been so long
Weird looking lingo but I'm here for it
Tyler my legs are made of salt now
Maybe you could check out Uncle Chop's Rocket Shop. Its a Rogue Lite Mix of Papers Please and Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes. It just released in December I think but it hasnt got the attention it deserves
It’s almost certainly being recorded today for me. Been on my list for a while. Look for it this weekend.
Ooh, nice. I like Zach-likes, but writing optimized Assembly grates on me quickly (especially the way Shenzhen IO makes comments count for the punishing line length and number limits). I might have to figure out if I got this one in a bundle at some point like I vaguely seem to remember...
love the game, love the video
Best thumb nail ever
Let's break the curse of the January slump; Tyler deserves the support for not abandoning us!
Thoughts on cabbage?
Big cabbage guy
@OlexaYT raw, or cooked
Yes
oh this is gonna be good
I actually spend more time in Opus magnum with the solitair mingame then the actual game xD
That thumbnail is so silly for making me squint to read the small fonts, optometrist-style, now I half expect you to ask of we find picture 1 or 2 to be more easy to see.
What did it say in the last line? I can't read that long word ("that would be ***** to claim...")
wheres my January Olexa crew at
i have opus magnum and wow is it fun!
until you come to the levels with the spinny element thingies and i just cant comprehend how to beat then stages pmq
This game is so good
Hey here a comment for the engagement gods
So, I'm 1:32 in and I've just facepalmed because I realised that Opus Magnum is magnum opus backwards....this is not my first time staring at this title screen at the start of a video...I feel stupid
Love this game but I have a rough time of it.
I want to be good at it and I suck 😅
you can rotate the output tho,,,
Kinda shocked you never played this before.
sad but understand Zachtronics shutdown
Why does your pfp (channel icon?) always remind me of noita?
Yeah, salary also takes a break
The game!
pensa olexa pensa
TH-cam is a strange master huh? (I didn't put just want to give you some engagement with a comment)
Opus magnum video 😊
Ladies and gentlemen
Oh ok... (sad enby noises)
It's not a huge deal it's just grating
Sorry :( just been my intro for forever. We’re a very gender friendly community
Ooh that's gonna be infuriating I know it
I never comment. But just to show you my appreciation, heres a comment in January! #engagement
Its kinda weird to me that January is bad for creators, im guessing its cos of like new years resolutions and stuff? Like new year new me less screen time? Just a bit odd personally tho. I activly enjoy watching the youtubers i watch i woudnt want to stop just cos screen time bad waa. I dunno lol.
Trust me I’ve never understood it either hahaha
I've heard its more that ad companies rarely spend in January because the push is in december for xmas gifts, etc. Less overall ad spending = less ad revenue other factors aside
Views being down makes very little sense though
Yeah I've never really understood it myself from the angle of views. Like sure, people are going back to work and school and all that, but I wouldn't think it'd be lower than the rest of the year (barring Christmas/sumer for vacation = free time reasons) where it's already like that.
26 seconds ago "No views" is crazy
Enjoy your salt!
this is a great example of how you manage to sell games. you get me interested then your scatterbrain does a horrible job and I just wanna do it better than you, so that means I have to buy the damn game
:)
:D
++
LMAO Hell yes I'm salty! A fire atom? 🤣 You noted that a glyph of calcification isn't exactly how things work but you let the fire atom slide as if every chemist has that in their cupboard? 🤣 But eh, I'll buy the whole box if you've got some 🤣