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Show HN: Countle (countle.org)

152 points by gdix ↗ HN
Countle is a daily puzzle game, a la Wordle, where you use 6 given numbers to produce of a sequence of calculations to reach a target number. In other words, it's a daily round of the "Numbers Game" from the British game show Countdown.

Sample numbers round: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfa3MHLLSWI

A new puzzle appears every day!

53 comments

[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 102 ms ] thread
keyle
Nice. I too enjoy making these little puzzles. Check out one I did last month:

https://curdle.me

dom111
Not working for me :( Only get:

  Sorry, game OZQTYAJL not found or long expired!
Tried a couple of browsers but always get the same code...
dom111
Oh I'm an idiot, my first cURL had a browser user agent so I got HTML then never cURLed it again without the code!
curiousgal
Oof, took me 30 minutes
divbzero
Impressive you stuck with it for so long. I was just about to give up…
jrmg
I would like to be able to undo any part of a calculation without trashing the whole row.
pekim
You can click either of the numbers, or the operator, in the row to remove them.
jrmg
Not after a row is filled, even if you haven’t moved on to the next row yet.
glokty
100 + 75 + 8 + 6 - 50 / 25 = 187

Any better solutions?

Elzear
6 * 50 / 25 + 100 + 75 = 187

is one step less

v01dv01d
I wonder how you do the input on Countle. It is still 4 steps, like above.
i_cannot_hack
You can use one less calculation

50/25=2 2*6=12 100+75=175 175+12=187

nicoboo
Nice implementation and animations.

I've used summle.net for a couple of months.

Few ideas from their implementation: - achievements, badges and stats - hints when your stuck - 3 levels (for kids, normal, extreme) - quick erase all - % of overall resolution from other user - best solution (in N moves VS your K moves)

Few other ideas: - dark mode - practice mode (more user retention, just like quordle)

Enjoy your code and your project, I'll try to add it to my daily puzzles.

onion2k
That's really cool. The UI is very intuitive. Bookmarked. :)
alanbernstein
This is my favorite so far of the number-based wordle-likes.
kirchhoff
I made summle.net a while back, which is similar.

After I while I found that this type of game can be frustrating as you are not incrementally solving the puzzle - instead there are multiple dead ends before stumbling upon the solution.

beardyw
The Countdown numbers round included this impressive solution in the allotted 30 seconds.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https:/...

As always that means there is a solver.

https://www.maths-resources.com/countdown/

bhrgunatha
Another similar problem from earlier in the show

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfa3MHLLSWI

Can I ask why you don't just link directly to youtube?

beardyw
I don't think I have ever worked out how to!(from the Android app)
remedan
The Android app definitely has an option to copy a link to the video under the share button. The copied URL doesn't even seem to contain any tracking parameters.
beardyw
Thanks I see it now. I hate that UI more than any other.
satyrnein
I was surprised you didn't have to use all of the numbers at the top. I never used the 8.
gsinclair
That’s just the way the game goes. Perhaps you’re not familiar with the TV game show Countdown, but it has been around for decades in case you’re interested in checking it out on YouTube. But I’d personally recommend the comedic variant “8 out of 10 cats does Countdown”.

RIP Sean Lock :’(

sfg
I enjoyed this. Thank you.
agmz
About time someone did a numeric version of Wordle. Nice execution
tokamak-teapot
When adding to Home Screen on phone, title suggest is ‘React App’. I changed it to ‘Countle’.

Great game, thanks!

gdix
Oops, fixed this. Thanks for letting me know.
pietroppeter
Very nice, particularly enjoyed the video (I did not know the original game). Could be improved on the sharing part! (Is puzzle the same for everyone?). A first idea: green squares for numbers on top used, yellow squares for intermediate numbers where used. Green square for final solution. Black (or similar) circle for operations. Black squares for other numbers
suprjami
Have been playing https://numble.wtf for a while, which is the same thing but nicer UI
geraldwhen
Countle has a way easier UI. The link you posted is not very friendly at all.
ashishb4u
No nerdle fans here?

https://nerdlegame.com/

neogodless
Kind of a fan - but for some reason the UI is really bad for me in Firefox. You cannot type `/` or `Enter` - you have to use the mouse for those. And it kept saying things did not compute, even though it was a valid equation.
12ian34
enjoyed this, thanks! I did have a problem (Firefox, Android) where hitting "share" upon completion just didn't work with some error I can't remember along the lines of not having any content to copy to clipboard. Now that the share button has disappeared I can no longer even try to share again
slazaro
The symbol for the multiplication shows as "ă" for me for some reason.
yreg
Hmm, it is the correct unicode character: × U+00D7 MULTIPLICATION_SIGN

Perhaps × html entity would fix that.

shever73
Brilliant, thank you. That’s a new daily puzzle in my bookmarks.