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Show HN: TuringJest – Pretend to be an AI and spot the real one (turingjest.app)

61 points by thornewolf ↗ HN
Hi HN,

I have been working on this website for a few weeks with some buddies of mine and would love if you checked it out. TuringJest provides a jackbox-esque experience with its two game modes.

*One Shot Prompt* - Submit a prompt for all players (including the AI) to answer. - Answer your prompts in the way that you think ChatGPT would answer them. - Vote for who you think the real AI is.

*Talk It Out* - Plan an event in a group chat with your friends. - Trick everyone into thinking you are the AI while voting for the real AI.

Let me know what you think!

20 comments

[ 5.0 ms ] story [ 54.0 ms ] thread
thornewolf
Sorry everyone, I think the server crashed and auto-rebooted.
thornewolf
Swapping to a persistent db to keep game states.
mach1ne
Way too unclear. Game flow isn’t explained before the game, you’re just thrown in with no idea what to do beyond the example prompts. Introduction to mechanics before a game would improve the experience.
thornewolf
You are completely correct. I was lazy and didn't want to add another page to the site so I put the instructions in the comments. #1 TODO.
dzdt
I just played a round and didn't see instructions anywhere. Was totally unclear what to do, what was the goal, or when the game would end.
nohaydeprobleme
For feedback: I had trouble understanding what to do at first, as I couldn't find the instructions or premise of each game mode within the app itself (e.g. what is One Shot Prompt versus Talk It Out).

I later found the instructions in the comment section on HN, but I missed it the first time around as I opened the submission first before checking the discussion. A quick screen explaining the premise near the start or an instructions/question mark button could help the game become easier to get into.

Great premise though, and I like the website performance (everything loads nice and fast).

thornewolf
Added game rules to the website. Thanks for the feedback!
agolio
Can I respectfully advise to spend some time adding CSS, rules, and remove strings like "response goes here for debugging" then re-submit, maybe an admin could delete the thread with that understanding. As otherwise you won't be able to re-submit as per HN guidelines, which is a shame as the concept seems cool.

You have done the hard work and built the impressive networking/ API interactions, now go the last 10% and make it usable :)

thornewolf
I have added the rules but I'm not sure what you mean by CSS. Do you not feel like the UI is usable? I tried to create something very utilitarian - sort of the same philosophy as HN in that regard.

I did discover some performance regressions after this post, but I feel that is expected when getting the HN hug. Hopefully it was still playable for you?

agolio
For example, I have these questions when opening the interface

https://imgur.com/a/WeCGy2n

In addition the time seems to go negative and the game never ends in some cases?

https://i.imgur.com/2cEbcKo.png

I have been unable to connect with another player so can't comment on the game-playing experience

thornewolf
Thanks for taking the time to provide screenshots. That is the public lobby list. I just auto spin up some lobbies for people to join if they don't want to create a game themselves.

There are some bugs here and there that can cause a game to "collapse" for lack of a better word and never get carried forward into the next state. I think this tends to happen when the server gets overloaded and restarts. I need to look into why this happens on occasion.

The total players figure counts the number of unique visitors that have been assigned a session_id. I think it's a bit optimistic since it counts any visitor at all. (excluding google crawler bots)

I have patched the active games counter. It was counting games that had been created but never started.

Thanks a ton for your bug reports, it's helping me harden the server so people can have reliable experiences going forward.

sdwr
Thanks, this is the good stuff.
thornewolf
Not sure if you go back and reread old comment responses, but I have made a lot of QoL improvements to the game - https://www.turingjest.app/

I will be moving away from the confusing public lobby system in short order, but the game should be smooth to play with a couple of friends you can send the link to.

MegaSec
This game is damm fun. I had no idea you were playing.
idiotsecant
Such a good concept, but needs some UX work.
MarkusQ
The timeout seems too short to allow much thought or time for typing. Even chatGPT often takes longer than you are giving us.
damowangcy
AmongAI or something along that line will save you lots of explanation.