It really is a crying shame thatLittleBigPlanethas hadpoor salesthus far. The title offers a dizzying array of tools for creative individuals to run free, and when you marry brilliant minds with the game’s level editor, you get an endless stream of amazing work. Exhibit A came weeks before the full game was even released: a crafty programming genius built acalculatorcapable of performing addition and subtraction, and the world was blown away.
Here’s another entry in the list of awesomeness to come out ofLittleBigPlanet: PSN user Cristel, who likely has a comprehensive background in computer science/programming, has created two working versions oftic-tac-toe! Here’s Cristel’s description:
Play Tic Tac Toe against a machine! There are 2 boards. One is beatable, one hopefully isn’t (if you don’t cheat). You can also take a look at the machine. Have fun!
I believe the scientific term to describe my current state is …HEAD ASPLODE. I’m trying to decide what’s more unbelievable — this, or the calculator — and I keep flipping back and forth. It’s hard to tell since the video is pretty crappy, but it appears that Cristel simply used a “brute force” method of programming — i.e., she inputtedall the possible outcomesfor tic-tac-toe. Since the player is always X, and X always goes first, there are255,168possible games (according to Wikipedia)! Of course, appearances can be deceiving, and Cristel says she definitely didn’t use brute force.
In the end, I think I’m going to have to go with this over the calculator for “most impressive computationalLBPlevel,” since I’m pretty sure that this is the first documented proof ofartificial intelligencecreated by a user. How crazy is that? My hat’s off to you, Cristel.
[ViaKotaku]
[Update:Cristel has let us know that she’s not a “he” (a poor and regretful assumption on my part), and that she didn’t use brute force. Ireallyshould stop talking out of my ass when it comes to programming matters. –Samit]
