Competitive mode

Hint

Before playing in competitive mode, it’s a good idea to have played in collaborative mode first. Review the previous sections to learn the basics of the game.

Prepare the game as explained on Setup a game. Each player chooses a color, takes the RAM card of that color and sets all the positions of their RAM module to zero. Distribute the energy units to each player according to the game’s desired difficulty:

  • Easy: 4

  • Normal: 3

  • Difficult: 2.5

  • Master: 2

Shuffle the goal cards and place them face-down to the right of the CPU. Each player takes a goal card from the deck, looks at it (without showing it to the other players) and places it face-down next to their RAM module.

../_images/competitive_setup.png

In each turn, each player may play as many operation cards as allowed by their energy units.

Hint

A player is not required to use all their energy units.

Important

Energy units cannot be transferred from one player to another.

Important

Any player can modify the values of any of the bits in the 4 registers of the CPU in their turn, but will not be able to copy or modify the values stored in the RAM of other players.

If a player manages to store their goal in register A of the CPU during their turn, the player will show their goal card to the rest of the players, keep it next to their RAM module and take another goal card from the deck.

../_images/competitive_show.png

Once the deck of goal cards deck is exhausted, the player who has solved the most goal cards will be the winner!

In competitive mode, there are two additional changes with respect to the cooperative mode:

  1. The MOV operation requires 1/2 energy unit (instead of 1 energy unit).

  2. Bug cards are used to view another player’s goal card at any time during the game. When a player takes this card from the deck, they show it to the other players and saves it for later use. The bug card can only be used during the player’s turn and, when used, the player who was forced to show their goal card will take possession of the bug card, which they can then use during one of their turns. These cards do not count as a solved goal to decide the winner at the end of the game.

Hackers

You can also make each player have special features in the competitive games. Look at the back of the RAM cards to see which hacker you want to be:

  • Green: you can use INC or DEC by consuming only 1 energy unit.

  • Yellow: you can use ROL or ROR consuming only 1/2 energy units.

  • Purple: you can make two MOV operations without consuming energy on each turn.

  • Red: you can do two logic operations OR, AND, XOR without consuming energy on each turn.