EmojiTetra

https://twitter.com/EmojiTetra/with_replies

Some analysis

• Cool graphs: http://pub.thorx.net/emojitetra/

Some plans for future analysis

Board health

Ideas to measure board health

• simple board fill - Count of positions on the board that are used. This is extremely simple and is already in the analysis
• modified board fill - count columns that have holes in them, and use that as modifying factor to the simple board fill. The height of those columns (or of highest?) should be a factor too
  • discussion in this thread: https://twitter.com/HeptaSean/status/1063093435719213056
• board age - for each used position, track how long (age in pieces spawned) it has been on the board. Health is then the sum of ages. Lower = healthier
  • A low board will have a higher turnover of pieces and better health. A high board will have low rows that are stuck for a long time - as they age the health will decrease, indicating we are high and possibly stuck there...
  • however, it's still not an objective absolute, as two identical boards may register different health
  • discussion in this thread: https://twitter.com/Caber_nl/status/1065174652060909570
• weighted board fill - count occupied positions in columns. The unhealth of a piece is valued according to how difficult it is to get to. Basically, the more buried a piece is, the higher it scores. Buried holes need to be handled in some form (they are bad), and deep open wells need to be handled (they are good)
  • possible implementation: every occupied position is a point. Those that are on an equal row or higher than the lowest accessible open spot have no further weighting, however each occupied position below that row gets an additional +1 for each row further down. Each unoccupied position (hole!) gets an additional +1.
  • Should it handle horizontal holes (ie don't count quite as strongly because once uncovered, they'll be easier to fill and move on?)

Sociopolitical analysis

The game can be examined as a microcosm of human democratic/communication behaviour!

I wrote some notes about this at one point. There have been many tweets too.

• For instance, this thread: https://twitter.com/alexjc/status/1063861229536665601

Rhyming game tips

• "less than four? build up more"
• "make a column only if it's to the bottom"
  • on the side build a column, but only if it's to the bottom
  • note: uses non-standard use of "column". Should find a tip to call it a well
• "more than five? clear some lines to stay alive"
  • I like it, except the meter in the first and second clauses is mismatched. “If you’re stuck with more than five, clear some lines to stay alive.”
    • https://twitter.com/JoeSondow/status/1031215485596004352

• I thought of "1+1<2" which is great for sentiment and brevity, but they only people it would be clear to are the power players who know it anyway

Game Table

Game	Theme	Start date/tweet	End date/tweet	Score	Notes
1	Fruit	16th April	28th April	8375	Board style changed on 19th
2	Animal	28th April	6th May	6800
3	Book	6th May	10th May	2200
4	Aquatic	10th May	12th May	900	Lowest score
5	Heart	12th May	27th May	13850
6	Clothing	27th May	1st July	41275	Bug caused in-game delay at GAMEOVER screen (how long?)
7	Plant	1st July	5th July	3675
8	Fruit	5th July	16th July	13725
9	Heart	16th July	8th August	26650
10	Animal	8th August	27th August	20075	Game paused for 24h on 2018-08-14
11	Aquatic	27th August	5th September	11925
12	Book	5th September	11th September	6300
13	Plant	11th September	15th September	3950
14	Heart	15th September	19th September	3225
15	Clothing	19th September	@EmojiTetra	79225	(current ongoing game)

Note: my timezone is UTC+10 and my dates reflect that. I hope to direct link to tweets sufficient that they can be used for exact time lookups if needed

Board styles

1. From poll #1 (16 April 2018): score in blocks, then unicode SOON, then linedrawing to illustrate NEXT piece
2. From poll #211 (19 April): unicode SOON replaced with unicode F-FWD
3. From poll #2663 (22 May): Literal "Next", then braille indicator of next piece. Then literal "Score" in and score in plain text
4. From poll 3718 (5 June): "Next" and score moved to right of board. Next illustrated with emoji same as board

My Terminology

(note: this is what I endeavour to use, and while I encourage others to use, it is in no way formal or endorsed. Most of it is what is commonly used already)

• board: play area (7x11 squares)
• column: a vertical sequence on the board from top to bottom (11 spots)
• line/row: a horizontal sequence on the board from left to right (7 spots)
• clear - to clear some rows
• single/double/triple: to clear 1/2/3 line(s)
• tetra/quad/tetris: to clear 4 lines
• collective/hive/electorate/crowd: everyone who votes
• hole (1): an unfilled space that is surrounded
• overhang/half-hole: an unfilled spare that is covered at top, but open to the side
  • some overhangs can be underfilled by a side slide. But not all
• clean - board without holes. as in "the board is clean" and "this is a clean drop"
  • question: is a half-hole a clean board?
• dirty - opposite of clean: a board with a hole. "the board is dirty". "this is a dirty drop"
• well/hole (2): a space perfectly suited for a single piece. Usually I-hole, sometimes J or L-hole.
• silhouette/skyline: the shape of the top surface
• empty board: nothing on the board. a perfectly flat skyline, as per the start of a game.
  • I prefer 'empty' to avoid possible ambiguity with clear or clean, however this is where my usage diverges most from the electorate