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posted by Fnord666 on Thursday June 01 2017, @08:07PM   Printer-friendly
from the pachinko-meets-atari dept.

When the lights go out and the entire world is thrust into the technological nether, we'll need board games like Turing Tumble. Created programmer Paul Boswell – he's well known for programming complex games for Texas Instruments calculators – and maker Alyssa Boswell, the Turing Tumble lets you use small parts to create logic flows in order to solve puzzles.

Boswell created the game to teach everyone how to program. It rose out of frustration. In his work at the University of Minnesota he found himself stuck with scientists who couldn't manage programming or computational analysis.

[...] The game is simple. The set of marbles roll one at a time from the top of the board through a series of pins and "logic" pieces. When the marble hits a flipper at the bottom it releases another ball – creating a computing cycle.

"Players add logic to the game board by placing six different types of parts onto the board. The 'Bit' is a particularly important one. Each time a ball runs over it, it flips to point the opposite direction. Pointing to the left is like a '0', and pointing to the right is like a '1.' Gear bits are the most interesting part, though. Gear bits are just like bits, except that they can be connected to one another so that when one is flipped, it flips the connected gear bits, too. It's these parts that make the computer Turing-complete," said Boswell.

Seems reminiscent of the Digi-Comp II.


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  • (Score: 2) by Bobs on Friday June 02 2017, @05:53PM

    by Bobs (1462) on Friday June 02 2017, @05:53PM (#519472)

    You can get that for $15:

    Virtual Pack

    We'll send you a pdf version of the puzzle book and all the 3D CAD files used to generate the parts. If you like, you could 3D print your own game!
    Includes:

            Digital copy of the puzzle book
            3D CAD files of all parts

    Starting Score:    1  point
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   2