alt Hacker News> By measuring it as a race, it becomes a race, and now the goal is the metric.
It becomes a race when you start seeing it as a race :) One can just... ignore the leaderboard
Replies
m000 • today at 2:51 PM
I disagree. Having a leaderboard also leaks into the puzzle design. So the experience is different, even if you choose to ignore the leaderboard as a participant.
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Waterluvian • today at 2:43 PM
That’s also completely true and something I often say about gaming. You don’t like achievements? Just don’t do them. Your enjoyment shouldn’t be a function of how others interact with the product.
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I've ignored the leaderboard for its entire existence, as the puzzles release at something like 4AM-5AM in my timezone; there's no point getting up 4 hours early, or staying awake 4 hours after bedtime, for some points on the internet.
Instead, getting gold stars for solving the puzzles is incentive enough, and can be done as a relaxing thing in the morning.
No matter what you do, as the puzzles get harder, you won't solve them in a day (or even a lifetime) if you don't come up with good algorithms/methods/heuristics.