Thursday, 3 July 2025

網絡隨心巡記(2): 三崎港→函館

當我新開這個系列的時候,我完全沒有料到這個系列會有第二集。當時我只是把這當成一種讓有借口寫我這種形式的隨筆而已。以下這個隨心遊記同樣隨心隨機,一切所記之事皆屬偶然。

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1) 三崎港

跟朋友吃飯,電視正播放日本料理巡遊的節目。這一集介紹的是三崎港。這我可熟了,京急的老熟人,還有那用電池漲起的平板點餐的迴轉壽司連鎖店,我怎可能不熟呢?

這次介紹的是某位山田老兄的餐廳。只見他端出他的招牌菜,烤巨型吞拿魚頭。他先給吞拿魚祈福,然後用純熟的手法用純熟的手法把魚頭解體成腦天、魚眼、面頰等部位。每個部位各有不同的口感吃法,讓人看了就流口水。

……沒錯了。

我衝口而出:「我認識這家餐廳和這位老兄。」

2) 愛の貧乏脱出大作戦

如果我是在其他料理節目中看過這家餐廳就算了,偏偏這餐廳出自愛の貧乏脱出大作戦,中文叫拯救貧窮大作戰。

說到料理節目這一塊日本似乎比西方走得更前。當他們在玩鐵人料理和拯救貧窮大作戰的時候拍Master Chef和Kitchen Nightmares的戈登還是個毛頭小子呢。

某一年台灣買了版權回來播,既便距離拍攝當年已經有15年左右,這劇集居然在台灣掀起了不小的熱度。看看中文版維基的詳盡程度就知道了,一般的番組可沒有這種狂粉喔?既然提到了這檔節目,我當然也是粉絲之一。節目裡的貧窮店沒記得多少,達人店倒是很有印象。至少那時候對所謂達人店有多好吃是很有憧憬的。

現在的大多數人自是不會認識這檔節目的,我只好跟朋友聊三崎港坐京急去很方便云云,但我心裡卻一直想著趁我還記得回家搜一下:距離上次檢查又過了好幾年,到底有哪些店還活著呢?

3) Tabelog

二十年前沒有這東西,現在總有了吧?到底達人店有多好吃,一查不就知道了。

原來一些達人的店也不能算最頂級,不過當然這有點過於嚴苛。要找一家肯花幾天幾夜(按照傳聞的話可不只幾天)全心教你的店主也不容易啊。

順帶一提,山田桑的店的分數是3.6,算不錯了。

4) 南醬

拯救貧窮大作戰的超級爭議人物之一。

其實能夠經營不善到被節目挑上,店主多半都有點毛病。比如說不講衛生、味覺跟一般人不同、對無關的事異常執著等等。南醬特別就特別在所有毛病都有一點,偏偏又沒很過份,加上他那不溫不火的性格和辦事調子,除了可以直接DQ他的達人以外大部分人都拿他沒辦法。

偏偏他通過補修,可以賣學來的四五六拉麵了。

偏偏貧乏店的存活率這麼低,這家店卻活下來了。頂著被霸凌的壓力,南醬的拉麵或許不是最好吃的,但他確實找到能讓自己這店活下去的方法。這家在函館開的拉麵小店最後靠俄羅斯遊客活了快二十年,還不是被經營狀況壓倒的,這個傳奇算是有個圓滿的結局吧。

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其實我想到南醬並不單純因為他是這節目的指標性人物,也是因為在愛の貧乏的非官方資料庫最頂看到一條訃聞。才看到第一個み字我想到南醬,而youtube的搜尋建議上「愛の貧乏脱出大作戦 みなみちゃん 死去」這條也的確排很前。考慮到南醬幾年前身體就很差了,現在出事好像也不是很意外。

事實當然不是這樣。嘛,現在南醬的確實狀況也沒人知道,但資料庫上說的卻是另一個同樣重要的番組成員--

2025/03/01 みのもんたさん逝去。ご冥福をお祈りいたします。

Monday, 23 June 2025

22/6/2025: Cell games

I was checking my old phone earlier today for any remaining files before hard resetting it as family backup phone.

I checked all the pictures and downloads, whatsapp backups, as well as all the abandoned apps. I then  came across to a particular app: the tentacle wars. That is the ported version of the old kongregate game that I spent so much time on. I played the custom levels on toilet, before bed or simply all the time back in the days. That's the screenshot I took today:


That means 3349 total (auto generated) random levels solved. Taking levels deemed too easy to spend time on into consideration the actual number is easily above 5000, and that's only on this particular phone. On previous phones the counts are all 5 digits. 

The total score is the sum of scores across all non-random levels, and the score is essentially a measure of remaining time -- or equivalently the time you used. The higher the score, the lower overall time you used to clear all stages in the game.

That reminds me of the various speedrun categories where players care about time spent on independent stages separately. It might sound less exciting than non-stop categories but they also provide all sorts of fun plus extra technicalities since you can study every detail to the finest bit. Examples include punch-out, Mario Kart 64 and Smash Melee break the targets -- when you know these are all games mentioned by Summoning Salt you know these categories must be spicy!

Fortunate for me, a framerule (cue the bus analogy here) system applies here where the clock/score ticks only every second, so optimization is much easier. I once thought 110k+ was impossible but then proceeded to reach that, and I am quite confident that this is very very close to perfect now.

I found myself so addicted to such simple game. Or rather, I found myself so addicted to a whole genre of games. Referred to "cell games" on Kongregate, it's a branch of RTS that is almost extinct since the discontinuation of flash.

Simply speaking it's a type of RTS around cells which are preset immovable architecture, and the goal is to conquer all cells on the map. Assault is usually done by connecting two cells where units are sent from one to conquer the other or boosting self's architecture. Health of the cell is usually the only measurement -- it represents both health (it flips when HP reaches zero) and strength (how many units you can send/how powerful your attacks are) at the same time.

Most cell games separate from each other by permutation of the above rules, but that leads to completely different strategy. Just to give a few examples:

Tentacle wars
Architecture: Power = HP, upgrade/downgrade automatically with HP
Attacking means: by extending straight line tentacles (that costs HP) that attacks, power depends on attacker level, no collision
Strategy: fully connected network, overloading (tentacles output much more if it has grown to size limit and consecutively receives from other tentacles)

Cloud wars
Architecture: Power = HP, no upgrade, homogeneous structures (with variations from 2nd game)
Attacking means: send half of its own HP towards others on straight line, with collision
Strategy: Aggressive, concentrated attack, make use of collision to defend

Little stars for Little Wars
Architecture: Power = HP, predetermined production power for each star
Attacking means: consume ALL of its own HP to attack on designated straight line (graph structure), with collision (only when path cross over each other which is rare)
Strategy: create chain of power transportation, create line of defense/min-cut analysis

Solarmax:
Architecture: Power = HP, predetermined production power for each star
Attacking means: consume part (adjustable) of its HP to attack, do not collide
Strategy: swift, concentrated attack, high precision high frequency control, game theory

Auralux
Architecture: Power = HP, spend fixed amount of HP to upgrade (for higher HP and production) for some stars, reverts to lowest level 1 if conquered
Attacking means: consume part (adjustable) of its HP to attack, do collide
Strategy: swift, concentrated attack, rely on chaotic randomness on multiplayer field\

I really how such simple rules lead to different optimization approaches. They are complex, but not complicated enough so that near full optimization is possible. It also matches my interest on investigating the "ultimate meta" of a game. 

Sadly the tentacle wars app is no longer compatible on my new phones and with the upcoming hard reset it would be gone forever on my phone. But for whoever interested in the game you can still find that in Kong (using ruffle). Alternatively, Little Stars for Little Wars and Auralux (2) are both on app store that you can give it a try.