Basically everyone I knew personally (including me) played without using the pause key (except if they needed to go to the toilet, were genuinely interrupted or sometimes for a little composure). Now it seems as levels get more and more refined (and with more levels, hence less time to pay each level, or less sleep) everyone uses the pause key (including me, although I hate it .. an addictive compulsion at times). Anyway, early on many people considered pausing lots cheating, so to ensure people couldn't play the game "completely" like chess (ie one move at a time) an update was enforced to ensure after a pause two ticks had to pass before you could pause again. Also, the recorded game keeps track of pauses so, in theory at least, you could play back a game showing the pauses as they occured when it was played.

The reason it was deemed necessary is that due to human reactions you could not (without super human reflexes) make a call on passing a yam two square away that was "making a decision" without taking a 50/50 chance. However, by pausing after one square you could make this call correct 100 percent of the time, etc. You can still use the pause key for such things, but not as safely. Anyway, that was the call. For many levels pause doesn't help, other than to gain composure and work out what you are doing. Generally, for levels based less on chaos or luck playing the level many times will get the method and score you are trying...

We could take it one step further and consider games with the same score, exittime and sub exittime to be ranked base on number of pauses during the game - or at least number of pauses less than 30 seconds...

Comments welcome... I think

I think allowing to pause after each tick would be way too much.

I had never used the pause key as an help until 2005. Then I tried it to decompose some levels into short easy sequences (5-10-20 ticks), especially for those levels that were long runs with tricky optimized move/grab sequences. Using pause at the proper moments allows to do complex sequences of keystrokes nearly 100% reliably. This can typically reduce the number of attempts to perform the "I-know-what-to-do-for-the-top-score" from 150 games to 2 or 3. Saves a lot of time and pain.

The funniest part is finding out the optimal strategy for me. The pause can help the actual realization to be less painful.

Imagine you're able to display the rankings for each level/levelset for the last week/month/year. Default could be to display scores and ranks based on the games played during the last 30 days. That way, newcomers to the game could have the reward to be ranked 1st-of-last-month in Homelands, provided they had some good scores. This could help spreading the word, telling their friends "beat me if you can!".

The "all-times" would represent the current game high scores and rankings. Way for more modest players to see what is feasible with training and experience. But new players challenging each-other on recent scores would make them play more, improve, and maybe ultimately fight for the big scores!

Or maybe I'm too old already and younger players are only interested in WoW-like stuff...

Well done asarkila! And it's good to know that like Mark and Daniel (from Blue Duck and BareFeet) you have plans for future bd4 players. Those guys sons are around the age to start playing bd4 ... I'd better give them a reminder I thinks

As for time, I have "more than ever" but still F*** all. Game development is on hold (as it has been for many years) until after I get some respectable scores back. I think you have scores in the bank! As for tickets... check them in! I play on tickets because my Internet provider is so shit (no choice, don't get me started) and the letency and network usage add up to grief. Everytime I get a high score I check the ticket in. I feel that's the best way to go. Hmmm, the weather is good and Christmas will bring some spare time. Beach, holidays, parties, outdoor activities or bd4 ... maybe playing bd4 is not the best idea after all. Moderation?