Hello, and welcome to the fifth annual Opus Magnum tournament! I'm panic, and I'll be your host.
If you have any questions (or just want to talk about your solutions before the deadline), feel free to message me on Discord (panic#9031) or send me email at ian@ianhenderson.org.
structure
The tournament will take place on this site, events.critelli.technology. There will be nine puzzles—one non-scoring puzzle and eight scoring puzzles. Your solutions to each puzzle will be ranked according to the metrics on the puzzle's page. Based on your best submission for each metric, you'll be given a score for that puzzle. The submitter with the highest total score at the end of the tournament will be crowned the winner!
The first puzzle, Week 0, is non-scoring; feel free to submit or not submit solutions as you'd like. On January 13 at 21:59 UTC, I'll host a stream on my Twitch channel kicking off the tournament, where we'll go over any submissions to Week 0 and introduce the Week 1 puzzle.
Week 1 will be due on Sunday, January 22, at 21:59 UTC. The deadline will be followed by a stream where we talk about solutions and reveal the winners. Week 2 will be released on Friday, January 20, at 21:59 UTC—two days before Week 1 is due. This will give you the weekend to work on either or both puzzles as you'd like.
This Friday–Sunday pattern will continue, with new puzzles released on Friday 21:59, submissions due on Sunday 21:59 (9 days after release), and a results stream following the submission deadline. There will be an additional one-week gap between Week 5 and Week 6, both for lore reasons and to give players a break. You'll have an extra week to solve the final puzzle in Week 8. For those affected by Daylight Saving Time in the US, be aware that the clock will change on March 12, so the final two streams may be one hour later than you expected.
schedule
Week 0: Now – Friday, January 13, 21:59 UTC
Week 1: Friday, January 13, after the kickoff stream – Sunday, January 22, 21:59 UTC
Week 2: Friday, January 20, 21:59 UTC – Sunday, January 29, 21:59 UTC
Week 3: Friday, January 27, 21:59 UTC – Sunday, February 5, 21:59 UTC
Week 4: Friday, February 3, 21:59 UTC – Sunday, February 12, 21:59 UTC
Week 5: Friday, February 10, 21:59 UTC – Sunday, February 19, 21:59 UTC
Week 6: Friday, February 24, 21:59 UTC – Sunday, March 5, 21:59 UTC
Week 7: Friday, March 3, 21:59 UTC – Sunday, March 12, 21:59 UTC
Week 8: Friday, March 10, 21:59 UTC – Sunday, March 26, 21:59 UTC
scores and metrics
A metric is a way of ranking solutions. For example, according to the Cost > Area > Cycles metric (abbreviated GAC), solutions are ranked primarily by cost (lowest to highest), with ties broken by area, then cycles.
A solution's score for a metric is based on its position in the ranking according to that metric. The formula used is:
where rank starts at 1 for first place and increases for each lower-ranked solution. Ties are ranked equally, with further solutions continuing after a gap. For example, if there's a three-way tie for second place, the ranks will go 1, 2, 2, 2, 5, …
Weeks 1 through 7 each have two metrics to compete for; they will be revealed with the puzzle and listed on the puzzle page. Your highest ranking solution in each metric will be used to determine the score for that metric. There's no benefit to optimizing for both metrics in the same solution; the best competitors will submit separate solves for each metric to optimize their score.
Your overall score is the sum of your scores for each metric of each puzzle. There are 16 of these scores, and the maximum value of the scoring formula is 10, so the maximum possible score is 160 points.
rules
The rules are the same as last year's tournament. Players are not allowed to:
- Collaborate with other players. Your submission must be completely assembled by yourself. (No teams, sorry!)
- Submit as someone else or submit for someone else.
- Publicly post details about their solutions before the deadline. Including metrics, tiebreakers, etc. This also includes metrics that aren't chosen for that week.
- Use older versions or modded versions of Opus Magnum that change metric scores or collision detection.
- Submit a solution to a modified version of the given puzzle as a solution to the original puzzle.
- Exploit glitches or modify solutions files to acheive what cannot be done in game unless stated otherwise. (Glitches include, but are not limited to: overlapping glyphs, overclocking arms, duplicating inputs and outputs, editing in unallowed glyphs, etc. Glitches do not include creating waste chains or having a non-looping solution.)
notes
Players of all skill levels are quite welcome, but know that competition will be fierce. Don't be discouraged if you place lower than you expected.
You can join or leave the tournament at any time. Don't worry if you missed a few weeks or if you just want to solve one puzzle.
After the deadline, everything about that week's puzzle is open for discussion. Most discussion happens in the #opus-magnum channel of the Unofficial Zachtronics Discord Server. You're welcome to join in!
results
score spreadsheet
result stream playlist
all submitted solutions
revision log
2023-02-02: The scoring formula has changed from 1875 / (rank + 29) to 300 / (rank + 29), so individual scores max out at 10 instead of at 62.5. This applies retroactively to previous weeks as well. The change doesn't affect rankings at all—it's just to make the numbers look nicer.