Minesweeper

Minesweeper is a single-player puzzle video game. The objective of the game is to clear a rectangular board containing hidden "mines" without detonating any of them, with help from clues about the number of neighboring mines in each field. The game originates from the 1960s, and has been written for many computing platforms in use today. It has many variations and offshoots.

The difficulty of a given minesweeper board is often measured using the 3BV measure (stands for Bechtel's Board Benchmark Value).

Method

The 3BV of a board is the total count of:

• openings of the board, i.e. regions of orthogonally or diagonally contiguous squares having no neighbouring mines, together with the immediately surrounding numbered squares
• numbered squares that are not part of any openings.

For example, in the illustrated example, there is one opening (shown by white borders) and there are seven further numbered squares (green dots), giving a 3BV rating of 8. Equivalently, it is the minimum number of single clicks required in typical implementations to reveal all of the mine-free squares.

3BV/s

3BV/s stand for 3BV per second. Because the time that is needed to finish a Minesweeper board depends highly on the difficulty of the board, it may not be the best way to compare records. 3BV/s on the other hand does consider the difficulty of the Minesweeper board as well as the time needed to finish it. Among the best Minesweeper players, 3BV/s records are not nearly as important as time records, but they give picture of how fast someone can play with regard to mouse-handling.

If flags are marked, it is possible to require fewer clicks than the 3BV of the respective board. Using only left clicks is called non-flagging (nf) whereas marking mines with right-clicks is called flagging-style.

Contrast

Contrast is a puzzle-based platform style video game developed by Compulsion Games for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360, and Xbox One.

The game sets in a mysterious world predominately inhabited by shadows. It begins in the 1920s, in the bedroom of Didi Malenkaya, a young girl with an imaginary friend named Dawn. They are assumed to be the only individuals that appear in 3D form, however Dawn has the amazing ability to phase from shadow to 3D in an instant.

Didi's mother, Kat Malenkaya, enters the room and tells her not to sneak out of the house while she is gone, again. Child services had already threatened to take Didi once, due to Kat's inability to properly watch over her daughter and due to the assumption that Didi maybe be 'mentally disturbed'. Child services notes that because of Kat's absence during the night it has taken a toll on Didi, causing her to act out (sneak out) and talk to 'imaginary people' (Dawn). Kat is given only two options; to find a more stable job or, preferably, return to her husband. Kat works as a singing act at a cabaret venue called the 'Ghost Note', in hopes of catching her big break. She begs Didi to promise not to sneak out, so that she will not get into trouble again. Didi promises but before she heads out, Didi asks if her father will return home. Kat answers that she does not know and leaves.