in reply to AI Animals

The proper name of this game is "Pangolins." Back when I was about 9 (so this would be around 1980) I was deemed one of the most gifted and talented students in Essex.


(Pauses to bask in your adoration.)


Anyway so I was sent to this camp to mingle with other superior individuals and that's where I saw my first computer up close. It was a Commodore PET with a whopping 8k of RAM and it was playing this game. It's uncanny ability to guess the animal I was thinking of totally scared the hell out of me. How long before such powerful AIs would enslave the human race?

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Re: Re: AI Animals
by Anonymous Monk on Sep 09, 2002 at 12:19 UTC
    Thanks - what I discovered was that there have been numerous variations on the game, but they all seem to have their roots in ANIMALS mentioned by hossman. Every example I could find out there today uses the same tree structure that I independently came up with. Though the original ANIMALS was written in UNIVAC assembly, it is head and shoulders above anything that came after it. Of course, that was probably due to its auther - John Walker. In any account, his assembly has given me some ideas, though I am not sure it is worth the time an effort. My goal was to replicate the functionality of the game I played as a kid (which I did), not that of a UNIVAC assembly programmer (which appears to be way cooler).

    Thanks for the input and congrats on a prestigious child hood!

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