ScottVee Gaming

I found out what happens when you pass element 118, the last element known in the real world.   I though it would progress with the IUPAC standard symbols for unknown elements.  This would be Uun for ununnonium, which means 1-1-9.  But of all the wacky choices, for element 119 they went with ...    Hydrogen?  They went back to the beginning and from here on out all the element numbers are going to be wrong.  No, element 119 is NOT hydrogen.  Argh. Well, you also get a trophy, and it comes with 5 uses of a "neutrino trap" in the minigame where you catch the purple particles.   You can click this little trap in the top left corner to grab all the particles.  And I'm sure it will recharge after some period of time, since there is a Research option to decrease the recharge time for some huge cost. Once again, I feel like I have beaten the game.  It tried to use some real-word science and was fine up to the point where it jumped the...

I didn't see that the devs did an update, but the layout of the Research page is much better now: I made it to element 64, then went ahead and did the reset to get more neutrinos.  Watching a video for X2, I got 10,682 neutrinos.  I also bought 200 quanta to speed up some things: I unlocked the collider for 175 quanta (instead of 2 million knowledge points), and then got 500 injections for 25 quanta.   The collider is pretty, although it's just another expensive tree of energy multipliers.  You buy "injections" with neutrinos or quanta then tap the circular button at the bottom to zap some particles through the collider, and hope they get caught by one of the traps.  You start with one trap at the bottom, a little circle that initially needs 30 captures to fill.  You can buy more traps, though the cost goes up exponentially (of course).  You can upgrade a trap for a cost.  The level 2 trap can hold 60 particles.  What I don't see is how ...

Over on Chem Merge, my inquisitiveness got the best of me.  While I slowly made it to about element 45 without buying any additional coins, I wanted to know what happens when you hit element 118 Oganesson (Og), the heaviest known element in the real world.  I saw that the leaderboards had nobody with a higher element.  And sure, enough, once you get to 118 Og, you get the last achievement on Google Play, and then ... nothing.  If you do get two 118s next to each other, they do not merge, they sit there and will eventually clog up the screen and end the game. I bought the 3000 coins for $2.16 five times to satisfy my curiosity, and it was a fun game to poke at on short breaks.  I continued playing just long enough to hit 2 million points.  From here, you will never get a bonus for a new element, so you will run out of coins.  You will still get the 150 coin daily bonus but at some point you will have to buy coins just to clear the extra 118s.  The ...

A while back I tested out an app called Chem Merge.  I wanted to do a quick update.  First, the full name in the Play Store is "Chem Merge Periodic Table Game" by Scienchro, although the on-screen icon still just says "Chem Merge".  It looks like it has had a graphics update since last time I played. It's still fairly simple: drop new elements down into the grid and try to make matches.  Generally, you want to put the new block on top of the same block for a match or on top of a higher block, preferably only one number higher (put a 12 on top of a 13, for example) so another of that same block can clear both (another 12 would give 12+12 for a 13 then 13+14 for a 14).  If you put a block on top of a lower block, it will be hard to ever clear out that column -- you're only real move if a 15 is on top of a 12 would be to drop another 15 next to it to pull the 15 over to the next column and expose the 12 for further builds. The power-ups on the bottom are: - un...

Rockhounding: Chemistry was a mod for Minecraft version 1.10.2 which had another solid set of chemical reactions to play with.  I hopped onto my VeeTech2 modpack world to refresh my memory (and notes) about it. Everything in this mod starts with the uninspected minerals found throughout the world.  You put these into the Mineral Sizer to get a huge range of minerals, but first you need some Lab Ovens to make some of the acids.  These all use composts which are made in the Lab Blender, so let's start there ... [Lab Blender] 3 S = 8 Sulfur-bearing compost (SComp), or coal blocks or coal coke blocks, there are variants for all of these that make different amounts [Lab Blender] 3 apatite = 4 fluorite-bearing compost (FComp) [Lab Blender] 3 salt = 4 NaCl compost (NaClComp) [Lab Blender] 3 coal = 4 Cracked Coal compost (CCComp) [Lab Blender] 3 Carbon dust = 2 Carbon compost (CComp) [Lab Oven] 1000mb H2O + SComp = 500mb H2SO4 [Lab Oven] 500mb H2SO4 + NaClComp = 300mb H...

Chemistry in Games: Nuclearcraft Nuclearcraft was a mod for Minecraft version 1.10.2 which had a pretty solid set of chemical reactions to play with.  I hopped onto my VeeTech2 modpack world to refresh my memory (and notes) about it. First there are the Nitrogen and Helium Collectors which just output 10mb of those gasses per tick from the air.  And with an infinite water source you could hook up to an Electrolyzer to get 475mb of H2, 50mb of Deuterium and 500mb of O2.  That's some funky water. The Isotope Separator has 18 pages of recipes of this sort: Th ingot or dust or grit = 2 Th-232 + 2 tp Th-232 (I use "tp" for "tiny pile", "tiny clump", etc) ... same for the oxide U ingot or dust or grit = 2 U-238 + 2 tp U-235 ... same for the oxide Yellorium ingot or dust = U-238 + tp U-235 Blutonium ingot or dust = Pu-242 + tp Pu-239 Boron ingot or dust = B-11 + 3 tp B-10 Lithium ingot or dust = Li-7 + 3 tp Li-6 The rest are used to recycle fuel pellet...

Here is a game that uses the chemical elements in a creative way and is not just another quiz.  Merge Elements by Scienchro is basically a "drop and match" game, so it's not groundbreaking, but it is very solidly coded and has its own kind of perks.  As you drop tiles, two matching tiles numbered N produce a tile numbered N+1.  Three matching tiles can produce an N+2 tile, and they can continue to drop and interact.  Side-by-side matching will favor the dropped tile, moving the merged result there, so you can pull a tile off a lower numbered tile by dropping a matching tile to the left or right of it.  As you discover new elements, you get coins. While it does not have the silly fun of the irregularly shaped heads from the Pop Cats game that roll around and merge in between moves, a single drop here can still produce an unusual chain reaction of the tiles.   You can use some of your earned coins to start the game at a higher atomic number. Note that on...

Org Chem Adventure by NinDiMo really did manage to make a game with chemistry content.  It's a text-based adventure game that follows a kid in search of his father who never returned from a trip to a weird land of chemical landscapes. It does show a few chemical formulas but I would not consider it overly technical. The story itself is oddly original and fantastical/abstract.  You do get to choose some dialog paths.  There are some sensible chemistry puzzles, like betting on which of the listed chemical is more acidic.  Of course you can scroll up a page or two to find the reference guide in the conversation before it. It was a bit annoying that nobody in this world thought anything of a chemist until they are proclaimed to be wizards and then they are worth rescuing. And then it cuts off suddenly. It hasn't been updated since 2017 but I felt it was worth a mention for being different from the rest of the quiz-based apps I have seen.

Molecule makers appear to be the most common class of chemistry-related games on the Android.  There are a lot of games where the challenge is to build specific molecules.  These have a range of styles and difficulty levels, and it is a more informative pasttime than just answering quiz questions.   "Molecule - a chemistry puzzle" (by a.mighty.dish) is very stylish and combines molecule making with an attractive spatial puzzle.  You have to navigate the atoms together in the limited niches provided.  It has not been updated since 2018. Chemistry Lab (by Monster Brain Educational Games) has a few different molecule maker levels.  The first mode is Classic where the atoms come dripping down the three tubes up above and you have to catch only the correct ones in the big beaker.  That's fun for a while.   The next level (Covalent Bonds) has you draw the bonds between atoms to meet certain goals.  Aside from one goofy typo ("Carbon di Oxide")...