Wouldn't the play experience of a dangling cat toy be different every time given the randomness of the toy's trajectory once impacted by the feline's paw?
this post was submitted on 16 Oct 2025
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Yeah but what good is choosing how I'm going to swipe at an RNG boss if there are no alternate paths, devil deals or final final final final final bosses?
Even as a single pendulum there's a huge number of possible trajectories it could take, making it effectively random from our perspective.
A simple pendulum is actually a chaotic system in the real world (everything is, for the most part). It's extremely sensitive to initial conditions. Even microscopically small differences in how hard the cat swipes, the exact angle of impact, tiny air currents, or imperceptible vibrations in your hand holding the toy all get amplified exponentially over time into completely different swing patterns.
The phase space is basically the map of all possible positions and velocities the toy could have. It contains an astronomically large number of distinct states it can pass through. We're talking numbers so large they're bounded only by physical limits like the Bekenstein bound. The path through these states depends on initial conditions we simply cannot measure precisely enough, plus constant perturbations from the environment (thermal fluctuations, air resistance, microscopic imperfections in the string).
Add to this that cat toy strings aren't perfectly flexible. They have some rigidity and internal friction that creates additional complexity and damping. This makes the system even less predictable because the energy dissipates in chaotic ways.
Whether the underlying universe is truly random (quantum indeterminacy) or just deterministically chaotic beyond our ability to measure doesn't matter for practical purposes. The computational precision required to predict the trajectory exceeds what's physically possible to measure.
For all intents and purposes, every swat creates a genuinely unpredictable and effectively random experience for the cat.
Its even more than a pendulum, as pendulum free swing on a nearly perfectly flexible wire. Cat toys typically swing on a plastic wire with some rigidity, making it less a single pendulum and more a complex system of counterweights against a single large point of inertia.
It is being moved by a multi joint arm.
That sounds like a lot of work to implement, can't er just procedurally generate it?
::: spoiler
/s
No, it's always the same. The "every run is different" in roguelikes is just an illusion, you just are playing with the same patterns over and over till "that" you are waiting for happen, like gambling.
Maybe if you're bad at the game?
Any good roguelike forces you to adjust your play style, strategy, and tactics with each run.
If you're playing the same way every time, just hoping for the items/upgrades/whatever that work best together or with your default play style, you're absolutely doing it wrong.
the point in my comment is about how some games relay in random rewards systems to keep you playing. Every game can be a roguelike if you dare to, like, finish metal slug only with knife when possible, finish a league in a baseball game using only left handed players, and so on
I feel like you don't know what you're talking about.
it's a taut string, not a double pendulum
But... The mouse on the end of the string could bounce in any direction based on the motion you produce with the stick. So, in effect, there's infinite variation.
But how many of those variations are effectively the same? There's really not that much variety. Cat goes left, cat goes right, cat gets bored.
The cat should be allowed to select from different wands, strings, and attachable toys, then play in randomly generated arenas with different treat loadouts and procedurally generated hiding spots.
Anything less is just bad game design.
I'm not sure I can afford a randomly generating House, no matter how much the cat wants it!
There's no post game content and no unlocks what am I supposed to do here, just play the game?
All the end game content is multiplayer raids, but this is the problem of putting together a group to run it. Also everyone wants to DPS and not a single player wants to play support.
Where's the content?
The last update was almost 15 days ago, I want new weapons!
Also, the 'pulling it up too high' meta is so unfair. Where is the balance patch?
How dare you liken roguelites to dark patterns!
Not even one single dark pattern.
Silly cat, doesn't know that fun is backtracking for 5 hours through the samd generic roguelike metroidvania soulslike maze to the boss that one shot you last time just to get one shotted again because some guy on the internet spent 100 hours on a single video game and is saying it's easy and people who play video games for a living say difficulty settings bad because they want to maintain their livelihoods? We can't have nice things, cat, we can't go back to nice linear games with good action like in the 6th and 7th, you either have this slop or casino mtx gacha slop. What's that, kitty? Indie, you say? Shit that's not a bad idea. Smart cat.
"EZ"
"EZ"
"EZ"
"fuxkd ur mum!"
me: and this is how I unwind after a long day...
You are the rouguelike element. You are supposed to make it different and interesting every time
That's the DM's responsibility here.
Gamers get mad nowadays because games do not use psychological strategies to keep them playing
The string is the true rogue like element
There was a comic like this with multiple panels, explicitly about slay the spire... I searched for it but couldn't find it. Anybody here got a link, by chance?
Not only do I have a link, I'm also the original artist. I love waking up and seeing a picture of me and my cat on the internet.
Yeeesss! That's it! Thank you! Like, for drawing it, I guess.
i want a bearded cat dad :(
Said the same person who played a walking simulator for hours on end.
Mouse simulators ftw
Not enough procederal generation slop.
I never really enjoyed roguelights outside a handful. At this point, I feel like we are at the peak of its popularity since it seems like every 3rd game i see is a roguelight, and I feel like the people who started hating souls style games because its the only thing flooding the market...
Anyway, the point of the picture sucks because to me, the one thing I hate the most is the replayability. If they showed me one thing its that I really hate playing the same thing over and over. Once I got past the 10 min mark of survival, I just had no interest starting over again, knowing I gotta do it all over again, just slightly different, and also hope I get better things to help. I am ready for the next new thing.
I generally hate roguelikes, so am I a cat?
I swear to god if i had my gwimbly gun on me right now