Get Your Rocks Out

Building a Zen garden or Japanese rock garden requires focus, a sense of harmony, and good fortune. It is a meditative practice, and like all such practices the most important thing is: can you get the highest score?

Get Your Rocks Out is a digital roll-and-write game (think Yahtzee). The aim is to make the highest scoring rock garden that you can, using that day's selection of rocks and other items.

[In beta -- let me know if you hit problems]

How to Play

Each turn you will be presented with two items for your garden. You must place at least one of them to continue, but you may place both if you wish.

Click on an item to select it. Click again to place it.

Not all squares in your garden will be available every turn. Those that are not available will be shown with a cross.

Each item has rules about how it should be placed in order to score well. Invalidly placed items will reduce the score. (Space, RMB or the eye icon will show a useful view of which squares are safest).

Once you are happy with the placement, press the green button to proceed to the next turn. You will not be able to amend the items after this point.

The small gauge between the items shows how many remain. When you're down to the final item, the pressing the button will score the game -- you don't need to place the very last item if you don't want to.

Why not post a screenshot online with the hashtag #RocksOutGame?. Not only would that be a fun way to compete with your friends, it would validate my choice not to code leaderboards of any kind in what is, essentially, a score-based game.

Items and Placement Big and Medium Rocks

To be valid, these rocks must be placed in accordance with the following rules:

• They must not be adjacent to other rocks; for a big rock this means within 2 squares, for a medium sized rock, 1 square.
• There must not be any other rocks in the same row or column. Note that shrubbery or lanterns negate this alignment, so rock--shrub--rock is fine (as long as the rock has enough space around it).

Low Rocks

These function similarly to Medium rocks, except that you only need to worry about one axis re alignment with other rocks. (Horizontal for left/right rocks, vertical for up/down rocks).

Small Rocks

To be valid, these need to be placed with no other rocks in a 1 square radius. Extra points can be scored by positioning other items at the "knight's move" positions -- see the green squares.

Lanterns

To be valid these need to be placed with no rocks in any of the squares at the immediate north, south, east or west.

Extra points will be scored by aligning with other lanterns, horizontally or vertically -- the further apart, the better. This alignment is blocked by big or medium rocks (but not low or small)

Shrubbery

This can be placed anywhere, but extra points will be scored if placed next to existing shrubbery.

Mystery Crate

This crate could contain any of the above, but its contents will only be revealed when the turn ends. (Gameplay note: the crate's content is not completely random; placed in the same position on the same map it will give the same outcome).

Other considerations

• The Border -- while rocks and lanterns placed on the outer edge can be valid, you will lose some points for them (shrubbery is fine). Conversely, there is a bonus for keeping the border clear.
• Faultless Bonus -- if all items are placed in valid positions, you will earn an extra bonus.