A possible explanation for the Board Cycle Bug of Microsoft Minesweeper
نویسنده
چکیده
The Microsoft version of the game Minesweeper has a known bug that makes sequences of boards appear again after generating thousands of boards, in a cycle, disturbing the random nature of the game. This article exposes the results of a research made in 2004, as well as the subsequent secondary discoveries, like the existence of boards made of combinations of mines from two consecutive boards of the cycle, the convergence of these boards towards the cycle, the fact that the mines of a given board can be put in a real order, and the relation between the locations of a same mine, if used to build beginner or intermediate boards. Finally, it gives a probable single explanation for all the phenomena observed, based on how pseudo-random number generators work, and on the probable conversion of these random numbers into boards.
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