The Ping.sg Game
Long hail the queen! Sheylara! She managed to get herself onto the number 1 position of the ping.sg game with a crazy score of 3030!
The game which took uzyn about 7 hours to code but ended up taking away the total productivity man-hours of all who have played, which must have worthed millions of dollars! In 7 hours, uzyn wrote a deceptively simple game that can bring down the productivity of nations. Long hail the dark lord!
Actually, I didn't want to spend so much time on the game. I went to ping.sg in the morning. Answered 2 questions and then skipped to read the blogs entries in the morning. After I came back in afternoon after my meetings, I went to ping.sg again. Suddenly, I noticed the top players list. My name was just a few position away from uzyn. I decided to give myself a small goal of just surpassing uzyn - the creator of the game. Within half an hour, I went above uzyn's position.
Then I saw Dk's score and position: 1000 points and position 10! It was like his avatar was mocking me, taunting me to challenge his position. No way! In my heart, I quietly set myself another goal of beating Dk.
At 11.30 pm, after my wife and the kids have gone to bed, I booted up my PC. I can hear the CPU fan whirling like it was declaring, "Gentlemen! Start your engines!" (Remember Daytona the racing arcade game?)
I started clicking away.
I had two tabs on my Firefox browser. One was busy clicking and firing away at the ping.sg challenge; the other was keeping a look out of my position.
Suddenly, I noticed that nocturne made his move. He had realised that I was sneaking up behind him. He started pulling away! My heart pounded! I clicked faster! Argh! 3 consecutive wrong answers. I was falling behind! I calmed myself. Clicked some more and I had a good fortune of getting 10 consecutive challenges correct and I slowly established distance between myself and nocturne with thanks to questions on Andreww, Cowboy Caleb and chioeves.
Around 12.30 am, I have managed to surpass DK but I noticed that few other warriors have joined the battlefield: Arzhou, ridz84 and ironicgamer. Ironicgmaer was one crazy knight. I was watching his scores. It is like the stock market on a good day, his scores just kept going up and up and up!
At 3am. Without realisation, I kept playing the game even though I've long passed DK's position. My eyes were weary and unfocused. I think I answered 10 questions wrong consecutively. The game is like gambling. When you lose, you want to win back; when you win, you want to win more. I just continued to click some more.
At 3.07am. I don't think I can see the screen anymore. All the words seemed to mesh themselves together. I decided to call it a night. With the satisfying thought that I've placed myself in eighth position which sounds like 'wealth', I went to bed and conceding the battlefield to brave warriors ironicgamer, ridz84 and arzhou with the conclusion that the eventual champion would be ironicgamer.
This morning, when I checked on the top player list, I realised Sheylara was the real amazon! Where did she come from? The queen had a unbelievable score of 3030! That was a difference of 342 points and 114 correct answers ahead of ironicgamer!
All hail the queen!
34 comments:
Ooops. I'm sorry. I totally didn't expect a successful entrepreneur like you would've been addicted to it too.
Must have cost you millions of $ playing the game. Ooops.
But glad that you enjoyed yourself. Take a break for a day. It was April Fools after all. :)
erm cobalt, just to let u know... nocturne is a guy...
We are very amused by your blog entry!
In other news... didn't you see me in the top 10 list at night? I was playing on and off between 7pm and 4:30am. :p
Uzyn,
Yeah, your fault! :p
Xinyun,
Haha! Oops! The entry has been corrected! Thanks.
Sheylara,
Guess you didn't notice me coz I only managed to squeezed to number 8 at 3am and was posing no threat to your conquest. ;p
Er, cobalt, still got one more to correct. "He had realised that I was sneaking up behind her."
But I got pushed overnight from #15 to #23! T_T
Hi WishBone,
Thanks! Corrected too! Part of the reason I kept playing was to ensure that I've enough points to remain in the top 10 when I wake up! :p
eh Cobalt alladin, you forgot to mention you have another browser with google so you would consistently switch browers and search for answers eh?
With all respect to Uzyn, but i think this is not a game. Those that are at the top of the list also doesn't shows how much about their knowledge of postings in ping.sg. Those at the top especially sheylara just shows how much effort they would put in to cheat just to get to the first position.
come on, lets be honest, there is no way anybody could had got over 100 just by clicking. Who the hell had the time to read all blogs and not only read by remembers who posted them?
I can safely say those in the top 50s are all cheaters and the most despicable cheat is the one at the top. I spent 30 minutes cheating and got myself over 300 marks. Skill is no relevancy. Your effort and time spent on the cheating will determine your score. For that let me sign off by saying the top 10 are perhaps the most cunning bloggers we have in ping.sg. For that i salute you for trying to hard to show how much you would go just for fame.
It's disturbing that people know such intimate, personal details about me. How does xinyun know my gender?!
Bernard. You're a moron. You don't need to google answers, you just need to notice styles. I'd explain, but you wouldn't understand the explaination, since writing that long comment probably caused your second last brain cell to give up the ghost. Don't stress the last one, now.
You know what? if i were you i would find a place to hide my face for the amount of time spent on showing people what a cheat i was.
Bernard: Unless you got proof that everyone above 100 marks is cheating, I think you better take back your words and apologise.
Why isn't it possible to hit more than 100? If you read ping.sg long enough, you would have notice the writing style of the bloggers.
hello i got more than 100 because I spent half an hr playing the game ok.
please la. just because u are lousy and got nothing right doesn't mean people at the other end of the spectrum don't exist.
pui.
Hi Bernard,
Actually, I'm more impressed by you. How did you manage to google and find the correct answer within the time limit? Sometimes, I can't even finish reading and choosing an answer and the time was up already!
You spent 30 minutes and you got more than 300 points. So if you spent 4.5 hours like I did, you would have gotten 2700 points! But since we spent longer time than you did to get a score lower than you, it goes to show that we really played the game, don't you agree? :)
Look at our percentage of correct answers, it is only at 49%. If I've googled, I think my percentage should have been well about the 50% level or even close to 100%. Lol!
Many of us had been in the ping community since year 2006 and hence we may have been more familiar with the particular blogging style and topics of the more prolific bloggers.
We don't remember all entries but we notice keywords. For example, if the word 'goonfather' appears, then it is by sheylara already; topics about Internet Marketing, then it would be Andreww; NTU then it should be chillycraps; NUS then it should be henribudi; NSFW then cowboy caleb; japanese anime then tedfox; about chio girls then chioeve.
See what I mean? :)
And then when you are not sure of the answer, try by eliminating the names that is obvioulsy not the right answer thereby increasing your chance by guessing the correct one.
Of course, even with that, we all needed to spend lots of time on it! I spent about 4.5 hours of my life just on the game yesterday. LOL!
Nocturne,
Aiyo, then can you tell me your gender? At first I thought you were a lady coz of the feline avatar you used. I blur liao. Just tell me and I'll go correct my entry again. :)
bernard,
yes, we could have searched for the answers, but to get back to the game within 10 seconds, either we have lightning fingers or something. and the game does not allow us to pause it because once the question is displayed, the timer starts counting down.
If you were to notice, none of us got a 100% correct. It's all a game of numbers. The more you attempt, the more you get correct, the more you score. For every right, its 3 points, while every wrong or timeout deducts 1 point. Even if there are the same number of rights and wrongs/timeouts, you would still get a positive score.
You are definately right when you say time and effort is needed.
I agree that no one has all the free time in the world to read and remembers who posted what. But there are some dead giveaways when names are mentioned in the question.
Furthermore, it was more of a game where you can score by eliminating the choices given. Any clever person would know of this inbar-ment to the game. For example, if the post is about school, you would elimate the choices given who are working.
There are also bloggers with certain distinct styles and this is a big clue to choosing the correct answer.
Kudos to you got getting 300 points in the game within such a short frame of time. If you did not cheat but noticed writing styles and clues in the questions, you would have definately saved more time and scored more.
Hi nocturne, DK, wendy and paced,
Don't get work up. I've wrote to Bernard and see if he was the one who left the comment here. :)
If the comments weren't left by the real Bernard, then let's just ignore them.
I think it is possible to cheat. Highlight copy paste and switch browser, fire and look at "KEYWORDS" then switch browser and select. I believe many are doing like that. No offence though but i think this is not call cheating since you have 10 seconds to you are allow to do anything within the 10 seconds so if you can find answers in 10 seconds, then u score, its fair. : )
You guys gotta be kidding to say you recognise writing styles when
1) only a few sentence are there for you to read
2) there are a few thousand bloggers subscribed to ping.
You know and i know lah. Everyone is cheating and of course NO ONE is admitting. Why the hell they need to admit since no one possibly can catch them red handed?
DK : I say they are cheating because it is so easy, god damn easy to cheat. I do not believe, you guys are so stupid not to cheat.
Wendy : That is the reason why you are at 100 and not at 2000.
Jas aka paced : I could do so in 6-7 seconds. And i was taking my time. I could do so in 3-4 second under extremely competitive circumstances. If i can do it, there is no reason why nobody else can do it. And infact thats why i believe those ASTRONOMICAL scores are a result of this despicable tactic. Nothing to do with skill. Nothing to do with knowledge. Just a matter of search and click, search and click. Thats why people if you noticed call CLICK CLICK CLICK and not read and click. They dont read, they just copy and paste then look for the author and click.
Leong : If only people had been more honest. Especially the bitch Sheylara who acted like she is some queen of sorts. She is just the biggest and most determined cheater in the world.
The Ping.sg Game call CHEAT CHEAT CHEAT.
Hmm, about writing style, upon what bernard pointed out that there are too many to recognise and remember, I've this to say.
I mean it's true that with the title and a few sentences, there's no way to pinpoint a writing style, but the following are how most of us scored the points.
a) cowboycaleb usually have short posts and sign off with "Copyright (c) year CowboyCaleb"
b) anything about girls we would click on chioeves
c) anything about girls wearing braces would be sgbraces
d) anything about food, most prob veron
e) anything about anime, most prob tedfox
f) anything about goonfather, click on sheylara
g) anything about teddybear, title says "princessa says", click on sabrina
h) any gadgets review, click on coolgadgetszone
i) anything about defector, click on uglyfatchick
j) anything on Malaysia's politics, click on fat4
k) anything about edison chen, click on jialat
l) anything about the religion catholic, click on catholicwriter
m) anything about engineering, click on chillycraps
n) anything with chinese text, its ccwoon, chillycraps or xizor
o) anything with korean text, click on idyll
p) any erotic stories, its sensualsophia
q) anything of going out with girls, most prob asahei
r) anything about Singaporeans being rude, click on rudesingaporeans
s) anything that talks about singapore, most prob singaporeangle
t) any title that starts with "of", click on lancerlord
u) anything with jay chou, click on winnilicious
v) anything that looks like a paid advertising, click on those who are payperpost members.
w) anything on ping.sg outing, think back on who went for the outing and choose form there
x) try to recall if you had ponged the entry before. most of the time, can guess correctly.
y) simplyjean and dk have a group of friends between themselves. if any of the names are missing, click on that fella's name.
z) scan through to see if there are any names, if not just click on any choice, 25% to get the 3 points
26 ways to score. And these are the 26 ways I did manage to use to score.
It is true that in every game, one can cheat or use a hack. But without substantial proof, it is not very nice to accuse.
Bernard,
OK. Here's a challenge. $2000.
I can get to 500 points without cheating (ie. using any exploits / referring to any sites (including Ping.sg and search engines) ). And all of this will be done live, and on filmed.
I win if:
I get to 500 points with >25% correct ratio. (25% being the expected correct ratio).
I lose if:
I failed to get to 500 points, OR
I got to 500 points with a lower than >25% ratio.
How? Game?
(typo - correction: removed '>' sign for lower than)
I lose if:
I failed to get to 500 points, OR
I got to 500 points with a lower than 25% ratio.
Jas aka paced : You talk as if those bloggers include all that in every single postings. I don't doubt there are generic terms but no it won't appear in every single post let alone every few sentence. I don't believe for a second, based on that you can achieve 1000.
uzyn : How long you need to get to 500? Anybody can, its just a matter of time.
I still believe everyone at the top cheats. 10 seconds, why can't? If i can do it, you can too. Its just a matter of how much do you want to be at the top. You expect people to lock themself in the room playing this little game on their laptop without cheating?!?!?! You all are cheaters and of course you all wouldn't admit it!
@Bernard:
can you dun contradict urself?
you wrote "there is no way anybody could had got over 100 just by clicking."
now u say you are talking about people above 2,000 points. can you like decide what your point of view is first?!
btw i don't think it's cheating when there were technically no rules in the game... so how to break rules that don't exist?
wait, did i say GAME? why are u getting so worked up over a game that was created for april fools, of all things?
@Cobalt:
haha don't worry abt it.. i'm not really worked up, although i realise i sound a bit agitated =/
Ber-nerd,
Do the math, I did my 4200+ qns in 4 hours.
- max time to complete 1 question = 10 secs.
- 500 pts = 167 correct ans x 3 pts.
- the probability of getting the right answer = 25% (whether you click or not you get -1pts).
- Uzyn will need to answer more than 667 questions to lose $2000.
- 667 qns x 10s = 6670s (roughly 2 hours.)
And that's not as if Uzyn - or anyone - will take 10s for each question.
Now that I have spare your last brain cell and done the math for you, here's what Uzyn has offered to you: 2 hrs of your time (at most) for a chance to earn / lose $2000.
You can take the offer, or you can continue to prove that at times, God does create people with AD&D rules and was left with single digits to assigned to the stats called 'INT'.
There's no point in offering him the challenge. We shouldn't have to prove ourselves to him.
Due niu tan qin (playing piano to a cow). We shouldn't waste time on him
I have to give a piece of my mind cos I was in top position 5 minutes after uzyn rolled out the game.
hello, why all these calling names and personal insults?
Whether it is a game or not is up to individual to interpret. People who enjoy it will call it a game. People who turn sour and all will say it isn't a game.
The fact that you can't spot the blogging style, just goes to show how much or how little you participate in our ping.sg community. I'm not saying I know everyone's style, but I'm not complaining.
Dear whoever it is, if you really want the ping.sg tee shirt so badly, you can download the image at ping.sg's official blog.
*cobalt, sorry if I am crapping here*
*side track*
to nocturne:
that's easy, i know priss and met you 2 years back :)
Hi everyone,
Just like to let everyone know that the real bernard oh has replied to my email that he was not the 'bernard' who left his comment here.
Also, please note that 'Leong' and 'Bernard' who posted using blogger identity are the same person. Just click on the profile and note that the ID numbers are the same for both.
@bernard (aka leong),
Kudos to you for being able to copy, paste, google, then click the right answer to the ping game within the time limit. At least I don't think I can do it for a long stretch of time! Probably that's why you gave up after 30 mins. It is really a lot easier just by simply guessing and clicking on the right answer. You should try it when the game is available again. :)
@Paced,
Thanks for the list. Now if the ping game is back, I'm sure I'll be able to get a better percentage of right answers now. LOL!
@Uzyn,
Aiya! You beat me to the suggestion! But I willing to win smaller prize money, $1000 can already. :)
@wendy,
Yeah, I also thought that he is contradicting himself.
@chillycraps,
No problem! Feel to crap! Hahaha!
People dun get roughed up by this "Bernard" guy. He's just enjoying himself stirring trouble.
The more we answer, the more happy he gets. Just ignore ba.
Anyway, if we really want to do anything, we shouldnt argue with him but have actual lawsuits for defamation. It's not as if we dun know who he is if we really want to dig.
I believe CP can dig out stats from the stat counter? And using his IP we can determine his geo-location, with TenCube or Bak2U help?
Plus his actions have already gave him away, so we can roughly guess who he is, which means Uzyn might also have a rough idea.
My suggestion, just ignore. No point feeding attention to kiddish behaviour.
Sry CP for using ur blog to pose my view. :P
haha such a heaty discussion.
juz passing by. it was possible to cheat using the exploit of the game. (you can get up to 15 points per answer) hahaha. i reported it to uzyn and the thing was demolished.
well i dunno. i dun think ppl will really cheat on this game. it's not like winning millions of dollars leh. haha. nothing much there!
Cobalt: Correction
NTU = Hendri
NUS = CC
NTU gal = CC :)
point to note: this bernard guy obviously never read the book "blink" by malcom gadwell.
Hi Dhope,
Nay, actually not really gonna bother much about the 'Bernard' guy anymore. He had his opinions, we explained ourselves. That's that. :)
But yeah, downloaded the log file from statscounter just in case. ;p
Hi Sylv,
There were exploits? Haha! Didn't even know about them. I was too engrossed in the hypnotic rhythm of clickety-clickety-click. Haha!
Hi Arzhou,
Oh yeah! Thanks for the correction. :)
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