I sat down last night to continue working my way through Othello World. I had my genetic algorithm working all day on my Raspberry Pi to zero in on the best weights for my board evaluation function. I’d done some reading on getting the correct heuristic to determine the depth for my Monte Carlo tree searches (MCTS). I researched how to best integrate the opening book into my strategy.
But I hadn’t done any of those things when I booted up the Analogue NT+ and entered the password for the country where I could take up where I left off, playing the Dragon. I couldn’t get the password to work — I guess I’d written down the hiragana incorrectly — so I looked it up online, entered it, and found myself face-to-face with GOD. Or at least His earthly avatar in the world of Othello, Hideshi Tamenori.
“What the heck,” I thought. I figured I’d try out the MCTS, for fun, see how badly I would do. Tamenori insisted that we would play with a timer — 40 minutes max, each. I don’t usually play with a timer, but whatever, he’s the man. After a couple of moves, my MCTS player would being returning almost immediately, signaling it had completely evaluated the game to its inevitable end. It meant one of us was destined to win, soon, and the other could do nothing about it.
I figured it was pretty much over for me, but could only watch as MCTS captured more and more of Tamenori’s pieces. The board was only white pieces, and Tamenori conceded.
After the credits rolled, I went back to the correct world and started again with the Dragon. Unfortunately, MCTS didn’t perform as well again the entire night. I tried doing like the first half of the game with MCTS and the second half with negamax, or alternating, but it really seemed like any MCTS led to puzzling moves and inevitable losses. I got through Dragon, Fairy and Thunder God to finish that world. The next world was themed around Shakespeare, with King Lear, Cleopatra, Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet and one other. I don’t think it was Othello, the play after which the game is named. (I just checked: the last one was Julius Caesar. They missed a bet there.)
Here’s their introductions, translated poorly by me:
King Lear: “Goneril and Regan and Cordelia. All three of them are very important to me. But of all of them, Cordelia was the most important. I loved you. I made a big mistake! What a pity! It was all my fault!”
Cleopatra: “I loved you, Caesar, with all my heart. However, I didn’t think I could ever love anyone like I loved Anthony. I don’t know what to do. I won’t do this.”
Hamlet: “Father, let me be! A false king sits on the throne. And what of Ophelia? I feel sorry for you. How pitiful, my intended! Can you manage it, somehow?”
Caesar: “Rome is my greatest love. But my dreams turned to dust. No matter what happens, I will not leave. To Anthony and Brutus and Cassius, too, I will definitely show you.”
Romeo: “I am Montague’s only son.” Juliet: “Romeo is an enemy of the Capulets. Falling in love with him is forbidden! If this love is not true, I cannot live!”
The only way out is through, I guess, as each will pause their turbulent lives to play Othello with you. I was unable to beat Cleopatra and King Lear last night, so I think I need to tune my game just a little more.
Anyway, my NT+ has been dedicated to Othello World for some time. I think I’ll be able to put some other cartridge in there soon…
