Trio Game Program for Windows
(Version 0.8)

Introduction

Trio is a math game for training children in combinations of elementary multiplication and addition. Nevertheless it is a good concentration game for people who like to do math in their heads.

The idea of the game is as follows: On a 7x7 board number tokens are randomly placed having numbers from 1 to 9 on them. Some number x between 10 and 80 is given and you have to find a triple of neighbouring tokens a,b,c on the board where a*b+c equals x (the tokens being adjacent horizontally, vertically and diagonally in arbitrary directions, but in a straight line). When you have found such a triple, before the think time is up, you click onto the middle token with the left mouse button. Now the system will tell you whether your guess is correct or not. If you think there are no solutions, do not click at all. A right click will bring you to all the solutions for the given number (if any) and another to the next problem. When all 71 numbers have been shown, the game ends and you will be added to the high-score-list.

Figure 1 shows the situation after the user has clicked on some token to solve the problem for the given number 10. Note that 10 equals 1*3+7 (to be read horizontally from right to left), so the solution is correct.

screenshot from Trio game after
left-click on token — Fig. 1: Trio Situation after Left-Click on some Token

Usage

When you start the program, a window similar to the one shown in Figure 2 appears.

screenshot from Trio game at start — Fig. 2: Initial Window State

There are five buttons available at the top of the window (see Figure 3) with the following functions:

set preferences: shows a preferences dialog to set some personal configuration variables (see below)
show highscore: shows the highscore table (only available when no game is going on)
start game: starts a new game
end game: ends current game discarding the points achieved so far (after a confirmation question)
show instruction window: displays a small help window

buttons in trio game — Fig. 3: Buttons in Trio Window

For the normal course of a game you have to press the "start game"-button. A first random number between 10 and 80 is shown in the number box in the top right of the window and the time runs down.

Now you have to find a triple of neighbouring tokens a,b,c on the board where a*b+c equals the given number. Because the tokens may be adjacent horizontally, vertically and diagonally in arbitrary directions, but in a straight line, at each position you normally have eight token constellations which may fit.

When you have found an appropriate triple you must click onto the middle token with the left mouse button. If you think there are no solutions, do not click at all (when playing without an "unsolvable" button) or click on the unsolvable button when it is shown. Anyway when you click the program will tell you whether your guess is correct or not and increase or decrease your score accordingly.

When the time is up or after the evaluation of your guess and an additional right click the program will show you to all the solutions for the given number (if any, see figure 4). You can hover over fields marked as solutions to see how they work (in case you cannot find out). Another right click brings you to the next problem.

showing possible solutions for some
number — Fig. 4: Showing all Correct Solutions for Given Number

If after all 71 problems your score is large enough, then you generate an entry in the high score table (with your login name).

Setting the Preferences

Some settings of the program are user-definable and will be stored in the registry. These are:

interface language: German, English or French,
think time: either 40s or 25s,
size of the board: 7x7 or 9x9 (note that a larger board typically has more solutions which makes the game harder),
sound: either on or off (for some beeps etc.),
0-tokens: either on or off (which tells whether tokens with zeroes on it are allowed which makes the game somewhat easier),
'unsolvable'-button: either on or off (which tells that a button is displayed where you can guess that the given number has no solutions, otherwise you have to let the time run out),

Figure 5 shows the preferences dialog window in detail.

Installation

The following steps have to be performed to play the game:

Download the executable from here.
Put it somewhere on your computer and start it.

Have fun,

Thomas Tensi, October 2008

Download

You can download the Windows binary of the game. If you are interested in the Eiffel source code (yes: it is programmed with "Design by Contract"), it is available here.

Appendix: Change History

2008-10-13 (Version 0.8)
First public version

Trio Game Program for Windows(Version 0.8)