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Dev tools · alternatives · 2026

24 alternatives to Robot Unlock – an open-ended programming game/zachlike

Hello, In 2010 I made an open-ended programming game based on Befunge and Brainf*k. I was young and didn't know what I was doing - coding it in AutoIT of all things and using borderless windows for sprites. Nevertheless, it was a full game and some people actually played it, sharing solutions with each other. I took it as a sign that the game had some potential - I appreciated this very much at the time. It was zachlike at its core, except that it came out earlier than SpaceChem and the term hadn't been coined yet. Years passed, I worked in the game industry, had some fun, learned a few…

Robot Unlock is an open-ended programming game where players write code to solve puzzles, built on esoteric languages like Befunge and Brainf*k. Originally created in 2010, this sequel arrives after the developer… Below are 24 products that do a similar job, ranked by how close each is in meaning and then by launch-day votes. Prices are shown for the 1 we have checked on their own sites, 1 of them free or with a free tier.

  1. 1IM

    This is the first iteration of a short game I’m making that tries to interactively explain some of my favorite math questions / ideas. My goal is mostly to get the player curious and not necessarily to explain absolutely everything. There were a lot of fun technical parts to building this: - For implementation reasons, it’s much easier if the lines all have integer intersection points with each other. To do this, when a new line is added I “cheat” by rounding intersections to integers and then splitting the old lines at the intersection into new linds (with potentially different slopes)…

    2024 · rahulilango.com · its alternatives →

  2. 2

    robotgame.org is for sale on Spaceship. Secure checkout and quick transfer. See all purchase options. No hidden fees.

    2013 · robotgame.org · its alternatives →

  3. 3

    I'm a software developer with 20+ years of experience but during this time I never programmed any games, but I really wanted to for the longest time. With the advent of AI coding agents I thought that this is the best time to try and so I've learned a bit of Phaser.js (a Javascript based game engine) and entered Beginner's Jam Summer 2025 - a game jam for beginners in the game dev industry that allows AI coding. After around 25-30 hours (working mainly after my full-time day job) I managed to submit the game I called "Tower of Time" (the theme of the jam was "Time Travel"). You can play it…

    2025 · github.com · its alternatives →

  4. 4

    Hey everyone! Wanted to show off a little side project I've been working on. A lot of people have been using AI to one-shot games, but they're often quite buggy - glitchy graphics, collisions aren't setup, or regressions in earlier levels. With an AI playtester in the loop, I've been able to one-shot games like Candy Crush or Crossy Road that would previously have bugs like cut-off UIs or stuck retries. The way it works basically goes like this: 1/ The playtester starts by reading the code to understand what its parent AI is asking it to play, and to decide what breakpoints, hooks and…

    Feb 2026 · ziva.sh · its alternatives →

  5. 5

    A puzzle game inspired by functional programming.

    2015 · david-peter.de · its alternatives →

  6. 6IW

    I’ve been working on a puzzle game for a few years as a side project. The game is based on a small region of tiles in a grid that is mirrored, modified, and mirrored again. It’s based on a novel phenomenon I noticed where, once these mutations happen a few times, the original region can be hard to recognize. You have a feeling there are symmetries in the image, but they are just out of grasp. Going further, if only part of the region is visible, such as mirroring off the edge of the board, it adds to the feeling and it becomes a satisfying puzzle to solve. I originally published this on the…

    2024 · hidden-mirrors.com · its alternatives →

  7. 7

    The AI that answers programming questions.

    2019 · ask.roboflow.ai · its alternatives →

  8. 8
    Gateway▲56

    A puzzle-based platformer where you control a robot

    2015 · cockroach.se · its alternatives →

  9. 9

    A puzzle game about recursion, patterns, and programming.

    2021 · apps.apple.com · its alternatives →

  10. 10

    I built this game as a playful way to train code reading skills. You're dropped into a random location in a real GitHub repo where some lines code are hidden. The goal is to pick up clues from the surrounding code and fill in the missing lines as quickly as possible. It currently has curated game content for Python, TypeScript, JavaScript (by most metrics the top 3 languages on GitHub). I had the idea when it dawned on me that reviewing and understanding code spat out by an LLM is a key skill for the AI era. (I sincerely hope you're critically reviewing what your favorite LLM is serving…

    Feb 2026 · gitguessr.com · its alternatives →

  11. 11

    Built and open-sourced in the era before AI. I’m sure you know where to find the code.

    Apr 2026 · mehuleo.github.io · its alternatives →

  12. 12TP

    Hi HN, I have been working on this website for a few weeks with some buddies of mine and would love if you checked it out. TuringJest provides a jackbox-esque experience with its two game modes. *One Shot Prompt* - Submit a prompt for all players (including the AI) to answer. - Answer your prompts in the way that you think ChatGPT would answer them. - Vote for who you think the real AI is. *Talk It Out* - Plan an event in a group chat with your friends. - Trick everyone into thinking you are the AI while voting for the real AI. Let me know what you think!

    2023 · turingjest.app · its alternatives →

  13. 13

    A little game I made to show off an old project. The functionality of the CPU is derived entirely from simulated logic gates. All the operations and control flow are based on the underlying properties of the logic gates, and changing their operation leads to corresponding changes in function. The original game code is all python and it runs in the browser using wasm/pyodide. Not very mobile friendly

    2024 · loreley.one · its alternatives →

  14. 14

    Hello HN! My name is Patrick, and I am a junior at my High School’s FRC robotics team FRC 341 “Miss Daisy” (yes named after the movie). Every year, during the first weekend in January, a new robotics game is released (no it’s not battlebots). The game could be about launching balls into a goal, climbing monkeybars, or placing cubes on a see-saw. This year we were challenged to build a robot that could shoot orange foam donuts into a goal about 6 feet in the air. Here is a yt video with the game animation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9keeDyFxzY4&t. After we received the game…

    2024 · chiefdelphi.com · its alternatives →

  15. 15

    An abstract gravitational puzzler

    2015 · 0rbitalis.com · its alternatives →

  16. 16

    Hi everybody. I occasionally make little browser-based games, and this is my latest attempt. It's not quite done, but it's quite playable (note: it does include audio): https://www.omiword.com/ This has been my occasional tinker target for ~5 years now, starting in the early days of Covid. The objective is to drag letter tiles within certain boundaries to spell four common American-English words. It hasn't got ads or anything, it's just supposed to be fun for its own sake. If people happen to like it, I might add an option for folks to make a small, one-time payment to unlock…

    2025 · omiword.com · its alternatives →

  17. 17
    Roofbot▲61

    A meditative puzzle game that gets REALLY damn challenging.

    2016 · apps.apple.com · its alternatives →

  18. 18

    A challenging puzzle platformer.

    2016 · indiedb.com · its alternatives →

  19. 19

    The game for little programmers

    2015 · exploratoriumstore.com · its alternatives →

  20. 20

    Dear Hacker News, I'm kindly asking for your participation in the open beta for my AI-managed mini-games website. Thank you in advance! For a limited time window, I'm setting the all-free feature flag to true. I hope you have a lot of fun exploring the AI's sense for games! Here and there, I tweaked it to help with visual consistency. I would be deeply grateful if you opted into analytics. $2,300 in API tokens... Cheers!

    Jun 2026 · minigames.world · its alternatives →

  21. 21AM

    Hey HN, Michael and Scott here. We’re open-sourcing an interactive murder mystery featuring LLM-driven character agents. Solve the mystery by finding clues, taking notes, and interrogating agents. They all have distinct motives, personality, and can impact the game in different ways (attacking you, running away, etc). Try it out, it’s pretty fun! We’re also open-sourcing the framework that we used to make and refine the agents. The goal is to create an intuitive interface for storytellers to create, debug, and test game agents. We then take those game agents and expose an API beyond just…

    2023 · gron.games · its alternatives →

  22. 22

    An interactive functional programming course for children based on clojure and klipse - viebel/kids.klipse.tech

    2016 · github.com · its alternatives →

  23. 23

    The AI that answers programming questions.

    2019 · ask.roboflow.ai · its alternatives →

  24. 24

    Hello guys, I'm glad to present to you PlayAlgoShip, a web-based game where you solve fun algorithmic puzzles. The rules are simple, you need to find the correct algorithm that makes the ship collect all stars. If you succeed, you will unlock the next level! There are also live statistics like how many players are currently playing on your current level (you are not alone struggling!), the finish rate of the level, and how many players liked/disliked it. It's 100% free, I hope you will enjoy the experience!

    2024 · playalgoship.com · its alternatives →

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