Block'd (Part 2)

Here's a more detailed follow-up on my original Block'd post with some practical advice for how you can get scores over 1,000,000 or so ('Marathon' mode). In order to get to a very high score (e.g. my high score is 100,410,143) you will need to learn to control boredom - above about level 40 or so you have effectively beaten the game and the rest is just rote play.
(My explanation of going so far is that I was interested to see if the high score would 'roll-over' correctly to 7 digits. My particular game - on my old Nokia phone - has some other glitches where it can screw up if you go over level 128, so there was *some* reason to believe that other issues may arise:-) )

As mentioned in the original post, the key strategy is to try and get the maximum points every 4th and 5th levels so you can maximize the number of 'wilds' that you have. Then, use these judiciously over the next few levels so that you have some available for the next big level.

So minimizing the overuse of 'wilds' can pay dividends. A few simple situations and how to handle them follow. These will probably only make sense if you either play the game, or have read the earlier post! And to use a chess analogy - this is kind of like learning the endgame positions so you can recognize how to win them, and which ones to avoid.

First, a simple case (see below). To clear this without losing lives you might think you should put a wild on the top right (red) block (to clear it and the yellow), then place a wild on the top left (red) block to clear the rest. However this has a simpler solution...just place a wild on the middle blue block and clear the bottom row, and then you can clear the two reds as they will be side by side.

Now that you've seen the general approach, here's a quiz. In all cases, how do you place the minimum number of 'wilds' in order to clear the level without losing lives.

1.      

2.     

3.    

Answers:
1. Just need 1 wild (on the white)
2. Just need 1 wild (on the bottom white)
3. Need 2 wilds (e.g. one on the right hand red, then one on the white)

And what you will have seen by now, is that you don't want to get a very simple end position like:

Since you need 2 'wilds' to clear this. Don't forget, you can place them both before clicking to clear. (e.g. place a wild on each of the green blocks then click to clear).

I probably won't do any more posts on Block'd, so my knowledge of the 'middlegame' strategies for 'Marathon' mode, as well as how to get high scores on the 'Speed' mode will probably be forever lost.

Old and New Toronto - Pape and Withrow

Probably not much here for anyone who doesn't live in the area, but a typical case of widening a road and removing trees. A little less 'grand' a street than Jarvis (prior to widening) perhaps, but typical of many.

Here's a picture of Pape, just north of Withrow and looking south (1917). Keep an eye out for that horse-drawn carriage (in the middle of the picture) later in this blog. There is an old mailbox on the far left, and note the lights all attached to the poles at quite a low height - maybe they weren't bright enough to be higher?

The widening occurred a few years later (1922). Here's what it looks like today.

I also found a picture taken from a spot just north of the above (and looking north) during the actual road widening (Aug 1922). (Wonder if that horse-drawn cart on the right is the same one as in the first picture?! It has a similar look, but can't see any wording on the back of the carriage in the top picture - may just be too dark or far away to see.)

Some other Toronto 'before and after' road widening pictures can be seen at:  http://www.blogto.com/city/2011/10/that_time_when_toronto_widened_the_streets/.

Old and New Toronto - Withrow Park

I had found the following old picture online - showing skaters near the North East corner of Withrow Park (1923). Since it is close to where we live and many of the buildings are still around I thought I'd take a more recent look.

The nearest building (toward the left center) is still there (washrooms) and the houses in the background (along Logan Avenue) are mostly still there.

When you look at this today, there is a new building (Clubhouse) to the right of the washrooms, but even in winter the houses along Logan are almost impossible to see. Lots of tree growth in the last 90 years!

The original picture was probably taken from slightly farther North (to the right) than the above, but that is now landscaped more and didn't seem to compare quite so well - I include it below for interest.

And to think that the area that is now Withrow Park was once planned to be just a continuation of the surrounding streets and houses.

The 1899 Goad Map shows Withrow Park as proposed streets and housing. It also shows each house that had been built so far! And if you look closely you can see our house - the first one on Withrow between Pape and Carlaw.

The 1910 Goad Map shows Withrow Park as a park and the rest, as they say, is history :-)

ps If you like exploring old maps, this link is pretty neat: http://peoplemaps.esri.com/toronto/ You can move around kind of like Google Maps, and can choose different years (slider in the top right).

Old and New Toronto - King Looking E From University

Number four in the series of old and new pictures of Toronto. What looks like a somewhat boring corner now (King St W, looking East from University) still has one interesting older building visible.

I had found this picture (below - and again, from the 'Flashbacks 1' postcards book) and thought I'd check it out (it being very close to work too). This is King Street West, looking East from University Avenue (circa 1886).

The building in the center is the Rossin House Hotel, demolished in 1969. Given that there's nothing much visible today (see below) I wasn't even going to publish this picture, except that the (circled) building in the background - partially obscured by the light pole - looked interesting, somewhat older, but wasn't even in the first photograph.

Then, I found another old (but more recent than the first) photo, from 1936 taken from almost the same spot (just from the South side of King) and there it was - the tall building on the right in the background. It's now called Commerce Court North (above) but was the *Bank of Commerce* building in 1936. They merged with the Imperial Bank of Canada in 1961. And this was once the tallest building in the Commonwealth.

And the other tall building (closer, and in the left-center of the picture) is the original Toronto Star building - used as the model for the Daily Planet in Superman comics but sadly no longer around.

20150213 - Update: Thanks to Mark Brader for both giving me the dates for the Bank of Commerce building, correcting other errors I managed to introduce, and pointing out the interesting crossover between the streetcar tracks in the first (oldest) photo. "The streetcars then in use were symmetrical:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f8/Horse_drawn_streetcar_Toronto_1880s.jpg
so a short-turn just required moving the horses to the other end and setting the switch to go into the crossover."
Easy to miss, but then something that I won't miss in future (or is that "in the past"?)!