The Numbers Game

Goal

Reach the target number (from 101 to 999) by combining the six tiles with the four operations. Each tile can only be used once; all intermediate results must be positive whole numbers.

How to play

• Choose how many large tiles (25, 50, 75, 100) you want: from zero to four. The others are drawn from the small ones (1 to 10, each appearing twice).
• You have 45 seconds: tap a tile, an operation, then a second tile. The result becomes a new tile you can reuse.
• “Undo” reverses the last operation; “Clear” starts the calculation over.
• On the keyboard: 1 to 6 for the tiles (in the order shown), + - * / for the operations, Backspace to undo, Enter to confirm.

Scoring

• The exact target: 10 points.
• Otherwise, whoever is closest scores 5 points (if tied, both score). A starting tile that already equals the target counts as an exact result.
• In solo: 10 points for the exact target, 7 points within 5 or less, 5 points within 10 or less.
• Your best result is kept automatically, even if you carry on calculating.

About the AI

The solver explores every combination of tiles at increasing depth, ordering commutative operations, discarding negative or non-whole results and neutral operations, and remembering the states it has already met. It therefore finds the shortest exact solution or, failing that, the closest result. At the Master level, the AI always plays that result. At lower levels, it limits itself to fewer operations and sometimes aims for a nearby number: its approximations are always real calculations, shown at the end of the round.