Hard Chip News

[p]Greetings, Hard Chip players!

Get ready for another round of changes in Hard Chip! This update introduced the Gauntlet system for evaluation, bringing competitive challenges that tested your circuit design skills against players worldwide. I've also added comprehensive extended chip information, enhanced community features, and a wealth of quality-of-life improvements. Let's dive into what's new in versions 0.1.7.90 to 0.1.7.103!



[/p][h2]1. NEW Foundry Gauntlet Event & Community Leaderboards[/h2][p]
The most significant addition to Hard Chip was the introduction of the Foundry Gauntlet Rev0 - a special 4-week competitive event designed to test a global leaderboard system and showcase the power of the Community Stage Editor (CSE)! This temporary event provided a competitive space for advanced (and impressive TBH) players while I refined the systems for future events.

The Foundry Gauntlet interface showing the 4-week event structure and global leaderboards

Week 2 challenge naive implementation with its small description (editable in the CSE)

All challenges in this event were created using the CSE, demonstrating the potential for community-generated content. Keep in mind CSE is still in beta and has not been released just yet!

Players competed on global leaderboards and earned special recognition, including the exclusive GarnetTheme for top performers.

The garnet theme the top 5 overall players got

The Foundry Gauntlet Rev0 has now concluded, but don't worry - similar competitive events will return at various times throughout the year! This first event served as an excellent testing ground for the global leaderboard system, demonstrating the potential of the enhanced Challenge Stage Editor. I've gathered valuable feedback from this event to shape future competitive experiences!

This was a lot of fun! Intense at times, even! And the participants had stunning solutions!

🏆 Changelog:
- NEW Weekly challenges: Foundry Gauntlet Rev0!
- NEW Weekly Challenge screen for upcoming events
- NEW Past Gauntlets sections
- NEW Leaderboard ID (HC name and steam name to choose)
- NEW GarnetTheme for FGR0 winners
- NEW Pinout editor in CSE, revisited TruthTableEditor
- NEW notes window in the editor to show the description field of the CSE
- MI 4weeks challenge becomes Gauntlet
- MI Links for the Gauntlet's leaderboard
- MI Garnet theme logic
- UI Closing of the gauntlet conditions
- UI fgr0 event temporary indications
- UX Demo showing grayed out Weekly Challenge
- FIX Gauntlet previously forced you to redo all weeks if you wanted to enter w3 without having already done 1 and 2
- FIX Stage stage status on Gauntlet
- FIX leaderboard ID logic
- FIX less aggressive WorldScoreManager
- MI CSE rules when no steps are defined to avoid confusion
- MI Admin review tool for challenge files
- MI Weekly naming touch-ups
- FIX Add step when no step in CSE, duplicate 1 otherwise
- MI Validation runs gauntlet files as well
- TSL HC/Steam name translations
- TSL Localization key for leaderboard stuff



[/p][h2]2. NEW 4 Challenges - The 4 weeks of the Foundry Gauntlet[/h2][p]
Of course, the stages from the Gauntlet are now available to test your skills on some seemingly complex functions. Those challenges can involve up to a few hundred transistors, but they are really interesting in the sense that you can use clever tricks to get down to almost an absurdly low transistor count.

Hard brain teases are guaranteed! Available only after finishing HC's Chapter 1 in the Bonus Stage screen.

Past Gauntlet from the Bonus Stages screen

🏆 Changelog:
- NEW Majority Function 3Bit Stage (Week1)
- NEW Priority Encoder 4-2Bit (Week2)
- NEW Power of 2 Detector 3Bit (Week3)
- NEW Magnitude Comparator 2Bit (Week4)
- GRD revised for 3bit majority function and for frg0-tw1
- GRD revised Advanced grade for 4to2 priority encoder



[/p][h2]3. NEW Extended Chip Information[/h2][p]
I've expanded the information available about your chip designs with new extended info displays. Now, you can see live updates on each block added and gauge what kind of score you can have without having to validate first.

Extended chip information showing detailed performance metrics and floating gate counts

New floating indicator, indicating that a mos has its gate not connected to any state for 100 ticks

🔧 Changelog:
- NEW Extended Level Info (testing)
- NEW Show extended chip info permanent setting
- NEW floating count in extended and in perf report
- NEW Closed floating gate indicator
- NEW Reset Blocks/Volume/Ticks/Mos (BVTM) bests to the current solution
- MI Touch-ups on the saving ghosts for reset BVTM
- TSL Extended info trad
- TSL update message for reset BVTM to current



[/p][h2]4. NEW In-Game Help System & Tutorial Improvements[/h2][p]
HC now has a new tips system in the pause menu that offers contextual help! Bit by bit, adding more and more help to guide newcomers to what is the "area of improvement" for HC. Many controls have not been introduced yet. Additionally, some further adjustments to labels and other elements.

The new tips system in the pause menu showing helpful guidance for players

� Changelog:
- NEW Tips in the pause menu with 7 tips (and place for more)
- NEW help message on the binding tabs indicating "right click to edit"
- TSL translation for right-click tips
- TSL ru translation for tips
- TSL Paste vs past typo
- FIX Too aggressive cleanup for tutos
- FIX Input tuto could break
- FIX crash when exiting uptraces before the video was shown
- MI Safe guards loading video



[h2]5. UPDATE Performance Optimizations & Simulation Improvements[/h2]
Nice under-the-hood improvements to boost performance and enhance the simulation engine's speed, especially for complex circuits with floating gates and multiple components.

⚡ Changelog:
- PERF sim validated active blocks in parallel
- SIM floating mos starts settled
- MI Enforcing permitted block at load
- FIX loaded detection logic for the UI was missing frames



[h2]6. NEW Commercial Licence for schools and Netcafés[/h2]
Hard Chip is now validated for use in commercial settings, enabling schools and internet cafes to run HC! If you are a student and think your university might be interested, don't hesitate to discuss HC with a professor!





[h2]7. Quality of Life Improvements & Bug Fixes[/h2][p]As always, I've addressed numerous bugs and added quality-of-life improvements based on community feedback. From UI scaling fixes to crash prevention, these changes make Hard Chip more stable and enjoyable to use. This round is no exception; a significant amount of handling was added as soon as a soft or hard crash was reported or detected. Some are direct fixes, reproducible and "easily" fixable; some others are tentative fixes that I wasn't able to reproduce, but I guessed a weakness and handled/fixed it!

As always, your feedback is crucial; thanks again for it 🙏🙏🙏

🛠️ Changelog:
- NEW Opening links that are linked to Steam into Steam Overlay's browser
- NEW Bug report button linked to Steam discussions
- NEW Settings to hide the bug report button
- NEW help message on the binding key tabs indicating "right click to edit"
- UX Hide bug button in the settings from the pause menu
- FIX no ++ grade in CSE
- FIX review for potential weaknesses in HCDrives logic and related robustness and code quality fixes
- FIX Old dark mode option cleaned up
- FIX one probe removed by saving bug
- FIX Achievements not triggered
- FIX crash on probes delete
- FIX crash (2) on probes delete tentative on probe creation on copy/path operations
- FIX crash on probe creation on copy/path operations
- FIX potential crash in cupcopypastdelete handler
- FIX Potential crash on camera not ready
- FIX Potential crash due to video playback error
- FIX hotfix crash on specific challenge start
- FIX Shifter stage scores weren't submitted
- FIX potential UI crash when a screenshot is taken, and Steam is not there handling it
- FIX UI unlikely crash handling
- UX adjustment in settings
- MI Improve handling of generic (hypothetical) crash
- MI shared client for HCDrive imports/exports
- MI Improve crash logic
- MI UI scale tests
- TSL translation for right-click tips
- TSL French touch-ups
- TSL ru translation for tips
- TSL Paste vs past typo


---


The Gauntlet was a lot of fun, with plenty of feedback and a lot of exchange between players. It was an excellent opportunity to improve HC. And it won't be the last time you will have an event in HC, for sure. Maybe driven by the community even?

Congratulations to the 5 winners!

The expanded help system and tutorial improvements make Hard Chip more welcoming to newcomers while providing better guidance for advanced techniques. Combined with the extensive performance optimizations and quality-of-life improvements, this update makes Hard Chip more stable and enjoyable for players of all skill levels.

Your feedback continues to drive Hard Chip's development. Join our Discord server to share your thoughts, report any issues with the new features, or suggest ideas!

Thank you for playing Hard Chip 🙏. Stay tuned for more exciting updates and features in the coming weeks![/p]