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"I never saw why I had to give up science in order to write, or the other way around, so I didn't!"
- Gregory Benford
 |
| Full-Shift Set Variable | ||
| Infinite possibilities built into a game machine. |
You've seen pinball machines, but not like this one.
| "What's the object of the game?" Tinbane asked.
"We have here," the technician explained, "what we call a full-shift set variable. In other words, the terrain through which the steel ball moves is never the same. The number of possible combinations is -" he leafed through his report but was unable to find the exact figure - "anyhow, quite great. In the millions. It's excessively intricate, in our opinion..." |
| Technovelgy from Return Match,
by Philip K. Dick. Published by Galaxy in 1967 Additional resources -
|
For earlier speculations on infinitely variable gaming environments, see the remarkable kingdom in a box, from Stanislaw Lem's 1965 story The Cyberiad: Fables for the Cybernetic Age.
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I'm hoping that this procedure becomes a normal part of medical practice!
'... nothing was perfected until M. Pantalon announced the completion of his automatic valet.'
'...its streets were of remarkable width, with few or no buildings so high as mosques, churches, State-offices, or palaces in Tellurian cities.'
'...it was all composed of tiny, identical cubes, carefully laid to form a tilelike surface.'
'He carried on his person a triggering mechanism sensitive to his heartbeat.'
'...Anything was possible in my imaginary environment.'
'Somewhere in space, a chrome and blue automobile raced the green light of Earth.'
'That explains how it was so easy for me to remain motionless in midair...'
