Developer Mikael Lindström released Sortis, a pen‑and‑paper strategy game that mimics procedural worlds like Minecraft without any dice or calculator. Players advance by skipping turns and calculating only the moments they choose to intervene, keeping the mental load low while still feeling progression, automation and discovery. The design targets computer‑science fans but remains approachable with basic arithmetic.

The map generates from a single‑byte linear feedback shift register (LFSR) seeded with two numbers between 0 and 255. Each axis evolves via a bitwise shift and XOR of selected taps, then the X and Y sequences XOR together to produce a terrain value. Thresholds split values into water, forest or mountain, while trailing zeros encode ore grade, creating natural lakes and ridges.

Building costs follow exponential 2^n curves, mirroring OGame’s power‑of‑two scaling. Houses, workshops, extractors and smelters each require ore or wood proportional to their level, and agents spawn only when housing permits. Players iteratively upgrade structures, mine ore, and convert lower grades via costly smelters, aiming to raise the workshop to the highest tier. The system demonstrates how complex resource loops emerge from minimal arithmetic.