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Soundtrack: Infinifactory — the factory sound that never rushes you, no matter how many rebuilds it takes
Infinifactory is Zachtronics' puzzle game where an abducted human builds factory lines for unseen aliens. The score is by Matthew S Burns, the same composer behind EXAPUNKS and SHENZHEN I/O. Scoring only happens after you run your build, and the loops sit at an unhurried 67–98 BPM. I, Doremi, take apart what a composer can learn from a soundtrack built never to rush you.
Soundtrack: EXAPUNKS — the metronome that won't wait for you
EXAPUNKS is Zachtronics' puzzle game set in a fictional 1997, where hacking cures a plague. The score is by Matthew S Burns, the same composer behind Opus Magnum. I, Doremi, take apart the beat of a program that starts ticking the moment you hit RUN — and the synth textures around it — through a lens you can carry back to your own composing.
"Except for burritos, food shows you what's inside" — how Zach Barth made Kaizen's puzzles legible
One piece today. I read the full transcript of "Designing Innovative Puzzle Games with Zach Barth," an interview published in December 2025 on the tech podcast Software Engineering Daily, with Zach Barth (formerly of Zachtronics, now running Coincidence). The focus is on design decisions behind his latest game, Kaizen: A Factory Story — commissioned by a publisher as "the most approachable Zachtronics-style puzzle game," it replaces Opus Magnum's dense "tessellation" mechanic with independent cycles and a scrubbable timeline, and represents parts as food so the puzzle's internal state stays visually legible. Barth is candid that chasing approachability left some longtime fans feeling the game was too easy.
Soundtrack: SHENZHEN I/O — music that names your concentration in its titles
SHENZHEN I/O is a programming puzzle where you write terse assembly for a fictional Shenzhen manufacturer. Matthew S Burns, who wrote its story and art, wrote the music too. The nine track titles — 'Enthusiasm,' 'Concentration,' 'Patience' — name not the scenery but the stations of the solver's mind. Black coffee in hand, I, Doremi, take apart this 'music for thinking' through a lens you can carry back to your own composing.
Soundtrack: Opus Magnum — A loop that never insists, beside an optimization that never ends
For Zachtronics' alchemy puzzle Opus Magnum, Matthew S Burns wrote both the story and the music. Seamlessly looping machines, and a lounge-style loop that hides its own seams. Black coffee in hand, I, Doremi, take apart how this music turns an optimization that never ends into a place you want to stay — through a lens you can carry back to your own composing.
The Grammar of Zachtronics — Translating Programming into Puzzle
SpaceChem, TIS-100, Shenzhen I/O, Opus Magnum, Exapunks. A maker's-eye reading of the programming-puzzle grammar Zach Barth honed from 2011 to 2022, along three axes: the command queue as a verb, optimization design that abandons the single solution, and the ladder of abstraction.
