Bulls and Cows vs Mastermind

Bulls & Cows and Mastermind, in the form MagicLampGames publishes them, are the same puzzle: you guess a hidden number, and every attempt reports how many digits are correct and how many sit in the right position. What separates them is everything wrapped around that loop — Bulls & Cows is an iOS-only game built with SpriteKit, while the original Mastermind Numbers was rebuilt in Unity as Codex Numbers, which is published on both the App Store and Google Play. If you arrived looking for some other game with Mastermind in its name, this page will not describe it. Everything below concerns the two titles in this catalogue, and it is taken from their own game pages and from the Bulls & Cows guide already on this blog.

Which Mastermind this is

The name appears in the MagicLampGames catalogue in one place only, and not as a game with a page of its own. The Codex Numbers page says that game was rebuilt in Unity from the original Mastermind Numbers, and there is no separate entry under the older name. In practice, a search for Mastermind Numbers among this developer's games ends at Codex Numbers. Bulls & Cows is a different app with a different store listing, Bulls & Cows: IQ Game, and it has been on the App Store since 25 February 2016. So the comparison here is between two separate games that ask the same question, and that is precisely what makes it useful: when the puzzle is held constant, choosing between them comes down to the phone in your hand and the way you like to play.

The loop they share

Both game pages describe a turn in almost the same sentence: guess the hidden number, and the attempt comes back with how many digits are correct and how many are in the right position. Those two counts carry different information. The first is about composition, meaning which digits the hidden number is made of. The second is about arrangement, meaning whether the digits you got right are standing where they belong. Since the answer has the same two parts in both games, the reading habits from our Bulls & Cows guide depend on nothing else and apply to Codex Numbers as well: change one digit between attempts so the reply can be pinned on it, treat a zero as a result rather than a failure, and work out which digits belong before spending guesses on their order. Someone who plays one of these games well is not starting from nothing in the other. The guide is at /blog/how-to-play-bulls-and-cows/

Side by side

These are the facts the two game pages list, row by row. Where a row repeats itself, the games really do agree.

Your phone decides first

The row most likely to settle the matter is the platform one. Bulls & Cows is iOS-only, with no Android version, so on an Android phone the decision has already been made for you: the same deduction loop is available there through Codex Numbers. Its Google Play listing is currently restricted by country, so the store link may not open from every region. On an iPhone both games can be installed, and the question turns into what surrounds the puzzle rather than whether you can reach it at all. The engine row belongs to the same story rather than to the rules: Bulls & Cows is built with SpriteKit and is published only for iOS, while Codex Numbers, the Unity rebuild, is published for both iOS and Android.

What Bulls & Cows builds around the puzzle

Bulls & Cows places three modes in front of the puzzle: single player against an AI opponent, a two-player match found through Game Center, and training. The two-player mode runs entirely through Apple's Game Center. Matchmaking seats exactly two players, the moves travel between the two devices through Apple's servers, and the person you are matched with sees your Game Center alias and nothing more — there is no free-text chat, voice chat or photo sharing anywhere in the app, and matches are not recorded. Game Center leaderboards let a good round be posted rather than only remembered, and progress and settings can follow you between your own devices through your own iCloud account. Every one of these extras rests on Apple's services, which suits a game that exists only on Apple's platform.

What Codex Numbers brings

The Codex Numbers page sums up its extras in one phrase: the game comes with Google Play Games support. Where Bulls & Cows leans on Game Center, Codex Numbers names the player services of the Android side, which fits a title that is published on Google Play alongside the App Store. Beyond that, the game page keeps to the loop itself — a hidden number, a guess, and an answer in two counts — and so does this comparison. For everything the version you install contains, the store listings linked from its game page are the reference, and they show the version that is live: 1.7.14 at the time of writing.

What stays the same

• The puzzle: a hidden number, and an answer in two counts — digits correct, and digits in the right position.
• The price: both games are free.
• The languages: the same thirteen in each — Turkish, English, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Dutch, Danish, Russian, Japanese, Korean, Chinese and Arabic.
• The genre: both are listed under Puzzle · Logic.
• The publisher: both are MagicLampGames titles, with their pages in the same catalogue.

Which one to install

• On an Android phone: Codex Numbers. Bulls & Cows has no Android version.
• On an iPhone, if you want to play against another person: Bulls & Cows, whose Game Center mode matches exactly two players.
• On an iPhone, if you want an AI opponent or a training mode: Bulls & Cows has both in its menu.
• If you played Mastermind Numbers and want the game that was rebuilt from it: Codex Numbers.
• If you still cannot choose: both are free, so play a few rounds of each with the same habits and keep the one you find yourself opening again.

Bulls & Cows' page, with screenshots, the live version and the App Store link, is at /games/bulls-and-cows/ — and the Codex Numbers page, with links to both of its stores, is at /games/codex-numbers/