[kerpele]

Nice visualization!

I don’t think the algorithm is correct though. The heuristic seems to use Euclidean distance instead of “how the crow flies” and thus this implementation goes along the axis instead of directly towards the goal. This causes the algorithm to find the optimal route only occasionally and probably has little to no effect on average execution time.

[kerpele]

I just realized my terminology was way wrong. Sorry.

You have Manhattan distance and you want Euclidean distance to make sure the path is always optimal. Execution speed should be the same or better in the average case with Euclidean distance.