Dariuc wrote:
When you sit back and think about it objectively, the time spent following the post could have just as easily been spent being productive. I wasn't following the post for days, I was working and packing up to move into my college dorm (Which I am now in, the wifi here is amazing. >20mb/s up and download speed). | |
That doesn't really apply to you Albro, I remember you mentioning that you have a lot going on, I also saw that you have had a lot going on for the past few weeks based on a few of your other posts. Aside from that, you did actually enter.( Most of the people who were complaining that they didn't have enough time for the contest didn't even bother to try to participate. *which is what I found weird, I mean if a person don't even try how will they really know?* )
A good example of this is, the last two contests, I did actually attempt to produce something, even though I didn't enter officially. That's when I realized that for the most part it would take me either a) working 10-24 hours non stop to get something I felt like entering or b) team up with someone to produce something I would want to enter,but I also have weird habits for a game maker. I like to be challenged, which means the things that I could 'easily' make don't interest me. My efforts to team up with someone ended up in me doing the lion's share of the work on their entry and me not even getting anything done on mine. Hence I just fixed up their entry and left mine alone. | |
My entry, Gestalt is available for download for anyone who may be interested in playing.
Good luck to all participants! | |
4 hour countdown. Contest ends at 5pm c. However you up to have two hours afterwards to make a submission (to be eligible for the prize)
Any submissions thereafter will be accepted and judged (just not eligible for the prize pool.) :) | |
Well, I'm not going to make it. Sixty five hours at work this week did me in. But I did make a fair amount of progress and I'll try and release a playable version tonight or tomorrow. I like the idea so I'll keep working on it.
Thanks for the contest. Even though I didn't get anything finished, it did get me working on something I like, which is good :) Best of luck to everyone else. | |
N/p.
Late submissions still get judged btw so when you get it done shoot me a link. The ultimate goal of the contest is to get people to do "something" so I'm glad you ended up landing on a project you enjoy working on. | |
I submitted my entry... i'm going to crash now...
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LoL okay. Good luck though unless someone else enters in the next couple of minutes either you or Higoten will be eligible for 1st or 2nd prize. Any other entries will be judged and the results posted.
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I submitted my shit.
19mb rsc takes a long time to upload to email. | |
Contest Ended officially 3 minutes ago.
Higoten entered "Gestalt" Whilst Neo Berserker entered "Dread" Congrats. Results will be posted within 2 days from now *tuesday no later than 5 pm.* As far as the prizes are concerned, Ease mentioned donating 15 dollars to the pot-- but I haven't heard from or talked to him since tuesday so I'm not sure if he intends to still donate to the prize fund or not. If that's the case I will just award each game 1/2 of the pot since there were only two prize competition entries. Update: Apparently :  Hey. This is D4RK3 54B3R. My entry is called "Andromeda" Prize distribution amended back to it's original status. | |
uh what? According to the timer, the contest just ended, and not to mention the business with the 2 hour grace period? What the hell is going on?
Did my entry get submitted in time? Are there any other submitted entries? [EDIT]: Whew. alright. I guess I was cutting it a little too close then. :] | |
Judges, get back to me here if you still plan on judging (or email me so I can send you the entry links directly)
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Yep. If he wishes.
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Page me.
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Results will be posted later today: the prizes will be distributed after the announcement, thanks to everyone who entered, thanks to everyone who participated.
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Welp, it's an hour 'til 5pm. I'm just going to go ahead and post the results now.
There were three entries out of the 8 contestants: Gestalt- Higoten Dread- Neo Berserker Andromeda- Dark5r Sab5r Thanks to the person's participating (whether they entered or not), as well as the moderators for keeping the thread "healthy". Without further adue.. Placing and Prizes: 1st Place-(95+76)(171) Winning 30$ Dread 2nd Place- Andromeda(unfortunately ineligible for prize due to certain factors) 3rd Place-(74+80)(154)Winning 20$ Gestalt Prize winners get in touch with me with your paypal email addresses so I can send the prize money out to you. In Depth Analysis: (TLDR stuff) Out of the two judges that judged (Ease and I) We scored it like so : Themes 1)Exploration 2)Survival 3)Advanced Technology Civilization 4)Magic(anything magic related) 5)Supernatural(Ghosts Demons,etc) 6) Base your game off of the lyrics of a song. 7)A bible verse. Sub-themes: Use these in combination with the major themes. 1) Unity 2) Discord 3) Realization 4) Perception 5) Chaos 6) Creation Dread- Dariuc Review: Themes covered: Exploration,Survival,Supernatural, Perception,Realization Theme Score- 50/50 Gameplay Score- 35 Favorited +10 Overall Score- 95 I very much enjoyed playing through the game.(even though I died several times). I will go on record and say that normally, I stay away from games like this: because well- I hate creepy sh*t to put it bluntly *-_-. The beginning of the game instantly makes you wonder what it's about, and while the title is an apt description, the game does an excellent job of keeping the player wondering enough to explore and and figure out exactly what is going on. It also does an excellent job of setting the atmosphere. The hint of "what's in the darkness" always stays with you as you search for the next clue. My only real problem with the game is that I personally couldn't see the text hints too well, but it seems like that may just have been an issue on my end as no one else really mentioned it.(hence I won't really deduct points for it) I realize that something like this concept has already been done, but that doesn't make this game any less interesting to play, if only for the unique twist bought to it. The gameplay is rather simplistic(explore, get item, search, understand) but all in all that's fine (even though normally I'm firmly opposed to games who have no type of self defense). This one as my favorite among the entries, it managed to combine quite a mixture of themes in an obvious way, and probably a few that I missed subtly, and keep the experience interesting until the end despite my qualms about being stalked in the dark -_-. Ease Review: Dread 76/110 Themes 41/50 Something about this competition really brought out the dark side in our entrants. This game is truly terrifying, and had me more scared than any game I’ve played in months. It rang strong resonance with the Pop-culture game Amnesia, which is in no means a bad thing. The entire game is essentially exploration, whilst you hunt down the goal of the game. Once the goal has been realized you then have further exploration to do. Exploring the darkest recesses of your mind, filled with the scary as frack enemies, definitely follows the Supernatural theme strongly. Dread also ticked off a number of the subthemes, only really missing Creation, and perhaps Chaos. Overall Gameplay 35/50 It was deeply involving, utterly terrifying, and almost faultless (I only caught one small bug, in a very minor part of the game). The enemy A.I. seemed relatively clever, and the use of dynamic lighting was well executed and provided a brilliant effect. There wasn’t a lot to do besides walking around/evading enemies, but that only added to the feeling of helplessness for your character. It was a slight shame that each death required going through the very slow intro-sequence, as it made completing and testing the game a slight nuisance, but this is only a minor point. The sound in this game was also brilliantly suited to the gameplay, and did nothing bar add to the mood and atmosphere. All in all, a great and horrifying game. Andromeda- Dariuc Review: Themes covered: Exploration,Survival Theme Score- 15/50 Gameplay Score- 45 Overall Score- 60 Don't let the overall score fool you, the game is pretty fun. It takes a bit of doing to get working playing solo-but with friends I imagine that it would easily be a hit if you could manage to get 4 people playing together. The themes in the game are rather sparse however, pretty standard examples of exploration and survival. The gameplay itself however is quite awesome. You have options to choose between different ships, each ship allowing the player to configure and equip different components adding for alot of replay value and variety. From there you join the game, where your goal is to become the best player. You can do this in many ways, combat, exploration-bribery (Hey who am I to judge?). It's all very impressive, however the game really failed to capture as much of the theme and contest feel as I would have liked. All in all a pretty fun game, I'd recommend you try it out. Ease Review: Andromeda 80/110 Themes 22/50 This game is incredible, but it largely ignores the competition’s proposed themes. It has Advanced Technology, but not exactly what I’d call “Advanced Technology Civilization”, though some might. Other than that it barely made a nod towards any of the other Themes of Sub-themes. This is a bit of a shame, but these things happen sometimes when you have a concept in mind for a particular game you want to build. Overall Gameplay 48/50 This game is incredible. A little hard to test as it’s a totally multiplayer game and each Judge is but one person, but with some clever thinking/effort it was possible. The start screen is incredible, with a really polished feel: up there with AAA games from 10 years ago in my opinion. Then you get in to the game, and it only gets better. It boasts really impressive 3D models, for both the ships and most of the space environment. There’s no real story or plot to it, but the sandbox is great fun and filled with different ways of winning the game. In short, get your friends together, host this game, and play it. It’s awesome. Judge’s Favourite 10/10 Themes covered: Dariuc Review: Exploration,Supernatural, Perception, Realization, Magic Theme Score- 50/50 Gameplay Score- 30 Overall Score- 80 "Things are not as black and white as they appear." Epic. So I'm not a fan of text based games for the most part, I tend to like visuals but I can appreciate them and this one was rather innovative and interesting to me. The basic premise of the game is simple, you follow the story of someone on a journey (a literal journey) and they end up "travelling" somewhere completely different... The sense of exploration is very limited, but present since you are observing events through someone else's perspective. You watch as this person encounters spirits, and for lack of a better term has revelations in the form of puzzles that you the player must solve to continue. This is a game put together so that one could enjoy the ride so to speak. The story telling is pretty excellent, written in prose and often times poetry. I found that the story would have probably worked out better if you had something to look at though(visuals instead of text). Otherwise it just seems like a bit of a distraction. (Sort of like watching matrix coding on a computer screen, unless you get used to it, it just sort of looks like letters). Judging this title for what it is, I found the gameplay to be adequate. For a puzzle based narrative there were some improvements that would have made this game more enjoyable. For instance, mouse interaction , or actually allowing a player to roam the house freely instead of on a fixed path. Maybe the puzzles could have been less simplistic and more interactive as well. Based on that, the gameplay score suffered slightly in my opinion. The theme score however is very strong. The way of writing and the general sense of "what is this" tends to lend a particular effect to the game that makes you very curious to see how the story plays out and since the game IS the story, that's a definite plus. Ease Review: Gestalt 74/110 Themes 45/50 I think from now on I shall have to define a new Theme to describe certain games as; “Gestalt”. It was hauntingly beautiful, and somehow terrifying to the core. It nailed the Sub-themes, bar perhaps Creation, with a vast delve in to Perception and Realization. It did not (to my reckoning) include more than the smallest tip of a hat towards Exploration or Survival. Whilst the character explored far and wide, and died as the result of failing puzzles, the actual player had no interaction with Exploration, nor had to attempt “Survival” as I know it in the gaming universe. Unfortunately as I am a heathen through and through I can’t judge whether a Bible Verse was involved at all or not, so I will ignore that sub-category. Believe it or not the entire game could be the lyrics of a song, which is a feat in itself. It also heavily featured the Supernatural with a nice tinge of Magic. Overall Gameplay 29/50 The Gameplay was essentially “press Enter until a puzzle appears, solve it, then resume pressing Enter”. While still less linear than some AAA games (i.e., Final Fantasy XII), it did lack a bit of diversity and choice. I only noticed one (very) small bug in the entire game, so for “completeness” I am very impressed. I personally would have liked some graphics, but I know that’s purely a matter of taste, and have not deducted any points for their lack of. The puzzles were great; some of them entirely very clever, however, there was little gameplay besides that. The sounds were used with great finesse and were very mood-setting and totally unintrusive. Somehow despite any real threat of enemy, or action-based adrenaline, I was on the edge of my seat throughout. I just wish there had been some more choice. If you read this much thanks :P | |
I am not going to complain about the contest result; 2nd place, whatever. I don't care too much about the money either ($20 isn't exactly a lot of money).
BUT, I would like to know why I was disqualified. Was it because my game wasn't thematic enough? On the first page, you have "Advanced Technology Civilization" listed as a theme. When I emailed you my entry, I specifically said that this was my selected theme. How does flying around in a spaceship and visiting various planets not qualify for that theme? | |
Other Rules: Games must be created from scratch/ground up. Libraries are allowed, pre-made artwork is allowed,but all other code must be created within the one week time frame. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__NA6B_RlgA | |
It's been that way with the last 2 contests hosted here on BYOND for myself. However, not once did I ever really make some of the remarks many people feel it's their duty to post here.
So it sort of makes me sit back and wonder exactly what people are complaining about when I hear things like this (and I keep seeming to hear it several times)
People who knew about the contest from day one, showing up and going - "I might compete" then coming back later going "well i would if i had enough time" When you sit back and think about it objectively, the time spent following the post could have just as easily been spent being productive.
But that's just how I see it. If you don't have time to devote to a contest, nothing will change that no matter when it's hosted. Whether it's a 48 hour contest or a 170 hour one.