Ideas for the next game comp ( Feb to ??? 2018 )

Started by Qube, January 24, 2018, 01:19:15

Previous topic - Next topic

Derron

Quote from: iWasAdam on January 24, 2018, 09:05:01
dont like the idea of 'alternate' competitions


I suggested this to avoid a "competition ends, next starts" procedure. Having competitions regarding other aspects (sound, graphics, tools...) allows to have break for us "game coders" but allows other forum users to take part: people who are coming from the 3d modelling corner, or musicians. Or to make us improve in that areas. Depends on what users you want here (means on what to "focus" the forum).




Quote from: RemiD
you have not managed to finish anything in 2 months... So why allow less time ? 3 months would be better imo.
Some of us can't spend all our hours on the computer.
(apparently the 2 previous competitions have allowed 2 months)
I would have managed if timeframe was shorter. Like said the extension took away nearly all motivation as theme did not fit any longer. I just have "more important" stuff to do which I then preferred to do instead - giving me more spare time afterwards. And the longer the time frame the bigger the chances of "sudden disturbance". Not all of us know what will happen the next 3 months.


There are competitions only running a weekend - so in no way more than 72 hours of "working time". I assume one could spend 72 hours in 90 days.


And: 90 days to do something which is not what I really want (retro, limitations) ... nope. Shorter time frames allow to "toy around" with ideas, and hey, if it does not pay out, heck yeah, next competition will come sooner or later.




@ single word/phrase themes
Better than retro, 3D, VR, rendered, ... limitations :-)


Alien Card game
Candy Shoot'Em Up
Furniture Sports
...


Or maybe give X games to choose for a remake - might lead to 2+ projects doing the same in a "similar but still different fashion".


bye
Ron


Conjured Entertainment

#16
Quotehow about a game where letters and words must be the main components of your game?
Good idea

QuoteHi, many participants could not have enough time to make and finish their entries in the retro style game competition. Longer period may be better, "1 Feb to 31 May 2018".
More time for personal reasons?
hmm

QuoteI would like a shorter timeframe. The longer the more you try to pack into the project - and this is time removed from "spare time", "other projects", "family".

So better wait a month for the next competition and make it a 1 month long thing - with of course lower prices (or just an award... or product
Less time for personal reasons?
hmm

Quoteyou have not managed to finish anything in 2 months... So why allow less time ? 3 months would be better imo.
Some of us can't spend all our hours on the computer.
(apparently the 2 previous competitions have allowed 2 months)
lol

Some of us can't spend all our hours, and others can't do an hour here and there. (for personal reasons, hmm)

Maybe have an annual competition for the slow poke hobbyists for taking an hour out of their time here and there, and have regular competitions for hang out here for awhile then hang out there for awhile dudes who hop back and forth longer than hours at a time??

QuoteEach of us have some game genres preferences (shooter, platform, racing game, strategic game, turn by turn game, card game, find hidden items :D ,  etc...), it is obvious.
So the problem with that, is that we always try to create a game in the genre that we like.
A real challenge would be to impose a game genre, and let each participant decide of the details (theme, gameplay mechanics within this genre of game)

Or only impose a theme, and let each participant decide of the game genre and details (theme, gameplay mechanics)
Theme yes.

QuoteAfter I search for the information of some famous competitions, I realize that their game themes are always a single word or a few words. There is no game genre(card game, shooting game, platform game, etc.) limit.

The themes work good for long and short term competitions and are especially good for short ones when announced at start.

If it is an off the wall theme, then chances are nobody has a project already laying around to slip in the contest instead of doing an original work for it.

As said above, it lets us get a chance to see the different perspectives of the creators and how their juices flow differently with a common subject.

Attached is a quickie that I created for a 4 day coding contest, the theme was 'Cults'... ( can't expect much in 4 days lol )


Regardless of how much time any one person, or a group of people, can devote to a contest, the length of the competition should be based on expected results.

If you want casual games made by independent developers, then short competitions are fine.

If you want elaborate games made by a team of people, then take your time.

I suggest shorter competitions, over longer ones, for the indie developers here.

Then, if you can't make time for a contest then skip that one and spend time with the family/obligations/etc, and then jump in the next.

A long competition could result in a lot of work down the drain if your obligations out weigh your commitment to the contest near its end.

Also, the longer the competition is, the more chances you have of unexpected obligations popping up.


Now, for my idea  ??? maybe have other than cash prizes, like models & media, because all indie game developers can use more of those, and many community members have original models they have made that they could donate to the prize pool.

RemiD

#17
I agree that only imposing a theme/subject is better, because we all have different tastes in graphics and in gameplay, and as Conjured said
Quote
it lets us get a chance to see the different perspectives of the creators and how their juices flow differently with a common subject.
it could be interesting indeed

"bad santa" (related to the movie we talked about around the time of "christ-mas" (or rather "santa-mas" ;)) could have been an interesting theme/subject :D

Conjured Entertainment

#18
Quote"bad santa" (related to the movie we talked about around the time of "christ-mas" (or rather "santa-mas" ;)) could have been an interesting theme/subject
FESTIVUS!

Quotemaybe have other than cash prizes, like models & media, because all indie game developers can use more of those, and many community members have original models they have made that they could donate to the prize pool.
lol (I had another thought about this but wanted to bump instead of an edit so I could comment on Festivus)

Someone else had already mentioned other types of competitions, so what about 3D Modeling, 2D Graphics, competitions with those entries being donated to the prize fund for the coding competition.

Or, the contestants of the graphic competitions have a common theme and have the same theme for the coding contest with the assets from the first contests being the media used for the coding contest.

Then, we could see how various developers would use the same assets differently.  (just a thought)

If the media was limited/predetermined then the juices need to flow more on the code and less on the assets.


Derron

Limiting to assets limits individual skills. The people able to do assets are limited then - the people who are not able are getting assistance.
So having a "allowed to use" might be better than "required to use".

Similar to say about sound, music, ... every limitation you do will help some but constrain others.

But hey, not everyone has to take part in each compo, so if the "crowd"/majority does like a specific idea then it's the will of the masses - and should result in the biggest participant count.


Another thing: I would pay attention who brings up ideas but then does not show up in the competition thread (ignoring "finished" or "unfinished" compo entries ... the will is what counts). It is not nice to have 20 people saying "do a VR competition" but then only 1 developer is at least trying to do so. The compo afterwards should then slightly ignore these other 19 people :p


bye
Ron

RemiD

@Conjured >> i didn't know about "festivus" loool :P
What could we put on the top of the sacred pole ?


Maybe a mandarin fruit ? (from spain) ;D

Qube

I think the timeframe should stay between two and three months. That gives both people with limited time and those with more time to do "something".

Personally not too keen on having a set of assets to use because selfishly I like to do everything myself, for better or worse. It's all part of the enjoyment.

The retro competition was popular in both entries and posts yet there seems to be discord on having limitations?. No understandy as that being our most popular comp was pretty limiting.

Just throwing out some game ideas :

1.. Two colours only ( no other limits )
2.. 32 colours ( no other limits )
3.. As already mentioned... A game based around letters and words ( no other limits )
4.. Based around a theme. Horror, comedy, sci-fi, suspense ( no other limits )
5.. No external assets, everything must be done in code
6.. A complete free for all
7.. Pick an old 8-bit game and remake it ( copyright be damned!! )
Mac Studio M1 Max ( 10 core CPU - 24 core GPU ), 32GB LPDDR5, 512GB SSD,
Beelink SER7 Mini Gaming PC, Ryzen 7 7840HS 8-Core 16-Thread 5.1GHz Processor, 32G DDR5 RAM 1T PCIe 4.0 SSD
MSI MEG 342C 34" QD-OLED Monitor

Until the next time.

Conjured Entertainment

#22
QuoteWhat could we put on the top of the sacred pole ?
Unadorned ~ nothing goes on the pole.  :o


QuoteJust throwing out some game ideas :

1.. Two colours only ( no other limits )
2.. 32 colours ( no other limits )
3.. As already mentioned... A game based around letters and words ( no other limits )
4.. Based around a theme. Horror, comedy, sci-fi, suspense ( no other limits )
5.. No external assets, everything must be done in code
6.. A complete free for all
7.. Pick an old 8-bit game and remake it ( copyright be damned!! )

1) YAY , and I thought Star Castle was the fewest with the 3 color overlay on B&W monitors.  :)
2) lol all shades of gray for me :P
3) Soundz like phun  ::)
4) How about a horrifically suspenseful comedic sci-fi ? (I can start now on that one then)  :-*
5) Really? Who would be dumb enough to try that?  :-[
6) Put 'em up, put 'em up  ???
7) Oh yeah

It's all good.

therevills

I think having limitations focuses ideas, but since the retro comp was the most recent comp I think having some freedom would be good.

So I would say the next one should be theme only :)

STEVIE G

Quote from: Qube on January 24, 2018, 23:15:44
I think the timeframe should stay between two and three months. That gives both people with limited time and those with more time to do "something".

Personally not too keen on having a set of assets to use because selfishly I like to do everything myself, for better or worse. It's all part of the enjoyment.

The retro competition was popular in both entries and posts yet there seems to be discord on having limitations?. No understandy as that being our most popular comp was pretty limiting.

Just throwing out some game ideas :

1.. Two colours only ( no other limits )
2.. 32 colours ( no other limits )
3.. As already mentioned... A game based around letters and words ( no other limits )
4.. Based around a theme. Horror, comedy, sci-fi, suspense ( no other limits )
5.. No external assets, everything must be done in code
6.. A complete free for all
7.. Pick an old 8-bit game and remake it ( copyright be damned!! )

All apart from 3 & 6 sound good.  A theme would be my preference.

I like the idea of remaking any game old/new but from a different perspective ...  2D to 3D or Iso and vice-versa etc.. 
Also, as a big chunk of time is normally taken up with asset creation, maybe limiting something to a vector graphics style would allow more people to enter and give more focus on the gameplay.  Just some thoughts.

   

iWasAdam

I'm with Stevie G: all but 3 & 6 sound good

I liked all 'shades of grey' and 'remake something old into something new'

RemiD

#26
Theme or genre. No others limitations, i bet that some noobs here don't even understand what is texture filtering and what is the impact on the rendered image, so you see the problem with rules like limiting to a few colors...

Derron

Technical limitations also increase the hurdle to use the language/toolchain of your likes. Some languages might include the needed stuff, for others you might need to work it out.

It is not just creative limitation but also taking away time to create the basics to at least fit into the given limitations. Might be interesting for some - but also stopping others from joining.

Most important aspect: last compo already had a restriction. Maybe the restrictions catched the interest of more than before but it might also have been: the longer time frame, christmas time (cold = people at the computers), the bigger price/fund, advertisement in other forums ...

I _bet_ if you have a less restrictive compo with the same price and a bit advertisement, then more will jump in (with the risk of seeing premade-stuff in new bottles :-)).

So for me one of the needed restriction (at least for the compo version) would be the including of a "syntaxbomb"-reference. Not a logo or so - just somehow incorporate the forum, community name, ... the logo, ... into the game. Maybe you fight the darkweb-hacker "Yue" or buy your upgrade weapons in the "syntax bomb armory shop". Maybe this requirement does not fit well into all kind of games, which is why I suggested to only require it in the compo release.

bye
Ron

iWasAdam


Steve Elliott

I've enough projects to complete already.  My non-entries and incomplete Competition Entry haha  :D

I think Asteroids was the first one lol...
Win11 64Gb 12th Gen Intel i9 12900K 3.2Ghz Nvidia RTX 3070Ti 8Gb
Win11 16Gb 12th Gen Intel i5 12450H 2Ghz Nvidia RTX 2050 8Gb
Win11  Pro 8Gb Celeron Intel UHD Graphics 600
Win10/Linux Mint 16Gb 4th Gen Intel i5 4570 3.2GHz, Nvidia GeForce GTX 1050 2Gb
macOS 32Gb Apple M2Max
pi5 8Gb
Spectrum Next 2Mb