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savage
01-02-2007, 10:59 PM
<center><img src='images/events/2007PGDAnnualCompetition.jpg'></center>

I now declare the 2007 PGD "Multiplexity" Game Programming Competition open for registration.

Please read the rules and get more information about the competition @

http://www.pascalgamedevelopment.com/competitions.php?p=details&c=3

Legolas
01-02-2007, 11:24 PM
YAY! :shock:
I like this multi-genre idea, and GBA and NDS are allowed as dev platforms :D
Maybe it could be a good idea to check the nds entries on real hardware too, because the emulators aren't very accurate at this time.

Sadly I can't participate (I would need 36h per day), but I can't wait to see the entries ;)

pstudio
01-02-2007, 11:33 PM
Interesting game theme.

When both Action and Role-plaing is coloured red, is it then because they're both considered the same genre or is it just a lack of colours? :?
Nevermind. The rules says you must select 2 different colours :roll:

EDIT:

by the way. is education really a genre? I haven't played 'Where In The World Is Carmen Sandiego' but isn't an adventure/puzzle kind of game? I just mean if you forinstance made a WWII game you could call it educatinal because it teaches history (if the game is historically correct offcourse).

EDIT2:

I've just registered, but when i pressed 'confirm' I was directed to 'PGD annual 2006 competition Big boss' :?
I suppose you've just copied the competition script from last year and forgot to change an url.

FNX
02-02-2007, 12:51 AM
This's going to be a great compo!!

Looking at the rules i'm in doubt with this:

-Run and Gun (Contra, Strider, Mega Man)
-Platform (Donkey Kong, Super Mario Brothers, Sonic The Hedgehog)

To me Megaman and Mario or Sonic and Strider are Platforms, even
Metal Slug is a platform.. I would correct it at least using games like Cabal or NAM-1975... am i wrong? ;)

Unfortunatly i'm really not sure i can get in, anyway, when is the last valid
date to register? Am i blind or it's not specified in the compo page? Or it's just the end of the first stage?

Robert Kosek
02-02-2007, 01:18 AM
If I were to participate I would go with RPG/Strategy in a TBS game, Isometric viewpoint. But I lack the time right now. :s

HopeDagger
02-02-2007, 02:12 AM
How "powerful" does each genre need to be in the game? For instance, Final Fantasy 7 was an RPG, but featured "sub games" that fell into the Racing and RTS categories. Would these count, or do they need to be an integral part of the game?

cairnswm
02-02-2007, 04:53 AM
Very very cool! :)

Thanks guys!


PS. I notice there is no Windows CE emulator listed.

WILL
02-02-2007, 05:05 AM
How "powerful" does each genre need to be in the game? For instance, Final Fantasy 7 was an RPG, but featured "sub games" that fell into the Racing and RTS categories. Would these count, or do they need to be an integral part of the game?

The idea is to make 1 game not a whole bunch. Mini-games are fine, but the whole theme of the competition is to try and mix the genres together and see what you can do.

You can put in all kinds of mini-games to add to the genre color count as much as you feel is possible, but...

if you do this badly you'll likely get lower scores from the judges as they will be scoring you on how they felt you have integrated the genre types together.

The better you do this the higher the Innovation score you'll get from the judges. And the more it makes sense as a game the higher the Playability score will be too.

cairnswm
02-02-2007, 06:27 AM
Wow this is hard! Getting a multi genre game idea together is not easy - especially finding one that will not make it feel that the second was just added becasue it was needed.

Ñuño Martínez
02-02-2007, 09:31 AM
Wow! :shock: Will be too hard to me, I haven't a lot of time to spare :( . Anyway I'll try it. May be I can submit an interesting entry.

The multi-genre goal is cool but make things harder. I have some ideas. Time to put them in order.

Good luck everybody :D

jasonf
02-02-2007, 09:56 AM
I may have an idea for a nice Puzzle - Maze game.. or Puzzle - Platform

What category would Boulderdash fall under? Or Rainbow Islands?

Mirage
02-02-2007, 10:28 AM
Great contest idea!

cragwolf
02-02-2007, 11:11 AM
Good idea of more than one genre. Nice to see innovative ideas like this in a contest.

Bad luck no judge is able to run Linux or MacOS X. I thought we programmer types would be a little more avant-garde or radical when it came to our operating systems. :wink:

Multiple stages, deal-breaker for me, never liked them, but will not comment further on this issue.

Sensible decisions on the 3rd party stuff.

Nice prizes.

Another exciting competition, looking forward to the entries, I hope there will be plenty of them.

jasonf
02-02-2007, 12:00 PM
I'd not really thought about the stages idea, but I can see why it's done.

Sometimes, people have to be forced into taking a structured approach to their project.. I mean, I normally just dive in and code without too much thought to the design process (although I do design the game initially) This often leads to massive scope creep and unfinished projects. I know this, yet I still do it. So by building this into the rules, they ensure that more projects get finished because they are easier for the developers to manage.

Goal #3 might be tricky to some people who've included the second genre as an integral part of their game initially.. e.g. someone writing a Tetris based platform shooter would find it hard to include the falling tetris blocks as a seperate element if they were the platforms the player was jumping on, while shooting other platforms to move them... actually, that's not a bad idea :lol:

savage
02-02-2007, 12:19 PM
Hi Guys,
I know that the competition idea is quite challenging, but this year we wanted something that would push the envelope and as I mentioned would turn heads at the IGF! Having a competition that was just like all the others out there would not necessarily turn heads at the IGF.

I hope this does not discourage too many people from submiting an entry.

cairnswm
02-02-2007, 12:23 PM
One thing thats not clear to me is how the genres need to relate to one another. Should they both be active at the same time (like the suggested "Tetris based platform shooter ") or can they lead into one another such as having a Strategy map where you decide where to attack and then another screen where you control a fighter jet through a action shooter screen (ie two completely different screens).

Ñuño Martínez
02-02-2007, 12:25 PM
I've find a question. I started to write the design document with Open Office, but which document format can we use? ODT, DOC, HTM, XML, plain text...?

I think that it should be (X)HTML since all computers can read and edit them.

savage
02-02-2007, 12:31 PM
Bad luck no judge is able to run Linux or MacOS X. I thought we programmer types would be a little more avant-garde or radical when it came to our operating systems. :wink:

I have Linux and am trying to get a MacOS X box from work, but as we mentioned in the rules, you can submit a video clip of your stuff working on Linux/MacOS X as long as we have an exe for Win32 to test it for ourselves.



Multiple stages, deal-breaker for me, never liked them, but will not comment further on this issue.

I know some people are turned off by multi-stages, but we are trying to encourage structured analysis/design and implementation. There is nothing stopping you from implementing menus, for example, in stage one, the only thing is that it won't get scored until later one. We are not saying only X number of features need to be done at this stage. It is a guide of what minimum stuff should be be done at each stage. If you can do more than the minimum, then great it will give you more time to polish things off in the later stages. I hope that does not cause confusion.

savage
02-02-2007, 12:32 PM
I've find a question. I started to write the design document with Open Office, but which document format can we use? ODT, DOC, HTM, XML, plain text...?

I think that it should be (X)HTML since all computers can read and edit them.

I think HTML should be the universal standard and these can be posted on a blog about your progress if necessary.

NecroDOME
02-02-2007, 12:40 PM
Is a grand theft auto-like game a multiplexity? Like running around, racing around, flying around?

EDIT:


# Shooter

* First-Person Shooter (Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, Unreal)
...
# Vehicular Combat (Spy Hunter, Wacky Wheels)

So you can not put a first person shooter in combination with vehicles except when you are racing from point to point?

jasonf
02-02-2007, 12:54 PM
I am actually considering the Tetris platform game now, before anyone pinches the idea ;):lol: It should be really simple to define and relatively scope creep free :D

Robert Kosek
02-02-2007, 12:57 PM
Hi Guys,
I hope this does not discourage too many people from submiting an entry.The amount of time it would take deters me, nothing else. That is the fault of my life situation at the present, so I don't blame PGD or anything. Quite honestly I was already doing preliminary research upon making a strategy/rpg game and had gotten so far as to decide upon an isometric perspective. But I don't know if I can work, study for college courses, program for the compo, and still keep my hobbies going.

It is what it is. Sic est vitae. :roll:

Ñuño Martínez
02-02-2007, 01:23 PM
Is a grand theft auto-like game a multiplexity? Like running around, racing around, flying around?

EDIT:


# Shooter

* First-Person Shooter (Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, Unreal)
...
# Vehicular Combat (Spy Hunter, Wacky Wheels)

So you can not put a first person shooter in combination with vehicles except when you are racing from point to point?

Both First-Person Shooter and Vehicular Combat have the same color (red) so they are the same "genre", aren't they?

jdarling
02-02-2007, 02:15 PM
I'm in, I've got my design doc under way and I'm looking forward to completing my entry this year :).

I brought this up last year, and I'll bring it up again; If I have what is requested in the Readme.txt file in the game itself, do I have to have the readme.txt file along with the game? IE: I have a help, storyline and controls menu items that clearly state what the controls are, show the storyline and basic help all in game. Do I still need the readme.txt file :).

Also, Stages 3 and 4, Goal 1 doesn't make any sense. If you have a design doc, this should all be in it, not in the readme file. A readme file is for player information not design information. So, I'll ask; If I have it all in my design doc, do I have to put it into my readme.txt file?

Thanks for the clarifications,

WILL
02-02-2007, 03:15 PM
Both First-Person Shooter and Vehicular Combat have the same color (red) so they are the same "genre", aren't they?

They are the same Genre Color, not necessarily the same genre. Since they together are only 1 color you will need a 2nd color to meet the minimum requirements.


If I have what is requested in the Readme.txt file in the game itself, do I have to have the readme.txt file along with the game?

Yes. Judges don't like searching in all different places for what is meant to make their job easier. :)


Also, Stages 3 and 4, Goal 1 doesn't make any sense. If you have a design doc, this should all be in it, not in the readme file. A readme file is for player information not design information. So, I'll ask; If I have it all in my design doc, do I have to put it into my readme.txt file?

Yes. During your development we anticipate that a fair amount of games will have their original vision of concept change or even go a stray after a few months into development. Listen to any GDC Radio podcast or read any large software studio's postmortems and you'll see changes all along the way to the final product.

We expect some changes so we would like you to elaborate on how it comes together at that point. Any major changes, list them. Besides, it's a good, healthy game design & development practice. ;)

The design concept you wrote in Stage 1 will be a pretext. The small blurb or so you will write in Stage 4 will be the result.


The Stage 2 & 3 goals where you add the genre and write about it is only to only tell the judges WHERE or how you put it in.

ie. If it's a game like Rescue Mission for the NES where you have to run all 3 snipers into possition before you play the sniper feature, they might think that that is the only thing to the game. And you don't receive any points for adding the genre when it was in fact in the game, just not overly obvious.

It's in the Readme.txt because the Judges are looking for a Readme.txt and the easier it is to find this stuff in that file... the more likely that they will grant you those points.


One thing thats not clear to me is how the genres need to relate to one another. Should they both be active at the same time (like the suggested "Tetris based platform shooter ") or can they lead into one another such as having a Strategy map where you decide where to attack and then another screen where you control a fighter jet through a action shooter screen (ie two completely different screens).

Any way you like. Just try to make the game fun and innovative.

We don't want to tell you how your games should be creatively. We just want to give you the task at hand and see how you put it together.

But if you need a concrete yay or nay... either sounds fine to me. ;)

WILL
02-02-2007, 03:37 PM
The amount of time it would take deters me, nothing else. That is the fault of my life situation at the present, so I don't blame PGD or anything. Quite honestly I was already doing preliminary research upon making a strategy/rpg game and had gotten so far as to decide upon an isometric perspective. But I don't know if I can work, study for college courses, program for the compo, and still keep my hobbies going.

Like I have said before this competition began, the theme allows for small games as much as it does bigger games.

If you are making an RPG of any kind... well, of course it's going to be a lot of work and will take a lot of time. :)

A strategy game is a fairly moderate task aswell.


If you wish to participate, but have a strain on time, why not choose a smaller genre combination for your game?

Puzzle / Maze, Educational / Platform, Artillery / Music, Party / Pinball, etc..

jdarling
02-02-2007, 03:47 PM
Yes. During your development we anticipate that a fair amount of games will have their original vision of concept change or even go a stray after a few months into development. Listen to any GDC Radio podcast or read any large software studio's postmortems and you'll see changes all along the way to the final product.

We expect some changes so we would like you to elaborate on how it comes together at that point. Any major changes, list them. Besides, it's a good, healthy game design & development practice. Wink
I agree WILL, but I don't believe it belongs in the Readme.txt file. The Design Document is a living breathing document that follows the life of your product (read my article). BTW: Just looked at all of the 360 and PC games that we work on, don't see a single readme.txt :). Lots of design document versions though with track changes enabled and html files that contain version/change history (copied straight from the design document version history section).

Sascha Willems
02-02-2007, 04:01 PM
In a production environment you may be right jdarling, but there are only three judges and each of us will have to check all entries, so having to browse and read through maybe pages long design documents to find out what genres are combined in what way would add even more workload for us. So quickly elaborating about the genres and how they are combined/accessible in a separate readme.txt will make our work easier.

pstudio
02-02-2007, 04:12 PM
Is it possible to get an explanation telling what exactly should be included in a Game Design Document?
I haven't really written one those before :oops:
Perhaps that's the reason I haven't finished many of my games lately :think:

Robert Kosek
02-02-2007, 04:26 PM
Multiple stages, deal-breaker for me, never liked them, but will not comment further on this issue.
I know some people are turned off by multi-stages, but we are trying to encourage structured analysis/design and implementation.I will dispute with the bolded word, Savage. For the simple reason that requiring specific stages is not encouraging their use. You could have given a generic order like: 1) Write your design doc and submit it. 2) Create your design plan. And so on. The reason is that not all games fit into any one set plan and so are automatically penalized ... which I don't find very fair.

If I were to get my strategy/rpg going my first step, programmatically, would be to lay the groundwork for both genre elements at the exact same time! But I don't get credit for that. What use is rewriting the whole engine at stage 3 just to add an advanced veterancy system to my units including experience and such, when I can cut my work by half just by laying the groundwork at the very beginning.

I think you should really reconsider as some of us are penalized automatically by our genre picks, and so have a lesser chance to succeed from the get-go. Not a very fair set of rules IMHO. :evil:

AthenaOfDelphi
02-02-2007, 04:27 PM
pstudio:- Take a look at jdarlings article here (http://www.pascalgamedevelopment.com/viewarticle.php?a=67&p=1#article). Thats should give you a pretty good idea of what should be in there.

WILL
02-02-2007, 04:29 PM
Is it possible to get an explanation telling what exactly should be included in a Game Design Document?
I haven't really written one those before :oops:
Perhaps that's the reason I haven't finished many of my games lately :think:

Well if you want the full answer I recommend Jeremy's article 'Project Design and Documentation' in the Articles section.

However if you just want to know what the stage goal requires then:


Goal 1: Submit a Game Design Document including; 2+ chosen genre categories (with at least 2 or more colors selected), title or 'working title' and platforms you plan to target for your entry. -- 20 Points

- Write which 2 genres you are deciding to use. (Following the color coding rules)
- The Title of your game or the working title if you can't think of a good one yet.
- List the platforms you intend to port your game to by the end of the competition.

Thats it. Put those in your document and consider your stage goal complete. Of course I'm sure you'll want to write a bit about your ideas in it. Thats fine too.

WILL
02-02-2007, 04:42 PM
If I were to get my strategy/rpg going my first step, programmatically, would be to lay the groundwork for both genre elements at the exact same time! But I don't get credit for that.

I don't think you understood what savage meant.

You will get the points for putting together both genre together from the start, but you will get the 2nd half in stage 3 instead of stage 2.

In other words, submit your game as you stated for stage 2. Then continue development with the way you made the game (no need to include another genre now!) and in stage 3, you will get the points for the 2nd genre.

Let me help make this clear to all. :)

We let you complete goals early!

We just want you to give us a heads up in the 'Readme.txt' file where it is on that stage so we can give you the points if it's there.

Last year we had this whole thing where the judges would not find a team's completed goal and the team was all chuffed about it and would result in us going back and making corrections...

This is also why we have the Readme.txt. Use it, update it every stage and you will be fine. Indicate and completed goals for that stage early or within that stage is fine.

jdarling
02-02-2007, 06:48 PM
For anyone that would like a simple template, I'm being nice and posting the one I am using. I have stripped out most of my entries specifics, but have left some stuff in place for your reference. Hopefully this helps those who are not used to creating documentation up front. As others have stated, reading my article (http://www.pascalgamedevelopment.com/viewarticle.php?a=67&p=1#article) may help you fill this out: http://www.eonclash.com/DocTemplates/Game%20Design%20Document%20(Template).doc

pstudio
02-02-2007, 07:16 PM
Thanks for the template :D

I've just finished reading your article. I must say it's very good and quite usefull (though there is a lot to read :wink: )

DGL-luke
02-02-2007, 07:46 PM
I am sure this question has come up in earlier competitions - but what about multiplayer? Will you be able to test them, judge v. judge or do you have an assistant judge to play the second player?

Of course it will be crucial to have an AI if there's a multiplayer mode...

AthenaOfDelphi
02-02-2007, 08:04 PM
I can test multiplayer locally across my LAN with my housemate/business partner, so I have no problems there.

technomage
02-02-2007, 08:45 PM
This looks like a very challenging competition. Nice idea :D.

I'm taking a break from Judging this year, and I am considering putting an entry in.....just not sure what.... :?

WILL
02-02-2007, 09:43 PM
Hey Dean, I figured you and Jason would be working together on this one. :)

I am dying to see some unusual combinations this year: ie. Light-Gun / God game OR Platform / City Builder OR Space Sim / Beat 'em Up OR even a RTS / Puzzle game! :D

This theme just wreaks of creativity. ;)


Oh btw someone mentioned that Light-Gun was not possible. Not quite true. You just have to create an alternative interface thats all.

Take for instance Operation Wolf (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Wolf) for the NES. :) And I believe there was a Terminator 2 game like this aswell.

pstudio
02-02-2007, 10:07 PM
Oh btw someone mentioned that Light-Gun was not possible. Not quite true. You just have to create an alternative interface thats all.

What do people mean when they say you can't create a Light-Gun Game? Is it because you can't make use of a real Light-Gun? (If wikipedia has the answer I'm sorry but i can't read wikipedia. It's a weird thing with my router I'm trying to solve though I've runned out of ideas :? )
I was planning to make this one of my genre, so it would be nice to know what people exactly are talking about. It wouldn't be fun to make a game and then be told that it's not ok :cry:

jdarling
02-02-2007, 10:14 PM
Oh btw someone mentioned that Light-Gun was not possible. Not quite true. You just have to create an alternative interface thats all.

What do people mean when they say you can't create a Light-Gun Game? Is it because you can't make use of a real Light-Gun? (If wikipedia has the answer I'm sorry but i can't read wikipedia. It's a weird thing with my router I'm trying to solve though I've runned out of ideas :? )
I was planning to make this one of my genre, so it would be nice to know what people exactly are talking about. It wouldn't be fun to make a game and then be told that it's not ok :cry:

Simple answer; There is not standard Lightgun hardware for the PC. So, you would have to provide specialized hardware to the judges (not outside of the rules) and if you decided to sell/market your game, then you would have to provide the hardware for that as well.

As WILL said, you could fake it using the mouse (some type of pointer that would move around the screen stating where you would be shooting). Of course, then depending on how you implemented it, it would fall into the FPS genera as well :).

pstudio
02-02-2007, 10:26 PM
Ok. I'm reliefed :)

However I would say that just because you aim with your mouse (which I was planning on doing) doesn't make a LG game into a FPS. (not that its matter to me since my other genre isn't Action)
I would think that a FPS is a game where you have full control of your character movement (in 3D enviroment) which you don't have in a LG game. You may have some movement, but then it would usally be fixed.

Huehnerschaender
03-02-2007, 12:03 AM
I consider a light gun game where all you have to do is aim and shoot... like the arcade games in an amusement arcade.

The camera moves on a given path and you have no chance to change it (except maybe shooting a door or something similar to choose between two paths). Also the time the camera stays at one place is given by a script. So there is no interactivity in movement, just aiming and shooting enemys, obstacles etc). Thats a lightgun game in my opinion.

It turns into a FPS when you get control over the movement...

IlovePascal
03-02-2007, 03:16 AM
Hi Guys,
I know that the competition idea is quite challenging, but this year we wanted something that would push the envelope and as I mentioned would turn heads at the IGF! Having a competition that was just like all the others out there would not necessarily turn heads at the IGF.

I hope this does not discourage too many people from submiting an entry.

No way! That's the spirit! It has to be different, challenging, encouraging creativity! or else you'll always get the same games, slightly modified!

I agree that time consumptiom might be a problem for many, but personally I find the topic excellent!

Count me in ;)

vgo
03-02-2007, 10:40 AM
I'm thinking about participating, but I don't know if I have enough free time in my hands to meet the goals. Another problem is that I can't create any content (models, textures etc.) so I'm gonna have to find some guys to help me...

Can I use models and stuff that I can find in the Internet? I've even bought some models that I'd like to use... :P

AthenaOfDelphi
03-02-2007, 11:18 AM
I'm thinking about participating, but I don't know if I have enough free time in my hands to meet the goals. Another problem is that I can't create any content (models, textures etc.) so I'm gonna have to find some guys to help me...

Can I use models and stuff that I can find in the Internet? I've even bought some models that I'd like to use... :P

This is not an official answer (that would have to come from Savage or WILL), but I think using third party content is acceptable providing you don't breach copyright or its terms of use.

Certainly last year, I used a soundtrack that is if you like our browser based game's signature tune. We got permission from the artist to use it when we liked in connection with our 'The Outer Reaches' brand.

As for artwork, there is a ton of freely available content on-line, so if anyone is short of models etc., then here are some ]Lost Garden[/url] - As a starting point, run a search for 'free graphics'
molotov.nu (http://www.molotov.nu/?page=graphics) - Lots of links and downloads

savage
03-02-2007, 05:09 PM
I'm thinking about participating, but I don't know if I have enough free time in my hands to meet the goals. Another problem is that I can't create any content (models, textures etc.) so I'm gonna have to find some guys to help me...

Can I use models and stuff that I can find in the Internet? I've even bought some models that I'd like to use... :P

Hi Vgo, You can use model, textures or audio from 3rd parties as long as you are licenced to use them. We don't want to get into a situation where we or you get sued for using some else's resources without their position.

IlovePascal
03-02-2007, 09:37 PM
I'm thinking about participating, but I don't know if I have enough free time in my hands to meet the goals. Another problem is that I can't create any content (models, textures etc.) so I'm gonna have to find some guys to help me...

Come on man! The compo is more about creativity and having fun than getting the best graphics!

I have never made a 3D game before (I got OpenGL working for the first time three days ago!), and I have no idea how to make great graphics, but the idea is to go for it, do your best!
I believe it would be very very hard for us beginners to do better than the many ppl out there who make models and hard out graphics every day, so I'm gonna use that time to make a fun game instead of a pretty game!

Don't let that stop you!
Cheers ;)

steb
04-02-2007, 04:11 AM
confused about the prizes.


1st Place:
----------------
PGD & Savage Software Solutions Ltd. will sponsor the team that wins for the full entry fee into the 2008 Independant Game Festival.


2nd Place:
----------------
nonthing?


3rd Place:
----------------
nonthing?


Category winners:
----------------------
will receive a white mug?!?


is this correct? the only "physical" prizes are some mugs? No one asked ATI or NVIDIA for sponsorship prizes? I'm sure they could spare a few Video cards to give away....

What about asking for some sponsorship prizes from some of the Game companies? they all usually love to sponsor these types of competitions.... and they have tons of cool swag they will usually give.

WILL
04-02-2007, 05:54 AM
I can see how the listing might be confusing the way thats listed. :)

What you see there as prizes is only whats confirmed. The mug designs (graphics) will be done in a month or so and the rest of the empty prize positions will be filled up later as we confirm the rest of out sponsorship.

Sponsors are still being confirmed.

vgo
04-02-2007, 11:34 AM
Hi Vgo, You can use model, textures or audio from 3rd parties as long as you are licenced to use them. We don't want to get into a situation where we or you get sued for using some else's resources without their position.

Ok, that's good to hear. I'd prefer to have some of my friends creating the content for me, but if that fails then I have to start digging.



Come on man! The compo is more about creativity and having fun than getting the best graphics!

I know, but if it's up to me then my entry will have some nice boxes in it and that's all. :)

I bought DeleD and I've used it to create some simple test scenes that I can render in my game engine, but if I'd have to make space ship, car or some kind of human model I just simply can't do it.



I have never made a 3D game before (I got OpenGL working for the first time three days ago!), and I have no idea how to make great graphics, but the idea is to go for it, do your best!

I've used OpenGL since 1997 or so, but due to lack of time sometimes months pass until I pick up on it again.

I'm gonna create my game engine from scratch for the competition. Obviously I'll use some pieces of code I've written in the past, but the engine itself will be brand new.



I believe it would be very very hard for us beginners to do better than the many ppl out there who make models and hard out graphics every day, so I'm gonna use that time to make a fun game instead of a pretty game!


For me the competition is not about graphics. However, I'd like to have some "ok" looking content in my game. I'm not aiming for the graphical quality and complexity of Doom3/Half-Life2/whatever, there's no time nor resources for that.

savage
04-02-2007, 07:13 PM
is this correct? the only "physical" prizes are some mugs? No one asked ATI or NVIDIA for sponsorship prizes? I'm sure they could spare a few Video cards to give away....

Hi Steb,
Welcome to PGD. Every year we ask ATI, Nvidia for prizes and so far they have never responded to my emails. If you have specific contacts within either of these companies or any other game companies I would be more than happy to contact them about additional sponsorship. The problem with large organisations is getting in contact with the right person.

Legolas
04-02-2007, 09:37 PM
is this correct? the only "physical" prizes are some mugs? No one asked ATI or NVIDIA for sponsorship prizes? I'm sure they could spare a few Video cards to give away....

Hi Steb,
Welcome to PGD. Every year we ask ATI, Nvidia for prizes and so far they have never responded to my emails. If you have specific contacts within either of these companies or any other game companies I would be more than happy to contact them about additional sponsorship. The problem with large organisations is getting in contact with the right person.

You could contact M3 (http://www.m3adapter.com/), DS-X (http://www.ds-x.com/cgi-bin/dsx/engine.pl?page=home), NeoFlash (http://neoflash.com/) and NinjaDS (http://www.ninjads.com/). They're very supportive for nds homebrew development and as far as I know, they have sponsored several compos.
I'm pretty sure that you will get some cards for nds ;)

Clootie
04-02-2007, 10:26 PM
No one asked ATI or NVIDIA for sponsorship prizes? I'm sure they could spare a few Video cards to give away....
You can't expect commertial company to give away products for "nothing". The only possible return on investment for either NVIDIA or ATI is a good publicity, i.e. marketing value. So, you can talk to them only if you can guarantee that prizes will, for example, show the need for their GPU's - like requiring entried to use advanced 3D techniques (that will not allow Intel integrated to run them) or something similar. You can't just give away 'GPU prize' for entry that is not even using 3D graphics. I don't belive that PGD competition is ready for that yet.

Sascha Willems
04-02-2007, 10:59 PM
That's not true. At least NVidia also sponsored some competitions that were not about 3D graphics and effects, like the last competition held by gamedev.net. If I remember correct they haven't had one single entry in that compo with modern graphic effects.
So I guess it's just a matter of what people you know within the industrie or how to get in touch with important people. But on the other hand I think that NVidia and/or ATI are turned off by the term "pascal" due to it's usual connection with a dead language that's only used for learning purposes in school. But maybe if someone could show a PR person from one of those companies how well some of the entries from the last two compos looked, this may change.
And even if there is nothing about 3D graphics in this compo they won't waste their cards, as it would still be public relations work, so they would still gain popularity with sponsoring PGD.

steb
05-02-2007, 12:43 AM
is this correct? the only "physical" prizes are some mugs? No one asked ATI or NVIDIA for sponsorship prizes? I'm sure they could spare a few Video cards to give away....

Hi Steb,
Welcome to PGD. Every year we ask ATI, Nvidia for prizes and so far they have never responded to my emails. If you have specific contacts within either of these companies or any other game companies I would be more than happy to contact them about additional sponsorship. The problem with large organisations is getting in contact with the right person.

drop Rene Froeleke (rfroeleke[at]ati[dot]com) an email, explaining the contest and giving an URL to the website (include an url to the page showing last year's winners). Rene works in ATI Public Relations.

I would suggest making a list of 10-20 companies, preparing a simple email explaining the contest and how they could sponsor, and fire it off to all of them. Make sure you address it to a person and not a department (ex: "bob.marley[at]biggames[dot]com" is preferable to "marketing[at]biggames[dot]com")

Then follow up by email a few days later, then by telephone a few days after that.

in the email offer simple ways that they can become sponsors (everything from small prizes and small cash donations or products)... usually a company will want to do MORE than give a cheap prize, and will offer something better than the small prizes you suggest.

Explain that their Logo can be prominantly displayed on all contest posters & advertisments if they wish to become a "major sponsor".

If after the 2 emails and phone call, you are still unable to get a response, have someone drop by their office. ex: In montreal, I could visit SoftImage, Ubisoft, EA, Matrox.... and others for you guys.


regarding the mugs:
I would suggest that you contact cafepress and see if they will offer some prizes. You could then have the category winner's game logo, or screenshot printed on the mug/t-shirt/whatever for free.......

You could also contact Borland/Devco for sponsorship. They are sure to have a vested interest in promoting development in Pascal/Delphi.


all of this can be started by compiling a list of industry contacts (found on company websites) writing a short form letter, and firing it off to all of them.... the key is to follow up.


edited: added Rene's email address in first paragraph.


Edit by Traveler: Made emails less readable for spiders/harvesters

Clootie
05-02-2007, 08:22 AM
For NVIDIA PR contacts probably should be: Derek Perez (dperez_nvidia.com) and/or Brian Burke (bburke_nvidia.com)

PS. I thought @ati.com e-mail no longer works, and we need @amd.com ones?

savage
05-02-2007, 10:28 AM
edited: added Rene's email address in first paragraph.

Hi Steb,
thanks for the ati contact info, unfortunately as Clootie mentioned, the ati.com emails bounce.

Clootie
05-02-2007, 11:33 AM
You can try rene.froeleke_amd.com

steb
05-02-2007, 09:19 PM
savage:

I was also wondering, how exactly does one "enter" the competition? The entry process is not outlined in the contest posting. Do people email you or another mod? was there an entry form to fill out?

WILL
05-02-2007, 09:28 PM
Hmm perhaps it's not so clearly visible unless you go to the front page of the site, but there is a 'Register' button on the right-hand side of the details page.

And there is a link to the registry page from the front page aswell.

All the same I've added a more visible link to the form on the detials page after the welcome statement.

AthenaOfDelphi
05-02-2007, 09:31 PM
Hi steb,

To enter, goto this page http://www.pascalgamedevelopment.com/competitions.php?p=details&c=3. Under the competition logo on the right hand side are some links to the results page (where people can see how its progressing), the login page and the registration page.

Simply fill in the form on the registration page and you've entered.

Once you've registered, you can login to your team page where you can see your scores etc. and you can upload your stage entry there too.

Good luck :-)

steb
05-02-2007, 09:59 PM
aha.. I see it thanks. I guess I figured that was for forum/website registration....

AthenaOfDelphi
06-02-2007, 03:08 PM
Design documents and other competition files...

I notice that some competitors are posting links to design documents in the forums... I know the stage 1 deadline is still a couple of days away, but please please don't forget to upload them in the competition pages.

If you don't upload a file, we can't give you a score for the stage. There is an exception to this... the final scores... if you only manage to upload files for one or two stages, your entry will still be marked in the final scores, but it will be marked using the last uploaded file, but for all other stages, no file... no score.

And from reading some of these documents... I'd hate to have to give you 0 because you forgot to upload it.

grudzio
06-02-2007, 10:56 PM
Can the design document be in pdf format?

savage
06-02-2007, 11:09 PM
I think HTML would be ideal, as everyone who visits these forums has to have a browser to see the site, but failing that as long as the judges can download a viewer for it, it should be fine.

Btw, if your document format is a little weird, please give us a URL so the judges can view the docs :).

NecroDOME
07-02-2007, 09:12 AM
Can anyone see the game design document or would it be only visible to the judges ?

AthenaOfDelphi
07-02-2007, 09:32 AM
As far as I'm aware hon, only we (the judges) and you can see it if you upload it to the competition pages.

cairnswm
07-02-2007, 10:19 AM
Which is why I publish mine in another thread :)

Should we not be able to see our own uploads though?

NecroDOME
07-02-2007, 02:00 PM
Well, I posted my idea, but there are more or less some things in the design document that I want to "hide" for the rest of you as they are more like a surprise :)

WILL
07-02-2007, 03:21 PM
Should we not be able to see our own uploads though?

Thats a very good question. I'll try to add a link to your most recent upload so that you may confirm that you've uploaded or updated it correctly.

Same as last year however where if you are still within the same stage as the last upload it will overwrite the older one, however as soon as the deadline rolls over you will write a new file and upload anew the first upload of that stage.

IlovePascal
08-02-2007, 03:31 AM
Why on earth are the times for submission EST ??? :?
Aren't they supposed to be GMT ???
It's not like us on the other side of the world have to keep working it out each time, is it? :(

jdarling
08-02-2007, 09:21 AM
Why on earth are the times for submission EST ??? :?
Aren't they supposed to be GMT ???
It's not like us on the other side of the world have to keep working it out each time, is it? :(

The same could be said of those of us not used to seeing our time as GMT+/- offset value. Fex, I know that I'm -1 EST to get to CST unless I'm in our Seattle office then I'm -3 EST cuz I'm in PST :).

Just my two cents, but a time zone is a time zone. All that matters is that we have a deadline that is fixed :).

BTW: Good Luck ILovePascal, from your other questions and posts it sounds like your well on your way thus far. Just remember, its all for fun and your first year IS going to be a bit rough.

Eric
08-02-2007, 11:28 AM
Quick question on allowable game engines: am I authorized to use... the AirBlast engine from last time? :roll: It's Pascal and open-source... :P

Wouldn't be a vanilla reuse of course, but given my likely time budget this year (real low), there are quite a few things in there that would help cut development time down for this new PGD round...

Sascha Willems
08-02-2007, 11:34 AM
Yes, you're allowed to reuse your engine. As long as the engine is written in Pascal and most of the content is made especially for this contest you're allowed to use a premade engine.

technomage
08-02-2007, 02:31 PM
Oh no Eric is competing :wink:

The Airblast engine is great. :D. the competition is hotting up :lol:

WILL
08-02-2007, 02:53 PM
Indeed! I am proud to say that both of the previous champions of the 2005 and 2006 competitions are in this one. We should all expect some pretty amazing results this year. :thumbup:

Since the topic of the last 2 competitions has come up, I guess it would be a great time to mention to all that I have recently updated the 2005 PGD 'Dogfight' Competition page to match with our current competition system thats available right here (http://www.pascalgamedevelopment.com/competitions.php?p=details&c=2)!

It contains restored games, sources, screenshots, scoring results and judge's comments.

Traveler
08-02-2007, 04:18 PM
Oh no Eric is competing :wink:

The Airblast engine is great. :D. the competition is hotting up :lol:
Hehe,.. agreed on all three points :)
I can't wait to see the first screenshots / videos pop up.

Nice work with the 2005 competition page WILL, it looks great!

WILL
08-02-2007, 04:24 PM
Oh also another quick reminder for all those that haven't registered or haven't submitted your design documents, tomorrow is the last day to do so!

Don't miss out of those 20 points! They could make the difference of that one place to rank in the competition. ;)


Nice work with the 2005 competition page WILL, it looks great!

Thanks ;)


Tonight I'm hoping to have another video ad released. The only thing left is some final editing and then I can render it for display in both the YouTube/Yahoo! Video and the Google Video formats.

Eric
08-02-2007, 04:52 PM
The Airblast engine is great. :D. the competition is hotting up :lol:

Time is going to be a major factor though, and right now, I'm more designing around the 3d/2d resources I will not have time to make than anything else :roll:

cronodragon
08-02-2007, 06:09 PM
I just posted my idea... is it being checked or are you checking all of the entries at the same time tomorrow? :D

Sascha Willems
08-02-2007, 06:15 PM
Since you are allowed to update your entry for the current stage until the deadline has approached I'll start checking your entries after the deadline has ended. Note that the deadlines are measured by the servertime PGD runs on and that this is mostly a different time-zone than the one I'm living in, which is GMT+1.

savage
08-02-2007, 06:25 PM
The Server is in the US.

WILL
08-02-2007, 06:31 PM
Everyone has until midnight of the last day of the deadline to submit. So for those of your that are coming close to the end of the day now, you have a whole day to submit still! :D

cronodragon
08-02-2007, 06:35 PM
How are the 20 points for the design document divided? Or we earn those points just for uploading the document?? :D

WILL
08-02-2007, 07:04 PM
If you meet the goal requirements you get the 20. If you don't meet them all then you get a big fat Zero. :P

Stage Goals are worth all or nothing of the point values listed. This will be the same until the final stage where you will then be judged and scored from 0 to 200 for each 'Judged Category'.

Traveler
09-02-2007, 11:47 PM
I appear to have 15 mins left and I can't seem to find the place to upload the files :(

I've just created an account, but can't seem to continue to go to an upload page.

How do I proceed??

Edit: Ah sweet,.. just it got it... and just in time too :)

WILL
10-02-2007, 01:13 AM
Oh man... we almost had to have our own little 'PGD Defense' there. :P

Glad you made the deadline Alex. ;)

Mind you... if you missed out on the deadline it's not a great big HUGE deal... it's 20 points, but if your good then you can still make it up. And you are also still eligible for the 4 Excellence Awards.

Sascha Willems
10-02-2007, 02:03 AM
I just finished judging stage 1!

Important note :
In this stage we don't judge your game design, but only the game document. So there are no comments (at least from me) concerning your game design! (Though some of them are so interesting that I'd loved to have a comment about them. But I'll rather put those comments into your appropriate threads)


It's awefully late here (almost past three'o'clock deep in the night) and it took me around 2 hours, but now it's done. And except for one person/team everyone got 20 points from me. And if you think I did you wrong with my comment please let me know, but don't forget that I judged very late in the night and that it's possible that I have made some (hopefully small) mistake due to being rather sleepy!


And now to my comments :
I usually write a small passage about the document itself, nothing spectacular and sometimes pointing out missing or unclear things. And then I also added a list of the genres I found to be valid and the ones I found to be discussable, which will look like this :

Comment on your design document here...

Valid genres (x) :
- Action (red)
- ...

Discussable (x) :
- Strategy (green)
It's discussable because (my opionion or the reason why it's discussable)
So you can easily see from my comment if I got the genres you have intended to implement right or if I did a mistake. The discussable ones are mostly also depending on how you implement them, so they may "move" from discussable to valid once I played the game!


So if you want to discuss my comments (either in general or on your specific entry) please do it in this thread (http://www.pascalgamedevelopment.com/viewtopic.php?t=4105)!


And now I'm going to bed, so please be patient with me you won't get a direct answer for the next ten hours or so ;)
But tomorrow I'll be back and try to answer your questions as soon as possible.

cronodragon
10-02-2007, 02:21 AM
Where is the revised document? I login in the contest page and there´s only the original document, without comments... maybe I didn´t get the points :lol:

IlovePascal
10-02-2007, 06:28 AM
If you meet the goal requirements you get the 20. If you don't meet them all then you get a big fat Zero. :P

Stage Goals are worth all or nothing of the point values listed. This will be the same until the final stage where you will then be judged and scored from 0 to 200 for each 'Judged Category'.

Then what's the point of there being 3 judges? :? Is it possible that you have done something and at the same time haven't??? :shock:
For example, if the goal is "Create a Main Menu", either you created it or you didn't, right? So either you get 3X points or 0, correct? So why 3 judges?

grudzio
10-02-2007, 06:38 AM
Then what's the point of there being 3 judges? :? Is it possible that you have done something and at the same time haven't??? :shock:
For example, if the goal is "Create a Main Menu", either you created it or you didn't, right? So either you get 3X points or 0, correct? So why 3 judges?

Remember that the points gained for completing stages are only a part of total score. (1/6 if I remember correctly).

IlovePascal
10-02-2007, 06:46 AM
Oh! so the fact that there are 3 judges will only be useful at the end... (no hard feelings :wink: ! :lol: )

AthenaOfDelphi
10-02-2007, 12:02 PM
Where is the revised document? I login in the contest page and there´s only the original document, without comments... maybe I didn´t get the points :lol:

The comments and scores.... you'll have to wait for those until Clootie has finished scoring. Then all the results will be published together. With regards to why there are 3 judges... a more balanced view. At this stage, we should all be able to read your documents, but with stage 2 when you have to start submitting programs... one of the requirements is that you design your game to run on the judges hardware... so it could be that it runs on Sascha and Clooties machines but not mine... they can score you... I can't.

My Comments and Scores For Stage 1

Unlike Sascha, I'm not commenting on genre choices at this stage. This is largely because I felt that practically all entries have clear ideas that fit neatly into their chosen genre, but also because at this point, you're only telling me what you going to try and achieve. One or two entries got me thinking, but ultimately I have to take the documents at face value. So now its up to you to prove to me that you have incorporated the genres you said you would. In the case of the one or two entries that got me thinking, it was a case of 'can they/have they incorporated enough of the second genre' for it to qualify.

As Sascha pointed out, theres not really a lot to say at this stage because we are only judging some very basic requirements. The real comments will start with stage 2. So if you are one of the many teams that got 'Great Job'... apologies... theres just too many good looking entries this year ;-)

Overall, I think everyone has done a great job so far and I'm really looking forward to playing all the games. Some remind me of old classics, some remind me of plans we have for our own products (which is admittedly a bit worrying), but one thing they all have in common.... they make me want to play :-D Great job guys.

If you have any questions about my judging, comments, then please post them in this thread (http://www.pascalgamedevelopment.com/viewtopic.php?t=4106).

Eric
10-02-2007, 02:49 PM
I did not see an entry size limit in the rules... is there a size limit on the entries? I'm currently having to decide between generating stuff at runtime, ie. small size but more coding work & optimization, vs pre-generating, which means less work, but larger files...

AthenaOfDelphi
10-02-2007, 02:58 PM
Last year the file size limit was 20MB, but some teams broke that, although they were the minority.

The biggest issue I think is server bandwidth. If each team submits 20MB thats 60MB when we download it to judge it. Soon adds up.

Hopefully WILL or Savage can chime in to make it clear if there is a limit and if so, how big.

WILL
10-02-2007, 05:51 PM
I cannot say officially what the max. size is this year... though I can tell you with the uttermost certainty, it will depend on the PHP timeout setting no matter what we set it to.

Whenever you upload your entry the page that does all the work is a single script that just packs your file into a package and starts sending it up to the site. If that script is still running when the timeout passes, it will stop the page and give you the error message of "page script timeout... blahblahblah" So... though we may want to give you 30MB, it might turn out that the page times out after 25MB of upoading... this is of course something else we have to consider.

So when uploading it really helps if you have a fast (or just not slow) connection. Just think faster connection = bigger file sending capability.

As for the set limit, if the new teams competing this year don't know it's mostly to prevent super consumption of our monthly bandwidth. We'd love to be able to provide 200MB games made in Pascal, but truth is... we just don't have the kind of capital to support that. :?

Last year I believe we choose 20MB as Athena said, but we eventually moved it up to 30 Mb in some cases.

I would think that we are keeping to 30 MB but if you have a real need (for the quality of your game's sake) to go higher to contact and ask him about it. Of course he may give us a totally different answer after this. ;)

JSoftware
10-02-2007, 06:09 PM
Now if your problems are about saving bandwidth and timeout times couldn't you then just have people requiring larger file sizes use their own mirroring service?

WILL
10-02-2007, 06:27 PM
In short, not really no.

The long...

In the first competition we didn't have a competition system in place we just had competitors upload their games to an FTP. That proved to have a whole set of issues all onto it's self.

The fact is the we need the scripts to be able to control the tracking of meeting deadlines and the like so uploading to an external filespace doesn't really allow us to show these scripts who met the deadline and who didn't. It takes any chance of a question if one team was allowed more time than the other and several other 'fairness' concerns.

Also on top of that there is a maintenance aspect to consider. We can maintain all the files within our site. We cannot maintain file that are not within our site. If anyone remembers the older 2005 details pages you will agree that external linking can cause a huge mess and sometime a maintenance nightmare.

Plus also by retaining copies of your entries we can ensure that we have them around when we want to make ads such as those that I've released in the last couple of weeks using captured video footage from them.


So we keep it all in-house so we do not lose any of the content that would otherwise be lost by someone else and so we can tell for sure if that team has met a deadline or not. We also can present them all on our site advertise with them and have them on one spot available without a major amount of work involved.

Eric
10-02-2007, 07:28 PM
I would think that we are keeping to 30 MB but if you have a real need (for the quality of your game's sake) to go higher to contact and ask him about it. Of course he may give us a totally different answer after this. ;)

Ok understood! I'm now on one of those new 22" monitors, and so I have a tendency to use very high resolution textures, ie. 4k x 4k... I'll stick with low-res textures for all the intermediate stages and preserve bandwidth ;)

LP
10-02-2007, 07:40 PM
One question to PGD Compo staff: we're working on a 4-day game that we started a day ago, which will be finished soon. Does this qualify for the compo? Is the registration still open?

The style is puzzle/real-time strategy/arcade (not sure how it's translated to PGD compo "colors"), it contains all stages complete except the design documents (which we thought as a time waste for a mid-term project made in such hurry). It also has no story-line, which is useless for that type of the game.

AthenaOfDelphi
10-02-2007, 07:52 PM
It translates to Grey/Green/Not sure because there is no 'Arcade' genre.

As far as I know, providing it fits the multiplexity theme, which it appears to from what you've said, providing of course its all Pascal, which I assume it is because otherwise you wouldn't be asking, then you could enter it.

And yes, registrations are still open.

WILL or Savage will need to confirm it, but I don't see why you can't enter it providing you've complied with all the competition rules. And I think the same will go for any late comers to the competition.

Clootie
10-02-2007, 08:06 PM
Here are some comments from me after judging competition Stage 1

I'm quite impressed with some of entities design documentation. And already impatiently await to play some of the announced games. I've commented only entities that needed some correction to succesfully complete at later stages. So, if you have not recieved any comments from me - everything is going fine! :D

While scores given for completing this Stage are rather small (and some teams have done only minimum amount of work to justify scores) - I believe what investments done at this stage will really play out later in competition.

Good luck to all teams at next stage! 8)

Clootie
10-02-2007, 08:10 PM
Is the registration still open?Yes, registration is still open. And you have not yet lost a lot of scores to other teams. So, you should register right now!

WILL
10-02-2007, 09:05 PM
Go for it Yuriy! :)

You'll lose the 60 points for the design doc, but there is still another 3540 to go around...

The only requirement for each stage is that you upload a submission for that stage to get the points for that stage. If you finish some of the goals early, great, just resubmit your game for that next stage to get the points. If you manage to enhance/add things along the way that'll help you win over the judges in the final scoring too.

You are more than eligible to join in at this stage of the competition. :thumbup:


EDIT: And just to make mention of this... registration will not close until the start of the last (6th) stage. Only at that point will we stop taking in new teams for the competition.

AthenaOfDelphi
10-02-2007, 11:05 PM
Since a recurring theme in my questions thread here (http://www.pascalgamedevelopment.com/viewtopic.php?t=4106) is about my hardware and performance....

If any of you want me to test things on my machine BEFORE deadlines, then post a request in my questions thread. This doesn't necessarily have to be your game, it could be test applications to check performance etc.

Just let me know and I'll try to get it sorted asap.

cairnswm
22-02-2007, 09:09 AM
What defines a maze game?

From Wikipedia

Maze games have a playing field which is entirely a maze. Some may be simple puzzle games in which the player must navigate to the exit, others may be action-based.

An example sub-genre of the action-based maze game is the maze chase game in which the player needs logical thinking to foresee where the enemies come. One must be able to foresee hostile attacks about the flanks to escape from them. The most famous game of this genre is Pac-Man. This genre frequently crosses over with Puzzle, but it often gets by completely without jigsaw puzzle elements and demands only reaction and planning. Notable games include Pac-Man and Ms. Pac-Man


So does this mean a map where there are obstaces to avoid counts as a maze game or does it mean that the players movement has to be restricted based on the walls around them?

PacMan didn't actually use a Maze - so saying the game has to occur within a maze doesn't really count.

WILL
22-02-2007, 04:12 PM
It means that the game has
a playing field which is entirely a maze. Which is pretty much the basis of the concept.

Pac-Man was a maze game because the whole world he inhabited was generally a maze. In design anyway. It just didn't have an entrance and an exit. Have a look at the Wikipedia article on 'maze': http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maze

It sort of simplifies what the definition of a maze is.


A maze is a tour puzzle in the form of a complex branching passage through which the solver must find a route.

You can sort of see what it's getting at. A series of walls making up passages from which you have to traverse to successfully enter and exit from within it.

Lock 'n Chase was also a maze game. It used the same maze concept, but this time it had an entrance and an exit. More true to the concept of a maze in definition.

There were other games that were maze-based, thought some may have been mixed genre. (even for way back in the 80s ;)) Some others that I recall playing myself at an early age were; Ms. Pac-Man, Burger Time (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burger_Time), Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Cloudy Mountain (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AD%26D:_Cloudy_Mountain), Night Stalker (http://www.intellivisionlives.com/bluesky/games/credits/action2.html), and Adventure (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adventure_%28Atari_2600%29). Iirc, there was some old racing game with two cars that wasn't very good for the Atari, but it would likely fit into this genre aswell.

cairnswm
22-02-2007, 04:13 PM
Is Doom a maze game - the original Doom?

WILL
22-02-2007, 04:21 PM
Now you're starting to see why the Maze genre is somewhat antiquated. :p

I'd say it's too far removed from the original concept to constitute as a maze game.

In fact some of my previous listings above that are very loose as it is would be Adventure and Cloudy Mountain as they take away from the simplistic aspect of being in a maze-based play-field.

Traveler
24-02-2007, 01:26 PM
I'm currently working towards the second stage goals and I have a question regarding the implementation of the first genre (goal 3).

I have choosen Strategy (RTS) and platform as my genres, and I was wondering what is considered a correct genre implementation.

In my case both genres rely heavily on eachother, but obviously I dont have enough time to create both. I'm currently working out the isometric engine, creating maps, sorting out construction of buildings, and adding a gui.
Later this week I plan on having resource management and hopefully the upgrade functions ready. I probably also have time to implement unit construction, but the whole battle part wont be there yet as that is actually where the platform genre steps in.

Is this enough to be considered a good enough implementation of the strategy genre (in this case)?

AthenaOfDelphi
03-03-2007, 11:13 AM
Just a quick reminder in case you're so engrossed in your entry....

The deadline for Stage 2 is midnight today (ie. 23:59:59 March 3rd :-) ).

This is based on the server time which I believe is EST. If you are in any doubt about the server time, its available in the team pages of the competition section.

If you are working on an entry, don't forget to upload it. No upload = no points for the stage.

Good luck to everyone and happy last minute blitz :-)

WILL
20-03-2007, 03:14 PM
Ack! I forgot where this thread is and started posting in the announcement thread. :?

4 days left how is everyone HERE doing? ;)

Traveler
20-03-2007, 03:33 PM
(Quote taken from this (http://www.pascalgamedevelopment.com/viewtopic.php?t=4039&start=75) thread)

But it will be hard work for me to get the genres "fit together" in gameplay within 4 days...

Actually, I don't think thats really necessary. Unless I misunderstand you, you only need to have the second genre implemented.
I believe (or rather, hope) that they do not have to 'work together'.

As for my entry, I still have to put in quite a bit of work to get the 2nd genre done. To save me some time, I've already decided not to use custom made sprites for this stage, but dummy sprites instead. (At least for my main characters)

On the other hand, most of the AI is already there. Enemy sprites patrol the mines and in case they spot the player, even if he's on a different floor, they'll react to him appropriately.

The thing I'm a bit worried about is the part where the player has to die or lose in this stage. As with most RTS games, the player never dies, but simply gets a mission failed message of some sort, when he fails to overcome a certain situation. Usually that means the mission has to be done again.

I'd like to have something similair, if that's okay?

WILL
20-03-2007, 04:07 PM
I think the player having to stop and start over again via a 'message of failure' would constitute as the same sort of thing, I think, but this is up to the judges...

jasonf
20-03-2007, 05:16 PM
If the game has no concept of player death, or death at all then it would be unfair for the game to be penalised because of the wording of the rules. A sports game wouldn't involve death for example.

I believe that the rule means, it must be possible to lose the game, to be defeated.

If not, then the rules are forcing the game design, but I think that this is just a common term as most games involve some form of player avatar death.

IlovePascal
21-03-2007, 07:51 AM
Ack! I forgot where this thread is and started posting in the announcement thread. :?

4 days left how is everyone HERE doing? ;)

man...i think im out :roll:

Huehnerschaender
21-03-2007, 12:44 PM
Why???

jasonf
21-03-2007, 01:25 PM
I second Huehnerschaender, Why do you think you're out?

This competition isn't over until the final stage.. I'm counting on that for my entry.. as I don't think I'm going to get enough done to cover all the bases for stage3, but I'll bloody make up for it for stage4, sometimes there is more time available than at other times.. I think pretty much everyone on here has a time issue of some kind. Real-Life is annoying when it comes to dishing out enough time to do the things we like. The best thing to do is keep on going and see what happens.

I don't hear no fat lady singing yet, so it ain't over! 8)

WILL
21-03-2007, 03:25 PM
I don't hear no fat lady singing yet, so it ain't over! 8)

Hear, hear!

Huehnerschaender
23-03-2007, 08:12 AM
Hi...

One question concerning goal 3 for stage 3.

Player must be able to lose/die.

In my game players don't die. And there is no situation where you "lose" the game.

It's a multiplayer game where one of 2-4 players wins and the others lose.

But if I finish my entry to this state (player X wins) then I have nothing more to do in final stages because this means I am ready with implementing my game. I agree that in other games (fighting, action, sport, etc) it is very easy to add the "die or lose" situation, but in my game it is not.

So here comes the question:

How can I get the points for this goal in stage 3? Is it enough to add a screen which says "Player X has most points and wins" after lets say 4 mins of gameplay time?
I am already using some kind of scoring system (even if this is a goal in a further stage, so this whole win/lose thing would not fit here at all if I would not be that far!).

Any ideas? Maybe the judges (if they are allowed to) can state what they would consider ok for this goal in my entry to give the points?!

Greetings,
Dirk

savage
23-03-2007, 11:33 AM
It's a multiplayer game where one of 2-4 players wins and the others lose.


Hi Dirk,
Doesn't this mean that someone loses?

Huehnerschaender
23-03-2007, 11:42 AM
ehm... yes... obviously :)

But this assumes my game to be finished with all genres and complete gameplay... know what I mean? There is no "get hit by an enemy and die" solution for this goal.

I have three genres now which all play together... puzzle, RTS and artillery. It's hard enough to make them work in a way that the judges can see all genres in this stage. But for the "loose"-goal I guess I have to cheat and let the player lose, even if he did not play the game as it is supposed to be (actually I don't have a clear lose game condition in my mind yet, but I guess it will be time/round based).

jdarling
23-03-2007, 01:26 PM
Hey Dirk,
Temporary solution, have more then one way loose. For example, if you have to run to the end of a given level then have the level timed. If you run out of time you hit a panic mode (added time to complete). If you run out of time completely, then you "loose". Since yours also falls into the frag or be fragged (maybe not directly) scenario, this will fit in well at this point. You could even put play pieces into the "Level" that allow the player to take time from another player or give time to themselves. Nothing in the rules says that you can't change it to fit your original design later on :).

Huehnerschaender
23-03-2007, 03:41 PM
Hi Jeremy,

thanks for the reply but I doubt that anything of this will work in my entry.

I will see what I can achieve until tomorrow and if I don't get the points for this goal... bad luck... but nothing to worry about.

IlovePascal
23-03-2007, 11:14 PM
Why???

Well, when I signed up for the compo i was on holidays, had jst finishd high school and felt good about havin nothing else to do...
But now is another chapter of my life called uni n it's a bloody busy one!!! lol

Most of u hav probably been thru tht already and think it's nt too bad, bt this being my first year i dnt have time for ANYTHING! busy busy busy
Wakin up at 6h30 and goin to sleep at 23 pretty much everyday ain't funny, dam it! busy busy busy

I even have to build a bridge model to be 'tested to failure' in a week! And im still into the design process! busy busy busy

And the worst part is tht one of my papers is programming, bt its C#! So i am doing some programing like 10hr a week, bt i can't even work on my game, bloody hell! busy busy busy

So until I get used to this routine and learn to be more time efficient... i jst can't work on my entry... unfortunately...

snif snif :cry:

Huehnerschaender
24-03-2007, 07:55 AM
D-Day (Deadline day :) )

And I am far away from reaching all goals... and I don't think I will manage to get everything working until tonight.... So I guess time has come to lose some points.... But let's see... there are still some hours left... *cracking fingers*

Huehnerschaender
24-03-2007, 03:33 PM
I hate it when it comes close to deadlines and I have to haggle for some hours :)

So quick question: Which timezone was the correct one for calculating the left hours? :)

Oh man, this upload will really run short this time :)

Traveler
24-03-2007, 04:08 PM
Look at the page where you need to upload your entry.
It states the time for your previous submitted stages.

I believe we have till 5am to upload our entries (not that I'll be needing that, fortunately).

AthenaOfDelphi
24-03-2007, 04:13 PM
All deadlines are based on the server clock which is visible (I believe) in the upload pages of the competition section.

WILL
24-03-2007, 04:41 PM
I provide the exact time that the server calculates as your deadline time inside your team's account page.

For me it shows a timezone of GMT -4:00 hrs. (Would appreciate it if others could confirm the same or different for them?)

Sascha Willems
24-03-2007, 05:10 PM
German entrants (and all others within GMT+1) still have (according to the deadline clock in the judge page) 11 hours left.

An yes Will, you're right, it's GMT-4.

Huehnerschaender
24-03-2007, 05:34 PM
Thanks for the replys... Now that I know I have several hours left and this night will be a long one for me, I sent my girlfriend to the shop around the corner to get some beer and potatoe chips for me *lol*

Traveler
24-03-2007, 08:04 PM
I've uploaded my entry for this stage.

Good luck to all those who are still working on theirs!

Huehnerschaender
24-03-2007, 09:25 PM
Thanks! I am :)

vgo
24-03-2007, 09:46 PM
I couldn't make it. :(

It's almost midnight here, I'm gonna call it a night.

Huehnerschaender
24-03-2007, 10:03 PM
You still have some hours... It's just a matter of how you "planned" the night *lol* I think I will work 2 or 3 more hours and then upload whatever I have then.... Right now it looks a little weird what I have, but I hope I can sort everything in it's right place until I want to sleep. I had to do a lot of work on User Interface things which of course stole time in game/content development. Oh *looking at the watch* no time for blabla... talk to ya later guys :)

DGL-luke
24-03-2007, 10:54 PM
Umm... i know we're a little late, but could anyone please tell me the deadline in GMT+1?

EDIT: 5am, is that right?

Sascha Willems
24-03-2007, 11:04 PM
Yes, it's German Time - 5h (GMT+1) as I said above.

Huehnerschaender
25-03-2007, 01:11 AM
Just uploaded! Now I am tired.... I guess I managed to get all necessaray stage 3 things in.... Good night *yawn*

WILL
25-03-2007, 02:27 AM
If you guys want to know how much time you have left, all you have to do is login and look at what it says for the time.

If it's before midnight the day of the deadline then you still have time.

WILL
25-03-2007, 02:51 AM
We still have an hour left! Which means that you can upload your entry if you haven't already done so.

Even if you don't have any or all goals complete, it's great to see an upload of your entry. So be sure to upload while you can. ;)

DGL-luke
25-03-2007, 07:20 AM
Sure like hell, we did.

WILL
25-03-2007, 07:38 AM
Well, Stage 3 is done, and now on to Stage 4! :)

Stage 4 (5 weeks): Complete Your Game Concept (Mar 25th - Apr 28th)

Goal 1: Explain clearly in your included Readme.txt how you have completed your gameplay concept and how all elements of the genres come together. -- 15 Points

Goal 2: Add a scoring system of some kind. Score does not have to be a number. -- 5 Points

Goal 3: Have a basic menu system that allows you to start a new game, check high scores (if Goal 2 was completed) and exit (only for PC platforms!) -- 10 Points


You guys have a bit longer (5 weeks instead of just 3) to get your game concept fully realized. The rest of the time would be to improve it, polish it, stabilize it or whatever else you feel you have left to do. But as always, this is just a guide and only worth 1/6 of your total score in the end so do what you have to to complete your game for the final deadline. :)

This stage was done with the idea of less scrambling and more available time to fix up stuff that was lacking in the previous stages. From what I can tell many of the teams already have some of these complete. So if you did, it's a gimme.

Goal 1, before we get the questions... ;) Was meant to be a gimme onto it's self. Just explain how your game comes together in concept and how the judges can see it as a multi-genre game.


Good luck in Stage 4 guys! Just remember not to fall behind even though you have 5 weeks. Take advantage of that time to make your entries shine. :thumbup:

WILL
25-03-2007, 07:45 AM
Oh and for those that may feel like you 'botched' this stage or fell too far behind, don't let that get you down. Keep at it! Most game projects have their nightmare problems while in development, it just happens.

It's those teams that overcome the problems and work through it that succeed in the end. ;)

(Near quote from the man in charge of the Daxter (http://www.us.playstation.com/PSP/Games/UCUS-98618/OGS) game for PSP. aka Didier Malenfant from Ready at Dawn)

Traveler
25-03-2007, 11:34 AM
Ugh.., I just read through the uploaded entries and I was a bit disappointed by the number. 6 didn't make it, 1 new (Big yay there!)

Please don't give up! As has been said often already, even if you didn't make it, dont stop now! I bet the toughest part is already behind us. With both genres in, all you have to do now is complete the puzzle and polish, polish, polish,... right?

pstudio
25-03-2007, 09:11 PM
I was one of those who didn't make it. :cry:
Probably because I haven't worked on the game at all for the last 3 weeks. Well, allmost haven't worked on it. The reason is that exams is starting tomorrow and I've been busy studying. No time at all for making games :(

But I'm not out of the compo. 3 more weeks and the exams are finished. Then with a super effort from my side I should hopefully be able to make something playable. :wink:

Well, I should prabably get some sleep now, so I just want to finish of with a congratulations to you who managed to make a stage upload. :D

Huehnerschaender
25-03-2007, 09:33 PM
Sad to hear that pstudio... but as you already said, the competition is not over and no one is out until he wants to... so I am looking forward to play your entry one day!

Sascha Willems
25-03-2007, 09:34 PM
Just a quick note : I finished judging the entries for stage 3 about an hour ago.

AthenaOfDelphi
25-03-2007, 09:36 PM
I've also finished

Traveler
25-03-2007, 10:43 PM
ohh,.. I cant hardly wait! :D

Thanks Athena & Sascha!

Huehnerschaender
25-03-2007, 11:06 PM
Holy moly! That was quick :) Thanks!

WILL
28-04-2007, 08:44 PM
Reminder: Stage 4 ends today!

I hope everyone has made their submissions or are going to in the next remaining of hours. :)

:arrow: If you made changes since your last version make sure you upload your latest!

:arrow: If you cannot continue in the competition for whatever reasons, make sure that we at least have your latest version before throwing in the towel.

:arrow: If you cannot continue, but have completed goals early make sure that you resubmit for that deadline so that you can get the points from the work that you have already done.


I'm looking forward to seeing everyones entries, I've heard of a lot of positive changes in the last 6 weeks.

Sascha Willems
02-05-2007, 06:12 PM
I just finished scoring the entries for this stage. Sadly (like the last stage) the number of entries decreased again to only 10 entries of which only 7 actually were different to the ones submitted to stage 3. Hopefully the number of submissions will increase in the upcoming stages.

WILL
04-05-2007, 04:28 PM
*ahem*

Well we're into stage 5 now and it's a shorter one for those of you who haven't noticed. Just 2 weeks to add your help screens / tutorials and configuration tools / menus. Which honestly doesn't seem to hard to me. Especially since most of you all have done this already.

It is also 2 weeks away from the final (6th) stage!

This last 3 week period will be for all the marbles. The latest submissions taken from all the previous stages and all these last 2 remaining stages will be judged, scored and tallied. The top 3 will collectively take home over $6,000 US Dollars in prizes!

The ultimate winner will also be given a shot at sending their entry into the 2008 Independent Games Festival fully sponsored by PGD!

So don't miss out on this opportunity to take some of these great prizes we have this year and to really show off what you can do with Pascal! ;)

Sascha Willems
13-05-2007, 11:25 AM
Stage 5 :
I finished scoring the entries for this stage which went very fast as there were only 5 entries submitted. This is sad as this stage was very easy to score with just some minor additions to your game so this could have been easy 60 points (20 per judge) for all that didn't submit something.

Stage 4 correction :
Will hinted me to a misunderstatement for goal 3 of this stage which I guess came up because the goal is described different in our judges login section (no mention of highscore being optional). So I revised the score (not the comments, ignore them and go straight to the comments for stage 5) which means additional 10 points for the entries from Traveler, InfiniteSpace, Cerebral Bicycle Company and FedeX.

jdarling
14-05-2007, 01:10 PM
Since the judges are busy revamping their numbers, I'd like to know why I didn't get points for my readme updates in Stage 4 from Christina. There isn't even a notion of why in the comments, except that Christina doesn't like the combat system and a few other minor details none of this had anything to do with the readme in the end though.

AthenaOfDelphi
15-05-2007, 08:02 PM
Since the judges are busy revamping their numbers, I'd like to know why I didn't get points for my readme updates in Stage 4 from Christina. There isn't even a notion of why in the comments, except that Christina doesn't like the combat system and a few other minor details none of this had anything to do with the readme in the end though.

You didn't get the points for the same reason other teams didn't get the points... I didn't feel at the time of reading that you'd done enough to satisfy the goal.

AthenaOfDelphi
15-05-2007, 08:07 PM
Since it may affect things, here are the details of the only hardware I have available for testing entries (I'm currently staying with family during the week, for work, so I only have access to my PC).

I have upgraded my machine to the following specs:-

Athlon 64 X2 3600+ (1.9GHz)
2GB PC5400 DDR RAM
256MB GeForce 7600GT

Everything else about my machine has remained the same, with the exception of some additional storage and I now have the option to use more standard audio hardware in the form of an AC97 compatible 6.1 capable on-board device.

I have my PS2 joypad available if required.

jdarling
15-05-2007, 08:53 PM
You didn't get the points for the same reason other teams didn't get the points... I didn't feel at the time of reading that you'd done enough to satisfy the goal.

You didn't feel or you don't feel? How didn't I fulfill the requirements of updating my readme.txt file to contain information on how I combined my genera into my Stage 4 submission.

From contestant rules:
Goal 1: Explain clearly in your included Readme.txt how you have completed your gameplay concept and how all elements of the genres come together. -- 15 Points

From judges rules:
Explain clearly in your included Readme.txt how you have completed your gameplay concept and how all elements of the genres come together.

From the readme:
The two previous genera's have been incorporated together even more having a new level in place that brings randomly generated mazes and the standard RPG elements have been enahanced. This will become more apparent as the game gets closer to completed. Plans are in place to bring out more quests and larger maps
to keep the players attention.

Your comments:
I have mixed thoughts about this entry this time around. Some of it appears to have taken a step forward while some of it has (in my opinion) taken a giant step backwards. The bits that cause me concern mainly center around combat... its organisation (I don't think the new queue system is logical or easy to use) and balance. Overall though its looking pretty good.

I stated clearly that the 3rd genera was dropped from the design still fulfilling two genera and stated how they were brought together.

I'm not asking for blood from a turnip, I'm asking for a clear explanation of the failure. Stating that you don't like the combat system has nothing to do with how I didn't clearly update the readme.

AthenaOfDelphi
15-05-2007, 09:05 PM
I've finished scoring the stage 5 entries. As Sascha said, thats probably because of the limited number :-(

WILL
25-05-2007, 06:56 PM
Well 2 weeks left. I hope everyone is pushing forward as well as they can. We have some great prizes to win this year.

You know... with all of these 'Game In a Day' and 48-hour game creation competitions out there, I'm surprised that we don't have more late deadline opt-ins. Maybe it's the theme? Some don't think it's worth it?

If I weren't a part of the organizing team I'd pump out an entry myself to grab any one of these prizes. New edition of Delphi, sweet sound card, chance to rub shoulders with the pros at IGF, and so on...

I'm surprised with what happened last year with Arctic Macrob noone has tried a small game like that to claim a prize. It wasn't that big or complex a game, but it so innovative that it reached out and grabbed an award all by it's self.

Just some food for thought folks! ;)

Huehnerschaender
25-05-2007, 08:28 PM
Hey Jason,

I really wanted to participate, but I had some real problems for a quite long period within the competition. So I did not see any chance to finish my project in time this year. I'd really love to join a smaller competition which lasts for one week or two... Thats a straightforward timerange you can plan... but within 4 months there is always the risk that some private things will disturb the project.

Ok, enough chattering...

What I wanted to say is: All the folks who are still in the compo, put your ass on the chair and make cool stuff to show in the end. I was not able this year, but anyone who sends in ANYTHING has real chances on the prizes! Just remember that last stage there were only 5 uploads, so there is not much quantity of rivalry.

And the prizes this year really rock! So go and get them!

WILL
03-06-2007, 01:39 AM
Well we're at the final hours of the competition. I hope everyone has a chance to submit their final versions. After tomorrow it's all over.

Good luck to everyone and I hope you all had fun competing this year. :D

Also, prize mugs will be revealed sometime this upcoming week.

AthenaOfDelphi
04-07-2007, 06:28 PM
Hi all,

I'd like to apologise for my slow progress with scoring the competition.

Unfortunately over the last month, I've had to contend with hardware upgrades that have failed due to faulty motherboards (my machine and Spirits), a failing hard drive in my machine, a bunch of business planning that had to be completed by the start of this week and Spirit has been quite ill with a collapsed lung.

Throw work and traveling into the equation and I've simply not had any time to get busy with the competition scoring.

Touch wood, my machine is now fully functional, as is Spirit's and she's on the mend, so I'm hoping to have my final scores sorted this week.

Sorry for keeping you hanging around, I know what its like from last year.

Traveler
05-07-2007, 07:54 AM
A collapsed lung. :shock: That sounds painful. Good to know things are going better for her now, though.

Huehnerschaender
05-07-2007, 10:32 AM
I hope Spirit gets well soon!

jasonf
05-07-2007, 10:45 AM
Me too, A collapsed Lung sounds really serious.

jdarling
05-07-2007, 12:17 PM
[Grandpa Mode]
When I was young in 19 dikitey twelve we didn't know what a collapsed lung was, they just though you needed another shot of penicillin and that would fix it all. Thats the fix for everything, just give them another shot and see where it goes from here! WOOPIE!
[/Grandpa Mode]

Seriously, best wishes from my end of the world as well and hope that everything works it way out in a good way. What caused the lung to collapse?

AthenaOfDelphi
05-07-2007, 05:52 PM
Thanks all. I'll pass your thoughts onto Spirit :-)



Seriously, best wishes from my end of the world as well and hope that everything works it way out in a good way. What caused the lung to collapse?

She got a tear in the lung in September last year. It collapsed then, but they didn't do a great job of telling her this. So, on and off, she's been getting pains and difficulty breathing. Last time I was down there, she had a hicup fit... thats what set it off again. It appears the tear has nearly completely healed... just not 100%, so she can still get air in the chest cavity. As for how she got the tear in her lung in the first place... we have no idea other than a couple of big sneezes. Apparently it can happen spontaneously.

WILL
05-07-2007, 06:28 PM
Well I said via ICQ, but I'll say it again. I hope she gets better still.

When you think she is up to laughing again, show her this. ;)

http://www.merrimackvet.com/images/vax/Cat%20w%20Lime%20Helmet.jpg

WILL
18-07-2007, 02:58 PM
All teams in the competition, I recommend reading this thread:here (http://www.pascalgamedevelopment.com/viewtopic.php?t=4661)

savage
18-07-2007, 03:18 PM
http://www.merrimackvet.com/images/vax/Cat%20w%20Lime%20Helmet.jpg

I welcome our new helmeted cat overlords.

jasonf
18-07-2007, 03:21 PM
If you stare into the eyes of that cat... it tries to implant a subliminal message into your brain..




~ ~~=#Give me all of your fish!#=~~ ~

jdarling
18-07-2007, 04:18 PM
So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/So_Long,_and_Thanks_for_All_the_Fish)

NecroDOME
18-07-2007, 04:56 PM
So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojydNb3Lrrs) (yes, this is a reply on jdarling)