Well as you all know, the 2006 PGD Annual Competition is coming. But what you may not know is that we will be trying a new format this year. We have had more time this year to plan and organize and because of that we are able to be a bit more creative. So I have decided to tell you all a little bit about it. I personally think it's rather neat and I hope that you guys will enjoy it too.
Last year we had a rather simple, yet successful competition. We had 5 judges, a generally direct set 'gameplay theme' and a single set deadline. Sponsorship was great and the entries were wonderful! I personally enjoyed the attention and the exposure the 2005 Competition got despite it's late and, I'll admit, disorganized advertising campaign. It lasted about 3 months, which seemed to give some people enough time and others no so much. There was definitely some concern about skill level too. But, overall, despite the obvious flaws of such a straightforward contest, I think it was quite enjoyed by all.
This year we are going to try to take lessons learned from last year and approach some problems that people have with such older competitions. First instead of having a single set deadline, and run it like a big free-for-all where it gives only the more skilled developers, we will be having various set deadlines each with a set of goals you complete for points.
Now I will not tell you what these goals are, or what the deadline dates will be either, as this would take away from the fairness of a set start date and equal time management. All teams will have to work to a schedule with a reasonable set of development goals. And I have checked with a few industry professionals to make sure, considering that this is an independent competition and we are not all working the daily grind just for PGD, worry not.
Now after each stage, as I call them, you will not be scored for graphics or sound or stability or even how fun it is. This will not be taken into consideration until the very end after the last stage of goals has been completed and you have submitted your final entry. After that all the completed and on time stage goals will be added together and form your Time Management score category of your total final score.
<u>If you miss a stage goal or even miss a stage deadline, you will not be knocked out of the competition</u>, but you will simply lose the points of goals that you missed. Miss the deadline with no submission in by the set date and you will lose all goal points. This is in place to promote proper time management and will be of great benefit to those who are new to creating and finishing projects for set dates. This will also help prevent those common mistakes of going too far into some set of features or details that are unimportant at the time by sticking to the schedule and getting the goals completed first.
At the end you will have 5 score categories; Graphics, Sound & Music, Stability, Innovation & Fun and of course Time Management. Each with a value of 1/5 of your total end score. There will be 1st, 2nd and 3rd place prize winners just as last year, but another change to this year is that instead of honorary mentions we will instead have 4 'Best Of' categories to promote those that may not have gotten best overall, but at least excelled in on particular category. Those categories are: 'Best Graphics', 'Best Music & Sound', 'Most Innovative' and 'Most On Time'.
The last and final reasoning behind the 2006 format is that it can be hard to spend 4 months on a competition with no feedback on how your doing, or way to gauge your progress. This format will add more of a 'race' feel to the competition and will ultimately be more satisfying overall. Plus it might even help push more finished projects at the end.
I hope you have found this brief insight into the inner thinkings of the rule makers for this competition interesting and I also hope that you will enjoy competing under this new format which we, the organizers, have worked so hard to fine tune.
Reply With Quote
.
Bookmarks