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AthenaOfDelphi
09-04-2009, 09:34 AM
Hi all,

Well, it's clear there is a desire amongst you all for a big competition this year. Whilst there has been an increasing amount of chatter about it, no one has really stepped up to the plate and said 'I'll get it sorted'.

So, whilst I may regret this, I'm going to try and get things organised. I've started writing a back end system for entrants, scoring etc., and I'm already making noises with some past sponsors to try and get some prizes sorted.

But, I'd like you, the people who will be entering to provide me with some information so that I can discuss it with Savage and Traveler and finalise the competition plans... I need to know when you would like the competition to run, what theme, and how you think it should be organised (competition specified stage goals, entrant specified stage goals, or one long run to the finish - personally I would go for entrant specified stage goals because I think it allows you to pace your own work, completing things in a sensible order, but most importantly instills some professionalism in the competition).

So what do I want from you in this thread... a simple single post... this is NOT a discussion thread. Simply answer my questions above.

Thanks

Edit reason: turned into sticky

AthenaOfDelphi
09-04-2009, 09:41 AM
One other thing... no competition is complete without judges, so do we have any volunteers? Unless of course you want the entrants to judge?

marmin
09-04-2009, 10:28 AM
(I moved this post to another thread, because it might be a discussion).

pstudio
09-04-2009, 12:33 PM
Personally I would prefer the competition to start during the summer. Many of us possible contesters are students and don't really have time before.
I then wouldn't mind if the contest lasted about 6 months. This would allow you to work on and off on your game. We all know, that sometimes you just don't have the time or energy to work on your game, and I don't think people should be punished for taking a rest and charging up the batteries.
If you insist on having stage deadlines it should be the competitor who decides what the deadlines are for his/her own project. And there should be about a month between each deadline. But I don't think that people should be scored on how well they succeed on adhering to the deadlines. The deadlines should only be there to help us all through the development progress.

Mirage
09-04-2009, 01:06 PM
I would like a themed competition with stages (competition specified or by entrants) any time this year.
The competition theme should be specified immediately before the compo I think.

WILL
09-04-2009, 05:39 PM
I'll judge. I have 2 machines, a gamepad and both modern versions of Windows at my disposal now. ;)

Also I can help advise you on some of the pitfalls and helpful tips that both Dom and I ran into running 2005 - 2007. But beyond that I cannot do too much. I really need to focus on my school and training.

What I've observed...

Stages: Some like it, but most get bogged down by it. I'd get rid of it personally, it had it's purpose in the past.

Competitors: Make everyone register with real names and contact information and agree to a small, but specific legal agreement to cover your butt! Dom and I had a big incident about this in the Big Boss. I won't get into the details, but lets say a legal agreement would have saved us a headache. Also registering lets you count the interested. You really do need these numbers to gauge the event's success and the community's reception.

Judges: Don't look only in the PGD community, Dev-Mag and other groups would probably be more than willing to do the job as well. Also machine specs of judges will dictate tech level in the competition too.

Sponsorship: Don't just go looking for prizes alone. Also see if they would be willing to front some cash to help create other prizes and advertisements too! ie. T-shirts, award mugs, etc... Be sure to ask all previous sponsors, especially the loyal ones that were with the event since 2005. Also tangible prizes speak a bit louder than software.

Themes: You can either go with the PGD Annual tradition where you pick and aspect of gameplay OR you can make a change and do something else. For my personal feeling on it; I'd like to do casual games/thinking games OR for the non-tradition perhaps go with a genre like Arcade, board game or Platform/Shooter.

Event Timeframe & Length: I'd say 3 - 4 months is optimal. But this depends on when it's held. I don't know if the summer is better or worse for me. I'll be moving (possibly across country) sometime after July. Then again if I'm judging then add 3 to 4 months to that... it might not matter. :)

Traveler
09-04-2009, 06:53 PM
I can only offer one machine, but I trust it'll do the job well.
Count me in as judge #2 8)

ps. Since a competition is taking a more solid shape now, I've stickyfied the two main threads and demoted all previous Annual compo threads.

pjpdev
09-04-2009, 07:35 PM
I'll be a judge... I have only one PC, but it will do the job - running Windows XP and Linux...

I can also help with a bit of planning on the compo, if that's not a problem. :S

igel457
10-04-2009, 08:46 AM
I'd really love to see a competition this year (summer) - I already had in mind writing a game during the summer holidays, so it would be perfect if I could also use it for the annual. It will also help me to improve my graphics library.

I would prefer a competition without topical limitations, but to prevent people from posting stuff they prepared years ago, some kind of progress should be shown during the competition process.

NecroDOME
12-04-2009, 03:16 PM
Theme: Something like 'arcade' (not remake), boss fights, lots of action as long as you have some freedom.

Time span: Around 3-4 months, stage-based.

Maybe something to think of: give everyone that joins the same graphics, sound and music, and let them make a game out of it :) (theme would be free, but content is fixed)

chronozphere
12-04-2009, 05:34 PM
I might be able to do some judging, but I can't promise anything. My exams have a higher priority and I don't know how much time I have during the summer. Moreover, I don't know how much time it takes to judge.

I also need to know whether a judge can join the competition. If not, I think I'll rather join the compo instead of being a judge, because I've never joined a PGD compo before.

I don't think the compo needs a theme (at least not a restrictive one). I think more people will be able to join then. However, I really like "The big race".

It would also be nice if we could ask Delgine to sponsor us. A DeleD 2.0 license would be a nice prize. DeleD 2.0 will be release in a few day's (they mentioned easter, but I'd give them some extra time, if they need it). It has basic skeleton based animation. :)

pjpdev
12-04-2009, 07:02 PM
Personally I don't think a judge should be able to enter the compo. Others might not like that idea very much. For instance, if a judge wins the compo the other competitors will think he/she won only because of being a judge...

AthenaOfDelphi
12-04-2009, 08:32 PM
Judges will not be allowed to enter the competition they are judging. However, there is scope for the competitors to score each others entries, but I don't think the annual competition should work on that basis.

chronozphere
12-04-2009, 09:50 PM
Okay, that's clear. I'd rather just join the compo then. :)

Hope there will be enough people to judge. We need only 3 or 4 people do we?

JSoftware
12-04-2009, 10:48 PM
If you need judges, when the compo is getting closer, just drop me a message. If you don't need any I'll be participating. Unless it becomes a very strict competition

I don't really care that much about prizes. Mugs or t-shirts or something like that would be enough for me :)

AthenaOfDelphi
12-04-2009, 10:48 PM
I was trying to keep discussion in this thread to a minimum :-)

But, the last competition, I was one of the judges and we had 3 people (I think it was Clootie, Sascha and me).

Ñuño Martínez
12-04-2009, 11:54 PM
If I have time I'll participate. I prefer summer.

Will teams be allowed?

WILL
13-04-2009, 05:15 PM
Teams have always been allowed, I can't see why that would change. :)

Luuk van Venrooij
13-04-2009, 05:33 PM
Count me out for an individual game entry:) Currently working on a new game at work 5 days a week so thats ennough for me 8) If still needed I can judge if not I am interessed in teaming up with someone and writing subsystems like rendering (OpenGL or Direct3D) or physics (Newton). No actual gamecode:).

Ñuño Martínez
14-04-2009, 08:22 AM
Great. Then count me in!

pjpdev
05-05-2009, 07:30 PM
Hey people... Any news here? :)

AthenaOfDelphi
05-05-2009, 08:03 PM
Well, I'm working on the competition management system for recording entries etc. and I'm trying to secure some prizes/sponsorship for the competition... seems that this part is taking longer than I would like and I've already had the first indication that the global economic situation may make getting prizes more difficult.

So, stay tuned.

pjpdev
05-05-2009, 08:16 PM
Thanks for the info ;)

Yeah, thought that the economic crisis would be a pain...

Lilmariz
11-05-2009, 07:43 PM
Hi

I know this is my first post, but i've been reading this forum for months. You can realy get good ideas/things from hear.
As for the topic - although I haven't created any fully working games (just some basic things), I would also like to participate. It would be a good start for people like me, who hasn't any deadlines or anything. As I have noticed - if you have a deadline, you work more productive ;) So keep it up :) I would even participate if the only prize would be a PDF with a diploma ;)

Ñuño Martínez
12-05-2009, 08:41 AM
So there are some people who wants to participate. That's great! :yes:

WILL
13-05-2009, 12:14 AM
Oh I'm sure there are more than "some". lol When a PGD Annual competitions event start, folks come out of the woodworks. Each year it gets biger and bigger. I'm anxious to see how it turns out this year with the new dedicated website. 8)

Ñuño Martínez
13-05-2009, 09:02 AM
Just a question: Can we use some C code? I'm asking it because I have some problems with my game library and may be I need to write the engine/renderer in C. ::)

AthenaOfDelphi
13-05-2009, 09:37 AM
Traditionally, we allow the use of third party libraries, providing the rest (and the majority) of the game is developed with Pascal. That said... if you need to finish something and you can do it with C... why can't you do it with Pascal?

Ñuño Martínez
13-05-2009, 10:30 AM
I'm trying to add OpenGL support to Allegro.pas but I can't with my limited knowledge. I'm still trying (http://www.pascalgamedevelopment.com/forum/index.php?topic=5784.msg46776#msg46776) but I'm asking because I can use C to initialize my engine, put that C code in a shared object/dll and use it on Pascal.

Lilmariz
29-05-2009, 02:56 PM
So...
It's been almost 2 months since the first post in this topic. How is the organization of PGD 2009 going ?

AthenaOfDelphi
29-05-2009, 07:29 PM
Well...

I've spent much of the last two months getting a job. Now I've got that sorted I can hopefully finish off organising the competition. I've got some prizes lined up, working on more, Will has been working on some of the artwork for me (Thanks) and I'm working on the system to manage the competition submissions/scoring etc.

So...

The competition is in much better shape now than it was 2 months ago before I started trying to get it sorted and obviously, it's in much better shaper than last year when we didn't have one.

paul_nicholls
29-05-2009, 11:06 PM
Congratulations on getting a job :)

And great work so far with organizing the competition :)

cheers,
Paul

NecroDOME
30-05-2009, 01:20 PM
Good to hear you found a job and the competition system is going well!!

AthenaOfDelphi
30-05-2009, 02:47 PM
Thanks guys.

dazappa
30-05-2009, 05:12 PM
I trolled around here a bit before signing up, starting back a year or so ago. I didn't see the PGD going on then (From what it seems, you didn't even have one last year), but I watched the 2007 videos and I'd probably participate if you got this going (Within the next 1-2 months). I'm no expert, or even great, pascal coder but it's a language I love.

I don't care about the prizes and don't expect to win, so as a note for any future PGDs you hold, even if you don't have prizes available I'm fairly confident most people would still enter.

I hope you send out an email newsletter or something, because I don't plan on checking this forum every day to see if the PGD started.

AthenaOfDelphi
30-05-2009, 05:50 PM
Whilst prizes may not be your motivation for entering, they do play a part. They also help promote the competition as the providers of the prizes normally mention them on their website, so they are as much a marketing activity as they are bonus for the winners.

In terms of letting people know, there are only two places news will be posted... here and on the competition site itself. At the moment, I'm aiming for a July start, so you don't have to check everyday... at least not yet.

Wizard
31-05-2009, 11:00 AM
Congratz on getting a job Athena 8)

I agree, prizes (no matter how small or big) should be part of the competition :)

Lilmariz
01-06-2009, 11:19 AM
I somehow found the site of the competition - looked good. Currently I can't find the site anymore :(

Traveler
01-06-2009, 02:36 PM
Mind you, there has not been an announcement yet. Rest assured, there will be one, posted on various sites, together with all the information you need to participate.

AthenaOfDelphi
01-06-2009, 02:42 PM
The competition site resides at www.pgdannual.com. The last time I checked, it was working without any problems.

Lilmariz
01-06-2009, 04:08 PM
Yep - that's the site :) Looks and works great :)