This is kind of drifting away from the sort of contest that I had in mind. :)
I probably should have been more clear about the goals I had when I came up with this. They are:
Get some exposure for some of the under-utilized FOSS game engines out there. One thing I've noticed about the open source game development community is that we have a ton of engines and not really all that many games. People go out of their way to make their engines extensible, and it's very rare that someone will actually pick one of those engines up and make a game out of it. Most people decide to write a game from scratch (or mostly from scratch). Mind you, I'm not saying that there's anything wrong with that, but I wanted a contest that would encourage people to turn over a new leaf and put together an open source game using an existing engine -- particularly given how many good engines are already out there.
Keep it short and simple. The other common problem I see with FOSS games is the "My gigantic MMORPG is going to be awesome!" problem. Now, in saying this, I have to give a nod to the successful FOSS MMORPG projects out there, but they're definitely a rare breed. My point is that there are far more overambitious, failed projects out there than there are successful ones. Now, a contest for creating a short game will result in a number of "throw-away" games, as you called them, but I would posit that a contest for creating a larger and more ambitious game would result in a similar number of throw-away concepts and very few actual finished games, if any at all. Plus, OGA is still a fairly small community. We're a lot more likely to get a solid showing if we ask for small projects that one developer can finish in a week or two, rather than big projects that will take a whole team many months.
Help build a mod community. Closed-source games manage to build up huge mod communities. Why can't we do the same?
Finished games, even small ones, generate a lot more publicity than unfinished ones.
I'd like to state for the record that, despite what I said above, I'm not against having a more open-ended game contest where people are allowed to design and build an ambitious game from scratch. It's just not what I was intending with this particular contest, and it's something that I think we ought to do. I just think it should be a different contest is all. :)
With regard to SDL, I'd hesitate to call it a game creation framework, since it really only does low-level stuff. Pygame handles some higher-level things, such as sprites.
Okay, this works for me. Since you put the prize money forward, I'm going to match it. The pot stands at $50.
Since we're doing this for a cash prize, we need to make an up-front decision about who is going to be judging. Obviously, contest judges can't be eligible to win. :)
If you'd like to judge it yourself, that's fine. Just state in advance what criteria you'll be judging on and the scale you'll be using. :)
Honestly, I've tried cash prizes before, and I haven't really gotten many more entries than when there wasn't a cash prize.
That being said, that was a year ago, and we were getting a fifth of the traffic that we are now, so it might be a better proposition.
The other problem, though, is that while I have enough money to pay people to do art, I don't have enough money to get most people to enter the contest at the risk of not being paid. :)
Interesting. There's always a possibility that I subconsciously lifted it from somewhere, in which case, if someone can identify where it's from, I'll take the song down. That said, it follows a relatively common chord progression:
I-IV-I-V-I-IV-V-I
It could be that it sounds familiar because of that.
If it continues to give you problems, just email the files to me along with the licenses, title and description and I'll put them up for you. Sorry for the trouble.
This is kind of drifting away from the sort of contest that I had in mind. :)
I probably should have been more clear about the goals I had when I came up with this. They are:
I'd like to state for the record that, despite what I said above, I'm not against having a more open-ended game contest where people are allowed to design and build an ambitious game from scratch. It's just not what I was intending with this particular contest, and it's something that I think we ought to do. I just think it should be a different contest is all. :)
Thoughts?
Ah, didn't notice that. Maybe he meant October or November 1?
With regard to SDL, I'd hesitate to call it a game creation framework, since it really only does low-level stuff. Pygame handles some higher-level things, such as sprites.
Okay, this works for me. Since you put the prize money forward, I'm going to match it. The pot stands at $50.
Since we're doing this for a cash prize, we need to make an up-front decision about who is going to be judging. Obviously, contest judges can't be eligible to win. :)
If you'd like to judge it yourself, that's fine. Just state in advance what criteria you'll be judging on and the scale you'll be using. :)
Peace,
Bart
Honestly, I've tried cash prizes before, and I haven't really gotten many more entries than when there wasn't a cash prize.
That being said, that was a year ago, and we were getting a fifth of the traffic that we are now, so it might be a better proposition.
The other problem, though, is that while I have enough money to pay people to do art, I don't have enough money to get most people to enter the contest at the risk of not being paid. :)
Addendum: If you've listened to my two over versions of this song, you might be remembering those. :)
http://opengameart.org/content/jump-and-run-tropical-mix
http://opengameart.org/content/jump-and-run-8-bit
Interesting. There's always a possibility that I subconsciously lifted it from somewhere, in which case, if someone can identify where it's from, I'll take the song down. That said, it follows a relatively common chord progression:
I-IV-I-V-I-IV-V-I
It could be that it sounds familiar because of that.
As suggested, a rock remix of Jump and Run. I give you Jump Higher Run Faster:
http://opengameart.org/content/jump-higher-run-faster-jump-run-miniboss-mix
If it continues to give you problems, just email the files to me along with the licenses, title and description and I'll put them up for you. Sorry for the trouble.
Bart
Okay, the deed is done. :)
I've set you as the owner, so you should be able to edit it and add a description.
Thanks, and sorry for the trouble. I wish I could figure out what's going on, but I didn't have any issues uploading it.
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