2015 Indie Game Maker Contest, what, when, how?

[Sieginder Niederlage]

You know, I've checked the Indie Game Maker Contest in the forums but I never really understood it. I don't mean to bother, but could anyone explain in detail? I MIGHT participate but I'm not too sure...

Who organizes this contest? Are there any prerequisites I need to fulfill before entering? Do I have to work solo? If not, then how much people can help me? What's the time limit? 

There's a lot of things I don't know and are really worrying me, I'm sorry for asking, but even if I act all high and mighty (or haughty or simply putting on a public persona, depending on your point of view) I'm a total n00b when it comes to this.

 

[??????]

Last year the IGMC was a contest held by I think* humble bundle and degica (could be wrong on that)

It was a contest where by you where given one month to make and submit a game which was to be judged by a predetermined panel.

There was various give-aways during the contest and also a very handsome grand prize of $10,000 (with multiple other cash prizes as well)

During the last contest you where allowed to work solo or as part of a team, but could only enter a maximum of 2 games.

Hope this info helps

 

[Formal Complaint]

I'd check last year's rules, I don't believe they have have announced this year's yet.

 

[Ms Littlefish]

It's probably going to be a hot minute before the contest is officially announced this year. The post made this week was just about the launch of the website that will be hosting it all. So, much more information will be coming soon. Don't fret quite yet. Much too soon!

Though based on last year. 

• you have a month
• you can work with a team or solo
• Degica organized it, I believe
• entry must not be started before the launch date of the contest but assets made ahead of time are fine, it is the actual game that cannot be started before hand
• judges will play for an hour so that's about how long the game should be
• for all intense purposes this would be commercial so you'd have to clear resources and scripts per their TOS

 

[??????]

@thefish - Good job on mentioning that commercial assets are required, I completely forgot about that one.

 

[Sieginder Niederlage]

Is there a limit to the number of teammates? I mean, I'm not going to walk in with an army of people (I don't even have that level of charisma), but were teams of 10 people too much in the last contest?

Assets could be made or acquired beforehand? Assets are music, tilesets, scripts, etc, right? If so then that's nice...

Now that I think about it, do you think the plot and storyline can be prepared in advance?

 

[EternalShadow]

To be frank, there's nothing actually stopping you plotting out the entire game and story in advance. The contest isn't about rushing things (though it sort of was last year, as we never knew about it until it actually started lol) - the base rule pertaining to that was that you cannot open RM and begin MAKING the game until the contest start date.


I do not believe there was a teammate limit last year.

 

[LostFonDrive]

Now that I think about it, do you think the plot and storyline can be prepared in advance?

Most likely. It's just mentally conceptualizing, really.

 

[Sieginder Niederlage]

Thank you everyone.

Eh...that about clears any doubts I had...I still have some, but those are about what should I do...No wait, there's a new one, but it's more of a random thought than a question...
How do the judges know if we opened RM or not before the start date to make the game? Do they have some sort of program? Do they take the contestant's word for it? I don't plan on cheating like that (or at all really), but I just wonder.

 

[EternalShadow]

The game project says (Much like any other file does)

 

[Ms Littlefish]

If you right click and hit "properties" on a project it says creation date. I guess there may be ways around that but I'd be too dumb to know what they might be.

 

[Touchfuzzy]

All questions about the IGMC that you want official answers for should probably be directed here. Just trying to keep all official answers to one thread on the site hosting the contest. I'm trying to answer as many as I can, some things are not entirely concrete though, or may be things I can't reveal.

(I am Nick Palmer by the way. The only reason I kept the Touchfuzzy name here is that all the people who knew me through older rm fan sites felt it was weird for me to switch away from Touchfuzzy).

 

[Sieginder Niederlage]

@Touchfuzzy: Alright I got it, If I have any more doubts I'll post them there. Thank you.

@Ms Littlefish and Hotfirelegend: I just thought that a special method would be used since, yes, there are plenty of ways to circumvent that. Heck, I once did it on accident (honest) with a word file in an old computer that had it's internal clock out of sync, and belonged to a friend of mine. It was a team project for "Development and Characteristics of Electronic Documents" (really fancy and presumptuous way of saying "Microsoft Word for Dummies") class, and the teacher began ranting about it but the bell sounded and he said something along the lines of "Look. Next time, bring it with a real date, okay?".