Any news when winners are announced?

[??????]

...I'm not sure about Non-RPGs...

Gotta ask... How come? Like, what makes the RPGs worth giving feedback on, but Non-RPG arent?

Not trying to sound rude or cheeky btw - just curious

 

[bgillisp]

This was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. I learned more than I could have ever hoped. And I learned it BY MYSELF. No tutorials.  It's a great feeling.

I'll second that. Just having the contest resulted in me making a game for the first time in about 20 years. Is it perfect? No. But its something, and it dusted the rust off of those programming/creating skills of mine.

I also agree with whitesphere. Maybe just a list of the top 25, in alphabetical order, in each category, by that judges opinion. That way little to no ranking is given away, but people can be directed to more games they may have missed.

 

[NickMakesGames]

Gotta ask... How come? Like, what makes the RPGs worth giving feedback on, but Non-RPG arent?

Not trying to sound rude or cheeky btw - just curious

I'm just guessing, but I imagine it has to do with the judge's level of experience. Given that this event is primarily hosted by the RPG maker community, it's not difficult to imagine that many of the judges are more comfortable playing RPGs and have a better understanding of how to actually pick out the good and bad design choices. Having submitted a non-RPG myself, I'm also a bit miffed about the decision, but individual reviews for each entry were never promised initially, so I'm really not too upset.

 

[Ksi]

The categories were split due to the huge influx of games (and yes, some of us are better at judging one category over the other - myself, I'm not very good at non-RPGs so it would have been a bad fit to make me judge them as it could have been unfair on those who made the games if my inexperience made me judge harsher than necessary. That said, I've played a hell of a lot of RPGs in my life and done quite a bit of judging for other events that are RM-focussed, so that is the **** I do know ;p ). Nessiah and I handled the RPGs and the non-RPGs were handled by other judges. Thus, she and I don't know what they plan to do as it was kept separate to restrict the amount of influence over each others' scores/thoughts. (Besides, we couldn't say anything because we never played the non-RPGs - something I'll personally be looking into doing eventually because I wanna see what was made on that side of the fence too - even if I'm balls at them. I'm far too curious for my own good.)

As Nessy said, though, she and I will more than likely be polishing up reviews for those games that are on RMN (so, you know, if you want to put your game up there... ) I might go so far as to add reviews to the RMW games too since, well, it'd be a waste not to share. Frankly, though, since the winner hasn't been announced yet it'd be best to at least wait until then so that we're not stepping on anyone's toes or pre-emptively showing hands. ^.^

Whatever the case, just know that you should all be proud of yourselves if you made the deadline. It's no mean feat working to create a game within a month and especially a polished piece. Anyone who released something should feel pride in that accomplishment. You all did great.

 

[NickMakesGames]

The categories were split due to the huge influx of games (and yes, some of us are better at judging RPGs - myself, I'm not very good at non-RPGs so it would have been a bad fit to make me play - unfair on those who made the games). Nessiah and I handled the RPGs and the non-RPGs were handled by other judges. Thus, she and I don't know what they plan to do as it was kept separate to restrict the amount of influence over each others' scores/thoughts. (Besides, we couldn't say anything because we never played the non-RPGs - something I'll personally be looking into doing eventually because I wanna see what was made on that side of the fence too - I'm far too curious for my own good.)

As Nessy said, though, she and I will more than likely be polishing up reviews for those games that are on RMN (so, you know, if you want to put your game up there... ) I might go so far as to add reviews to the RMW games too since, well, it'd be a waste not to share. Frankly, though, since the winner hasn't been announced yet it'd be best to at least wait until then so that we're not stepping on anyone's toes or pre-emptively showing hands. ^.^

Whatever the case, just know that you should all be proud of yourselves if you made the deadline. It's no mean feat working to create a game within a month and especially a polished piece. Anyone who released something should feel pride in that accomplishment. You all did great.

Perhaps it might not have been the best idea to limit communications, especially not after finding out that far more submissions were made than expected. Having people be in touch with one another is a critical element of properly executing an event of this scale, and I wouldn't be surprised if some of the delays have been caused by miscommunications or lack of information for the judges.

Anyhow, I'm a bit new to the community, so I'm not familiar with RMN or RMW as abbreviations. I assume they stand for RPG Maker Net and RPG Maker Web respectively? I'd love to know where to upload my non-RPG game so that it has a chance of getting a little bit more feedback.

And of course, thank you for the words of encouragement. After the two months of stress, I had kind of forgotten how significant it is that I (and 700+ competitors) managed to create fully featured digital experiences over a mere thirty days. Not many people can say that they've finished a game at all, and all of us really *should* be proud to have done so in so short a period of time.

 

[whitesphere]

That's really what I've won from this experience --- crucial experience at taking even a small project through to completion on a tight deadline.  Since many of us are making our games for our own enjoyment, we don't have a deadline and just add things "whenever."  And, often we get bored of a game or frustrated with it and drop it completely.  I'm sure there are so many RPG Maker games people have started but never completed.

These types of events force you to be focused, to make tough design decisions on what to keep and drop.   Otherwise, you won't complete a game by the hard deadline.  I'm sure professional game developers are constantly under that kind of pressure:

"Yes, we know you're only half done with the game, but it ships by October so we can have it for the Christmas rush!" 

"But that's only 3 months from now and we've taken 2 years so far." 

"I know.  The investors are very impatient and demand a new game release, or they'll pull our funding.  Cut whatever you have to in order to make the deadline.  But make it good!"

Sort of like the Atari 2600 ET fiasco.  "Good news!  We got the ET license!"  "Great!  What's the bad news?" "You have a month to make the game." 

 

[Touchfuzzy]

smaller contests and events on the forum here often have no conclusion or winners announced, but I wasn't expecting a big event such as this to be the same.

???? I actually don't know of any contest that no one won. There were times when winners were announced late, and there are times where people didn't notice it was announced (once on one of the ones on the steam forums, I announced one through the steam announcements and several people didn't notice and complained)

Also, I'm probably not going to do reviews for all the Non-RPGs. That is a lot of games to write reviews for. I will give individual feedback to people who want it if they ask me specifically, but writing full reviews for every single one seems like a bit of a waste of time unless the individual wants me to.

On the larger subject of delays. There were several causes.

1. Overwhelmingly larger number of games than expected. It took me a week and a half just to do initial screening on Non-RPGs, and I wanted to die when I got done. Not because they were that bad, but because you try playing 300 games for 5-10 minutes each in a row without it getting to you.

2. Most of our judges also do other things for the company. For instance, the blog had very very few updates during the contest, because I had to put something on hold to do the entry judging. But I couldn't put Facebook, Twitter, and our Support emails on hold (two of the 4 judges do support)

3. One of the judges suffered from some unexpected health problems. I'm not going to talk about that much more, because its not my business to tell, but that is there. I also had to suddenly move in the middle of the judging period (I had originally had a half month extension to my lease so I could have overlap with my new place, and would have moved after judging was over, and my old landlady backed out with about 2 weeks left, long story of frustration).

4. We are also waiting on the celebrity and Humble judges. The 4 company/community judges are finished at this time. I think I still need to play the top 5 RPGs, but that should take me about a morning.

This is easily the largest contest we've ever run, and I won't say it was run perfectly, and I agree the delays are not ideal, but please, if you could have a bit more patience, I promise we will have things finished soon.

 

[C-C-C-Cashmere (old)]

TL;DR The judges have lives.


Edit: Too.

 

[seita]

???? I actually don't know of any contest that no one won. There were times when winners were announced late, and there are times where people didn't notice it was announced (once on one of the ones on the steam forums, I announced one through the steam announcements and several people didn't notice and complained)

To be fair, it's not like I did research and looked up the contests to make my statement, it was just from personal experience when I entered contests/events. The one's I remember entering off the top of my head were last years Release Something Weekend, and two previous Game Making Drives. From all three that I entered, badges weren't given out after the events had finished.

Of course, those could be considered more as events and less as contests, and it's not like I'm sour about them, it's simply the impression I got from participating. Also, thanks for the clarifications, I'm sure the participants just wanted a little more transparency regarding the delay.

 

[Cinnamon]

Thank you for elaborating, Touchfuzzy. Those are all legitimate reasons for delaying the results. Actually, I never (and I think most of us) were upset about the delays themselves. It's the lack of communication with the contestants that has generated the negative buzz. Here on the forums the staff is very helpful and communicative, but most contestants don't check here. A quick 5 minute update of the main site would go a long way.

 

[don.dudong@gmail.com]

280 out of 700! Wow.

 

[B.Ultimus]

Whatever the case, just know that you should all be proud of yourselves if you made the deadline. It's no mean feat working to create a game within a month and especially a polished piece. Anyone who released something should feel pride in that accomplishment. You all did great.

This. I wish more people focused on this, and less on the delayed results. This was a very successful for me, no matter who wins. This was a major victory.

 

[Cinnamon]

Of course, but it'll still be a relief to have the results.

 

[Archeia]

To be fair, it's not like I did research and looked up the contests to make my statement, it was just from personal experience when I entered contests/events. The one's I remember entering off the top of my head were last years Release Something Weekend, and two previous Game Making Drives. From all three that I entered, badges weren't given out after the events had finished.

Of course, those could be considered more as events and less as contests, and it's not like I'm sour about them, it's simply the impression I got from participating. Also, thanks for the clarifications, I'm sure the participants just wanted a little more transparency regarding the delay.

Wait what? I remember we handed out badges for RSW in RMN (I don't recall RMW having a badge feature when RSW was done) and you should've gotten yours. As for GMD, I've been out of the loop from that 'mini-event' (it means it's not official by any means) and wasn't able to hand out badges and that's purely my fault

Aside from the delays Touchfuzzy listed, we also had one where people would update their downloads and the sick judge was the only one who has the initial versions. Because of their health issues, we couldn't get them until way later. So people don't update your games without keeping the contest version >:1

 

[EternalShadow]

Aside from the delays Touchfuzzy listed, we also had one where people would update their downloads and the sick judge was the only one who has the initial versions. Because of their health issues, we couldn't get them until way later. So people don't update your games without keeping the contest version >:1

How did that happen? Did people disable their download link from their file hoster, and link to a new version in the text of their game page?

 

[Archeia]

How did that happen? Did people disable their download link from their file hoster, and link to a new version in the text of their game page?

They linked to an external site and change the download from there or something in some cases.

I don't have access to the IGMC website so I'm not sure how the dl works there or if you can upload to the site itself. So I'm guessing they have the option to delete it?

 

[EternalShadow]

They linked to an external site and change the download from there or something in some cases.

I don't have access to the IGMC website so I'm not sure how the dl works there or if you can upload to the site itself. So I'm guessing they have the option to delete it?

On the IGMC site, you put in a link to your download, which is hosted on an external website. However, you weren't able to delete this download link after the deadline date. Seems they deleted their externally-hosted files when they wanted to update their game. Ouch.

 

[Cinnamon]

That's why I uploaded my game to Mediafire instead of my own server. With the latter it would've been incredibly easy to update the game post-deadline.

You guys are being lovely responding to our questions regarding the contest. For a second there I almost thought the contest would just sizzle out with no results, ha.

 

[C-C-C-Cashmere (old)]

That's why I uploaded my game to Mediafire instead of my own server. With the latter it would've been incredibly easy to update the game post-deadline.

You guys are being lovely responding to our questions regarding the contest. For a second there I almost thought the contest would just sizzle out with no results, ha.

Well I'm pretty sure you can edit a Mediafire file.

 

[Cinnamon]

Well I'm pretty sure you can edit a Mediafire file.

I'm pretty sure you can't falsify the local upload date & time on MF.