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@fantom
Go for it.

Sorry for the hijacking, @Talon5505. :stuck_out_tongue:

Weā€™re seriously considering a community vote for (effectively) ā€œBest Unfinished Gameā€? Doesnā€™t this strike anyone else as just a tiny bit ludicrous, especially in a community where perhaps three out of four developments never even reach the finishing post?

I also canā€™t honestly think of a more certain way of killing off a few more interesting prospects, when these poll too low against the most popular onesā€“which is bound to happen to someone.

The only community votes that would actually have real meaning would be ā€œBest Official Gameā€ and ā€œBest Hosted Gameā€, and allowing votes for released games only. As an annual thing, it would also be interesting to see if new games released in the past year can surpass the older, more popular ones. Budding developers could look more closely at those and perhaps learn from it.

Anyway, if this ā€œBest Unfinished Gameā€ idea goes ahead I would respectfully ask that Vendetta not be included in the listing. I would most certainly not like to be party to the negative consequence mentioned above, which IMO would definitely happen.

I wasnā€™t going to do something as specific as unfinished category. Something more like best story telling or best characters. I would like this to be fun for everyone, and not a project killer. Any suggestions @Vendetta?

Iā€™d ask that the final vote count in any competition not be revealed. The way IntroComp handled the issue of discouraging WIPs from not being completed due to results, was to only name the winners and give all other entries an honorable mention, listing them in alphabetical order.

Competitions like these can either be fun or game killers, depending on how theyā€™re organized, and I can completely understand @Vendettaā€™s choice not to be included.

I vote for Sabers of Infinity, a cavalry simulator by Cataphrak.

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I think @Vendetta has a point. Because most of the WIPs are in various stages of completion, itā€™s difficult to make a fair comparison between them all.

I think what Iā€™d like to see is something that highlights interesting WIPs and brings them to peopleā€™s attention - Iā€™ve played maybe 3 or 4 WIPs on the forums recently, and to be honest, itā€™s quite difficult sometimes to even find them when some threads begin as pages and pages of story and discussion, but with no demo link.

Itā€™s a shame people donā€™t make more use of the wiki game hub (http://choicescriptdev.wikia.com/wiki/WIP_Games_Hub), as these are easier to update and I know when I go there, Iā€™ll generally find a link for the demo straight away.

You could judge WIPs on specific things like ā€˜Best introductionā€™, ā€˜Best Character generationā€™, ā€˜Most interesting premiseā€™ but again it gets complicated. Self nomination, as mentioned by @Cs_Closet means youā€™d know you were looking at an ā€˜activeā€™ project (and also the author was interested in participating in what essentially will be a ā€˜popularā€™ vote - fragile egos need not apply), but I wouldnā€™t even vote if it meant Iā€™d have to go looking for links for each project.

Best Hosted game
Best non-hosted game (or unofficial)
ā€œHottestā€ work in progress (i.e. a vote on which one weā€™re looking forward to the most)

That would be as far as Iā€™d go. Maybe Best supporting character and/or best villain but I donā€™t know about having it be ā€˜best main characterā€™ for obvious reasons.

Furthermore, I agree with @Drazen 's implications. Once a month = not happening seeing how the release schedule is one a month lolā€¦ I reckon this could be done twice a year, i.e. every six months. Once in January, once in the middle of summer and then everything in those votes are re-voted on in November/December for ā€˜the yearā€™ categories with everything released after the second poll being nominated for the January poll (if that makes sense.)

Um, wow. Am I in a category where the only other competition is Vendetta? My God.

I donā€™t think this is necessarily a bad idea, but it needs refining. For one, authors should nominate themselves. This will be a way to ensure that the authors, at least, believe their work is competition ready. Personally, I still consider Poppies as a first draft, so to go against Vendetta, which has been in development a bit longer, means the playing field is uneven. I havenā€™t had the chance to make the revisions Iā€™d like or to squish the numerous bugs.

I do appreciate being included, however. I think this could be something interesting, if only itā€™s refined.

My idea was going to be that anybody making a game can be nominated, and I would then contact that person to check if they wanted to be in the running.

Thatā€™s not a bad idea. Itā€™d also ensure the games are still active.

@Farside The problem with being dumped in the ā€˜miscellaneousā€™ category is not that you have to compete against Vendetta (ludicrous, since they are completely different styles in virtually every way) itā€™s that any author should be made to feel that they have to ā€œcompeteā€ at all. For all the reasons you touched on there, it really doesnā€™t make any sense until a game is actually finished and launchedā€“at which point it would indeed be fascinating to see how it compares against previous releases, of all types and genres.

The suggestion of an author opt-in at least has merit. That way those with strong feelings on the subject (for whatever reason) can just stay out of it and avoid spoiling everyone elseā€™s fun, and no author need feel obliged to ā€œcompeteā€. Quite frankly, we lose enough promising WIPs as it is without even more authors being made to feel that their game just doesnā€™t stack up.

On the converse to @Vendettaā€™s point about demoralising the authors of games that go un-praised, what, exactly, will be accomplished by a WiP ā€œwinningā€? 'Tis spurious that they would be encouraged further, elsewise they probably wouldnā€™t have possessed the drive to have gotten far enough in development for the game to be considered decent anyway. There really doesnā€™t seem much point in this.

@Drazen The point being for the fun of it! :slight_smile:

Fun? Oh lord, @fantom, I think I might be ill.

Besides, we can set up certain rules for a WIP to be eligible, such as needing a minimum word count or something.

Can I at least help out with the extensions and upgrades of this??? Plus, the reasons I made it are 1. To give authors that extra motivation ā€œIf I work hard I might win!ā€
2. Gov recognition to those great games. 3. Just for authors to see that people really DO like their games.

They might win public accolade, which they would get anyway if their game was decent.

With what youā€™re trying to accomplish, @Talon5505, I donā€™t see why it necessarily has to be a competition. There could easily just be a thread dedicated solely to talking about WIPs, hosted games and anticipated games. It could be a general Favorite CoG thread. There may be a bit of overlap with the gamesā€™ own WIP threads, but this one could be more expansive. It wouldnā€™t necessarily be a competition, and allow authors to gauge how their games are received. Posts could be something along the lines of ā€œBoth ZE and Unnatural have amazing action sequences, but Terminal has interesting innovations that a lot of other games arenā€™t touching on etc etcā€ Or someone could simply comment if thereā€™s a new game thread thatā€™s created, and mention that it looks promising. The examples I gave do lean heavily towards praise, yeah, but criticism is more useful in the gameā€™s actual WIP thread where the author can respond to it.

Idea! I can put reviews on games on here (Even unfinished) To praise them and show how good they are.