screenshot/download page is up now

I don't know what's going on with the last judge. He told me yesterday that he was only a few minutes away from being done, but for some reason he still hasn't sent me his picks.

Sorry about the delay. *shakes fist at real life*
I've sent my choices now.

These are more or less the notes I made - some are essays and some are bulletpoints, they might seem blunt in some cases - this is not an indication of how I ranked anyone.

Beandog
:- complete entry
:- nice idea
:- update is very fast, perhaps too fast (seizure-enducing mouse pointer!)
:- too easy - got to level 7 & still no challenge
:- get rid of the blinking cursor & hide mouse during the game (or maybe use it as a control method for added difficulty)
:- why didn't I get eaten by the black hole?
:- sound is a plus.

d000hg
:- simple enjoyable gameplay = fun
:- update rate was perhaps too smooth for the style, but not a major issue
:- wish there was more than one level
:- neat building collapses
:- hidden depth - not all buildings need to be defended
:- star collector is too far away to comfortably glance at buildings very often - perhaps move collector closer and make stars a bit faster to compensate.

DrPetter
:- first attempt - read readme, run game, impressed by graphics, watch as my character falls to his death before I've put my fingers on the keys, say "what?".
:- figured it out, though it took a few tries - it could use a restart option. I nearly gave up out of frustration but it turned out to be worth a second look - any kind of log rolling simulation gets my vote :)
:- very convincing console emulation.
:- Sound, it exists at least.

Endurion
:- the kind of game that takes a while to get into but is probably one I'd come back to again and again.
:- Graphics could be better & I was never fully sure why far away sectors were marked as dangerous (flashing red), I never encountered any enemies & had enough fuel to get back to the mothership

GroZZleR
:- ... loose association with theme :)
:- nice explosions
:- instructions are short & sweet, but vague - turns out you can't move left and right, which did confuse me until I figured out where my ship was
:- didn't feel complete, not much of a challenge & it seemed possible to go on forever, given willpower.

matt_j
:- I played this after d000hg's entry but it's a good take on 'catch the falling stars', nicely done - has potential
:- tearing on blue portion of screen
:- possible to win without moving much
:- method of destruction was a cool idea - worms, kind of.

Nagromo
didn't run on my machine

Unhandled Exception: System.DllNotFoundException: Unable to load DLL 'ConsoleLib.dll': This application has failed to start because the application configuration is incorrect. Reinstalling the application may fix this problem. (Exception from HRESULT: 0x800736B1)
at ConsoleLib.ConsoleLib.InitConsole(String title, Int32 width, Int32 height)

at CSConsoleGame.Program.Main(String[] args)

scgrn
didn't run on my machine

The instruction at "0x7c93426d" referenced memory at "0x00000000". The memory could not be "read".
OK to terminate, CANCEL to debug

second attempt:
crashed with no error
I did get to the title screen on the first attempt & it did grab my attention, even looked promising :(

ToohrVyk
:- cool idea, text adventures in text mode
:- slightly loose interpretation of the theme
:- north, NORTH, examine pool, look pool, walk north - no matter what I tried I couldn't figure out the commands. I guess I just suck. Instructions would be nice though - it just wasn't possible to progress (for me anyway) without the walkthrough. I looked at the level data afterwards & got a rough idea but the parser needs to be improved bigtime - perhaps not the best genre choice for the time limit, brownie points for the attempt at something different however.

Specs:
Processor: Pentium4 3.0GHz
Memory: 1024MB pc2700 RAM
GFX: Geforce 4 Ti & latest nV forceware
Sound: SB Live! Value & Onboard audio
OS: Windows XP Pro SP2
Other Software: JRE 1.4, .Net 1.1, .Net 2.0(probably), DX9c (not sure about MDX), OpenAL 1.1


To Nagromo & scgrn: I don't know why I couldn't get your entries running - as far as I know I've got the same specs as capn_midnight's, could you tell me what I need to run them? Maybe it's a .net 2.0 issue, though I'm fairly sure I've got *a* version of 2.0 installed already. By the sounds of things it's a close race so I don't want to potentially wreck the ranking when it turns out to be my fault by not having the correct api or something.

The standard of entries was particularly high this time round, (even from screenies of ones I couldn't get working) probably because of how long it takes to design a sprite/model compared to how long it takes to make an ascii version.. so there's way more time available for tweaking gameplay. Perhaps there's something to this & a lesson to be learnt for future competition themes? ("make a game based on these sprites only" or something)

FANTASTIC job everyone!

[Edited by - DrewGreen on February 15, 2006 11:42:45 AM]

After much deliberation amongst the judges, we have the winners:

1. BeanDog


2. d000hg


3. DrPetter

Quote:Original post by d000hg
Capn, who were the judges and can we see their results? Or is that secret to save them any bother - or did I just miss the announcements in this big long thread?!

yeah, it's an ideological decision on my part. I've been judging various types of competitions for the last 5 years, and the two things I've learned are: always go with your gut feeling, and, telling contestants how you came to a decision offers nothing other than complaints from contestants that didn't win. I'd like to make the judging a double-blind system as well, but I don't quite have those resources yet.

Quote:Original post by DrPetter
I'm fairly surprised I did so well considering how harsh my game apparently is... with comments like this:
"- first attempt - read readme, run game, impressed by graphics, watch as my character falls to his death before I've put my fingers on the keys, say "what?"."
you don't tend to hold much hope ;)

:) just to clarify I didn't hold it against you/anyone else - I made sure to play every entry I could until I'd both won & lost, but always bearing in mind how tight 3 hours can be.
Generally I think of more negative comments than positive ones (they are implicit if there isn't a negative :) ) but try to give at least a hint of constructive criticism. Basically I wasn't expecting to start playing immediately - a pause via a start countdown or menu etc gives me a chance to get ready is all.

edit: I did say some of them were blunt..

[Edited by - DrewGreen on February 15, 2006 1:21:34 PM]