Heart of the OHR Contest 2016

My game seems to take 45 mins to an hour and a half at most.

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the quirky recurring villian of the ohr community

My friend played for a couple of hours before finishing (he spent a while grinding and farming), but I estimate about 1 hour at the most.

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All right, contest is officially closed. Thanks to all who have participated. For anyone who's so close to the finish line but ran a few hours late, or for those of you who are tempted to tie off a portion of your game at a reasonable stopping point that's at least 30 minutes into the game but haven't done so yet because you've spent so much time trying to finish up later portions (Nathan Karr, Harlock, Giz, for example), please respond to this thread tonight and I may give you a late pass for those early sections, if you still want to toss your names into the pot. Otherwise, we'll see you guys in the next contest.

As usual, we have a decent round of entries, with some official, and some not. The official games are those that the authors have expressed direct interest in submitting to the contest, and are eligible for prizes. The unofficial games are those that fulfill the requirements of the Heart of the OHR contest (with length being the possible exception--don't know yet), and have been released during the contest window either here on Slime Salad or Castle Paradox, but have not been claimed as entries by the authors. I'm listing them here for reference, but it is not necessary to vote on them (though, you certainly can, as I will still put them in the rankings if they receive enough votes). Please note that voting on an unofficial game is helpful for ranking purposes, but unofficial games will not receive prizes. Only if the author comes forward and approves his game as an official entry will he be eligible for prizes. The status of an unofficial game can become official at any point during the voting process, so keep an eye on this list for changes. Because the status can change, I still recommend you cast votes on unofficial games.

With that, here are the games. Let me know if there's anything missing from this list.

Officially:

The Successor's Legacy (Demo)
by Mammothstuds
http://www.slimesalad.com/forum/viewgame.php?p=121526

Dragon Chaser
by DragonChaserKev
http://www.slimesalad.com/forum/viewgame.php?p=121794
Note: I don't have enough information on this to know if this is a rerelease, an original release, or how much of the content that's here is new in the case that it is a rerelease. If anyone knows anything, let me know. I'll explore this further and make changes to this list as needed.

Quodia
by Froginator
http://www.slimesalad.com/forum/viewgame.php?p=120432
Note: I think this is official, but I can't be certain. Froginator, can you verify?

Grapnes 2: Kepnalcide
by Taco Bot
http://www.slimesalad.com/forum/viewgame.php?p=123825
Note: I'm not sure if this is new or a rerelease. Info please?

Sour City
by Phil
http://www.slimesalad.com/forum/viewgame.php?p=123830

You Need a Hero
by Idontknow
http://www.slimesalad.com/forum/viewgame.php?p=123860

Labyrinthilium
by Pheonix
http://www.slimesalad.com/forum/viewgame.php?p=124084

Bale
by guo
http://www.slimesalad.com/forum/viewgame.php?p=124082

Dark Planet
by Ichiro
http://www.slimesalad.com/forum/viewgame.php?p=123959 (gamelist file)
https://gitlab.com/lunarlabs/darkplanet (most recent file)

Surfasaurus
by RedMaverickZero
http://redtrianglegames.com/surfasaurus.html

Unofficially:

Note, these games were released during the contest window and satisfy the core RPG requirement, but have not been officially entered into the Heart of the OHR by the games' creators. I'm listing them here for reference. They can be voted on, but the authors must approve their entries for them to take any prizes.

Fruity Quest
by DarkLordCale
http://www.castleparadox.com/gamelist-display.php?game=764

Note: This can be found on Castle Paradox, and is really, truly old school. It also seems short. And offensive.

Again, if there are any other games that should be on this list that aren't, please let me know as soon as possible.

Unless any of these games take too long to finish, voting will close on August 31, 2016. Keep an eye on this thread for updates. I'll extend the voting deadline as needed. I plan to play these games over the next few days, so I'll have a better sense of how long the voting period needs to stay open for as I go. Also, just a reminder, if you have a game in the contest, I urge you to vote.

I will also have submission prizes ready for you shortly. Keep an eye on your private messages in the next few days.

Don't forget, voting is based on a grading system, not a competition system. When you vote from 1 to 10, you're scoring the game. I don't care how one game measures up to another. Just give me scores. 1 is the worst, 10 is the best. Here's a better way to think of it:

Low / High
1 / 2 - Terrible
3 / 4 - Below Average
5 / 6 - Average
7 / 8 - Above Average
9 / 10 - Excellent

No decimal votes! Whole numbers only.

Rate honestly, even if it's your own game. Vote for as many games as you can. Games that receive fewer votes are more likely to get average scores leavened in to balance out those with the lion's share of votes.

I'll announce winners shortly after voting ends. Good luck to all participants.

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Oh, and just a quick note, The Wobbler has agreed to host the contest results again. He also informs me that Surfasaurus will need lots of time given its use of the real time clock, so I'd recommend you all start on that one today. It may take until August 31st to get a fair impression of it. Not sure, but that's what it sounds like. RMZ, can you concur?

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Grapnes 2 is a new release.

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Sent from my iPhone

Surfasaurus is a game that you really have to live with to get everything out of. Wobbler is 100% right. You can't get far at all in the game if you play it for 30 minutes for one day. I realize most people will play it to cross it off the list of games to judge, but you can't enter your 1st tournament until roughly 5 days of consistent play I would say. I hope that helps Pepsi.

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Check out Red Triangle Games!

Going to hold a dissenting opinion and say that Surfasaurus, an Animal Crossing-esque game with the veneer of a surfing game, has no place being in a contest nominally about RPGs.

Do we need to have a Heart of the Heart of the OHR at this point? Or do we go the direction this contest seems to be going anyway, and just automatically enter every game that's released in the contest's timeframe?

Surfasaurus does not have any battles that I can foresee, but it does have a progression system using stats, which, as far as I'm concerned, classifies it as an RPG. It does stretch the nature of the Heart of the OHR, I will admit, as the heart of the OHR will undoubtedly remind us of the kind of game that was released sometime between 1998 and 2002. However, we can't claim the heart of the OHR is strictly stuck in that time capsule, and just as the engine evolves, so too can the heart of it evolve. I don't see anything wrong with Surfasaurus as an entry. As far as I'm concerned, it has the right elements to qualify it as an RPG, if not the Final Fantasy style we're used to. But, as always, I'm open to debate for future versions of the contest. I didn't want to accept T4R4D1DDL3 in 2014, but others convinced me that it fit the spirit of an OHR game from 1998, so I allowed it. I won't disqualify Surfasaurus from the running this year, but I'm open to arguments for why games like it shouldn't be allowed in 2018. Sound off!

Regarding a comment made in IRC about Fruity Quest, my contention is that if you don't want to support the game as an unofficial entry, then don't vote for it. Games that receive too few or no votes at all will be removed from the list. I don't have a problem with that. I present all games released in the window that feature qualities found in a traditional OHR game as a consideration to what this contest is about, and as a consideration to those who make games in the spirit of the OHR's original intention, but I make no defense for terrible games that no one wants to play that was never released specifically for the Heart of the OHR as necessary for the contest. I list it simply to let you guys know it's there. Seriously, don't cast a vote on it if you don't want it represented. If no one votes for it, I will remove it from the rankings. However, I did send its author a PM asking if he wants to make it official. If he responds in time and says yes, then it will be ranked regardless.

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Afraid it won't help; I doubt I have ten full minutes of game so far even if you inspect every object and never run from the random battles (set to every step or every other step on some maps, but the maps are all small and this was mostly because I found it easier to test with than textbox-initiated fights).

Hopefully the game will be complete by my birthday this year - the 13th anniversary of the Handshake update with which I started using this engine (13 is my favorite two-digit number). And then I can leave it on the gamelist and just enter it into the next contest if I have nothing new worth submitting by then.

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Remeber: God made you special and he loves you very much. Bye!

I've only played Animal Crossing for a few short sessions. I don't really think that game had any conflict, aside from I think bees hurting you. Surfasaurus has an ongoing story and it has conflict. You don't resolve said conflict in the traditional sense of fighting, but you do resolve it in a non-violent way. And like a traditional RPG, the story doesn't advance until the conflict is resolved. Thanks for keeping it in the contest Pepsi.

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Check out Red Triangle Games!

Hey guys,

To all of you who participated this year, I just sent out your links to your entry prizes. Tell me if you did not get your message.

You all have the same message, so there shouldn't be any problems.

If you have questions about the prize, feel free to ask.

Thanks again for your participation.

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Thanks PepsiRanger, I will be sure to have a read as I enjoyed PSMan in the distant past.

It's now day 3, and I am desperately hooked on playing Surfasaurus. The wait for the next day is unbearable. I have noticed a couple of instances of overhead tiles obscuring characters, eg in the Motel lobby where you can ask to rent a room. This game would be absolutely brilliant on a mobile device.

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Initial thoughts, by the order the games currently are in my HOTOHR folder:

Dragon chaser: Played all of a minute of it, and when I come back to this I think I'll need to mute it so I don't go mad. Battles are absurdly slow, and graphics are all over the place. Like the tree graphics on the overworld, but that doesn't make a game.

Bale: Wanted to like this, what with the intro being the player character resurrected into a decaying world, but everything else in this worked against that. Battles are repetitive and slow, the second part of the first dungeon is way too big for its own good, and you need an editor for your text.

You need a hero: I actually liked this one! Bit newbie-ish and a few kinda obvious bugs and misspellings, but it actually goes places in its plot, which is great.

Quodia: It's trying to be Earthbound and doesn't really get there. Going to go into a bit more detail later on, but when a single round of battle in the source material goes by faster than a single character's action in the emulation, something's up.

Successor's Legacy: Played this a while back, was a bit wonky but I enjoyed it. Gonna see where this guy got to later on.

Grapnes: Winner of the 'game with least effort put into their protagonist' award. Couldn't get past the first real boss, if only because I tried using items for their advertised purpose and was let down. Also, having blueberries in colors other than blue is silly.

Dark Planet: A singular battle, textboxes that are the maximum size no matter what's in them, and really nothing else. Menu's different, but doesn't really offer enough to justify the lack of everything that's here.

Sour City: Stick to the minigames, dude. They fit the nature of your game [drug-tinged hijinks, I'm feeling] far better than obnoxiously slow battles.

Surfasaurus: Game flat out doesn't need a real time-based system, given that you're really done playing this for the day in 10 minutes. Also, I legitimately want to know what your thinking was behind making the player wait nearly a week to do the advertised activities [you know, picking items from a menu to impress judges, the most thrilling of genres surfing], and moreover have them wait out that week by having them pick up trash.

Will do reviews later.

If it isn't obvious, Surfasaurus is designed for mobile gaming. It's intended for people to play for small bursts of time everyday and immerse themselves in the town. The point of making the player wait about a week is to give them time to learn everything they need to know to hit home the surfing elements of the game. A big part of the game and your success is developing a routine. You learn a little everyday and you can set micro-goals for yourself. You can't enjoy this game if you're wanting it to be a traditional RPG. It's not that kind of game. It's a much more chill and laid back experience and less of a beat the game as quickly as you can type.

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Check out Red Triangle Games!

So far more or less enjoying the games on offer. Surfasaurus is standing out as a highlight, and I lament that Dark Planet doesn't have more to offer because it had a really promising start.

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