Contest Ideas

[marionline]

Well, it's not clear, does "Hero Creation" include drawing hero graphics or designing the heroes, and does mapping include placing NPCs?
Hero Creation has no drawing included just setting them up in the editor, naming them, giving attacks to them etc.

Mapping was thought of both, creating the map from tiles and adding NPC, Zones, Random battle to it. But you could split that in two parts, I guess.

Do we have to stick to each of these stages? So you can't draw extra graphics or edit maps if you're not responsible? I guess anyone who needs to create NPCs/maps/heroes/etc but doesn't have the graphics yet should create placeholder graphics?

You can inculde an extra stage to draw more graphics. I thnik one should rather try to work with what the other made than creating one's own things that do not belong to the stage one is working on.

So I guess everyone is responsible for building on top of previous work. For example "Music & Sound" involves finding or creating music and sound, and if the maps/attacks/etc have been created already then you also need to edit those to add music/sound. But if they haven't been created yet, then the person creating them has to add music/sound later?

Sounds correct. Maybe we discuss that after everyone has set up a stage order for their game?

So that means the person adding NPCs to maps would be either the Writer or the Mapper or maybe the person drawing the chest graphic? And the person adding the treasure chests could be either the Mapper or the Item creator or maybe the Writer?

The writer should not really add things to thew map, see my comment above.

Is the final person responsible for making sure that the game is complete? What if they have for example "Music & Sound Effects" but the game is still unplayable?

Worse, who's responsible for balancing the battles, spells, item placement, inns, shops, foemaps, etc? That's all one task.

Ehm... I guess i forgot to include that stage. Add it and split it into several parts if you like.

I assume "Music & Sound" involves finding and placing free music and sound, and only composing/creating them if you wish to.

Yes, either find free music or if you can, try to make music.

Will you determine the circle order after people have decided the stage order for every game, to try to ensure that people don't have to do the same stage repeatedly?

Good idea.

Is the a theme or other guidance as to the games to make, such as a traditional RPG? What's the expected length?

I've no idea. Since plot scripting will be optional, what other than an RPG can you make?
The game should be complete, it can be short.

Every Stage should be included at least one time.

How do the optional stages work? What if someone wants to opt out of a stage like Plotscripting?

If they are optional they are still included in the list.

And how does having the same stage multiple times work? Does the first person specify subtasks like "Drawing (Tiles), Mapping, Drawing (Walkabouts)", etc?

Split up the tasks how you see fit. Just don't omit them completely. No mapping stage would be ... interesting?
Let's not do that in the first Individual Collab Contest. This should not get any more difficult than it is.

Is the two week deadline strict or a guidance? I hope we can finish early and move on, because some of the stages should only take a day. But then if people finish the easy stages quickly and pass the game on, the people who start with a lot of work will be given even more to do!

I'd say we wait till everyone has finished their stage and then we pass the games around.
How do we pass them around upload to slime salad, by PM or Email?

How do you determine whether to drop someone? Can someone drop just one stage because they're stuck, but keep working on others?

The drop out if they don't hand in the new part when it's due, unless they asked to get more time.

And I think 14 weeks in total would be far too long. I'll be away for two weeks in August, and other people probably aren't free for that long either.

Right, if two weeks per stage is to long, we shrink it down to one week. Maybe people should be able to pass a stage if they are still working on another stage?
But then you might have to do the same stage fro two games, and that is something that should not happen. Here it's getting complicated...

Is there voting afterwards?

We could hold a voting... What would the criteria for voting be?
The games will be all collab works from everyone.
I'd prefer a discussion on what worked and did not work. (Of course the created games could be discussed as well.)
Reading and thinking about your questions maybe we should be a bit flexible on the rules...

[TMC]

OK, thanks for answering my questions.

Well, voting on games is sometimes a good way to get feedback on them, or encourage people to play them. But nevermind; instead we could hold a discussion afterwards about the contest and the games.

The writer should not really add things to thew map, see my comment above.

That means that either the writer must go before the mapper and writes a lot of NPC dialogue without having any maps or NPCs to write for, or the mapper has to add NPCs to the map which have no purpose, for the writer to later assign textboxes to.
It sounds too difficult to split apart creating textboxes and creating NPCs, since to create an NPC, a quest or place a treasure chest on the map you need to do both and understand how all the tags fit together.
I think it makes more sense to have a stage for "NPCs and dialogue (and NPC placement, zones, puzzles and quests)", instead of Writing.
I suppose it could be possible to also have a Writing stage for the plot of the game (mainly the introduction and lore, some of which might be put in a text file for other people to use as a reference, like a design doc), but not including NPC dialogue?

Is the a theme or other guidance as to the games to make, such as a traditional RPG? What's the expected length?

I've no idea. Since plot scripting will be optional, what other than an RPG can you make?
The game should be complete, it can be short.

Without scripting you can create a purely-textual interactive-fiction game, a pure exploration game (no NPCs or battles), a puzzle-adventure game like House Escape, a game that happens totally inside the battle system like some of the Fight Contest games (or nearly entirely, like King of Gourmet), a maze game, a side-on-perspective game like Stand, etc. So, the question is whether you allow games without maps, battles, text, or graphics.

Sounds correct. Maybe we discuss that after everyone has set up a stage order for their game?

Good idea. After everyone picks a stage order we can provide feedback on whether that stage order makes sense or should be changed, before we commit to it.

[kylekrack]

I agree that Writing and Dialogue are two separate tasks. That being said, during the writing stage, some important dialogue can be written and transferred into textboxes during the dialogue stage. Some writing is not dialogue, however, like exposition and cutscene-like textboxes.

I think one of the voting categories should be "Which game did you have the most fun working on"

[TMC]

Agreed with all that.

But it looks like we can't start on the 23rd, because the contest isn't even announced yet? Or is the 23rd when sign-ups start?

[marionline]

Fine, writing (lore and story layout, and so on) and dialogue writing and cutscenes can be different stages.
I don't mind if it's either writer before mapper or mapper before writer. Both can be interesting. Also "design document first", is okay, and then mapper or writer or what ever.

Seems like there can be done a lot without scripting. I was just thinking of rpg games, so I did not consider any other type of games.(Especially those where you omit stages.) I don't want to say "No, that's to complex!", but it might make the collab circle more difficult. So it should be communicated what's the plan of your game.
That means, you can (should?) make a write game design document as first stage and write it.

The contest will start tomorrow. That would be the 21st. (Someone said 21st was better than 23rds because it adds a weekend, right? )
I'll set up an extra thread. We'll do the stage zero (setting up a stage plan) and announcement of taking part in the contest from the 21st on to 28th.
So basically to take part you need to set up a stage plan. The first stage will be done by you as well, because stage zero is just setting up the contest. Okay?

This is exiting! I hope the contest works out nicely.

[kylekrack]

I have another question. If someone finishes a stage early, may we offer to pass the game on to the next person? 2 weeks is a good, flexible amount of time, but could draw out the project longer than necessary.

[TMC]

So, "NPCs + Dialogue" would be a stage then, not just "Dialogue"?

I'll be entering, but will post later. I first have to decide what sort of game and which stage I want to start with. I think I'll try to provide direction for the game through the stage order and whatever the first stage is rather than through a design doc.

[marionline]

If someone finishes a stage early, may we offer to pass the game on to the next person? 2 weeks is a good, flexible amount of time, but could draw out the project longer than necessary.

Yes, that is a good idea!

So, "NPCs + Dialogue" would be a stage then, not just "Dialogue"?

You are free to set up your stages. NPC + Dialog can be one or two or more stages, however you think it works best.
Just don't try something like each textbox is a stage on it's own. That would not be okay.

[kylekrack]

Just to be clear, everyone involved in the contest has to start a game by making a stage list and stuff?

[marionline]

Just to be clear, everyone involved in the contest has to start a game by making a stage list and stuff?

Yes. Post the Stage List in the Individual Circle Collab Contest thread, please.
You can also say you'll take part there and then post the list later. (Working on the game content should start next week, but I doubt we'll be able check that.)
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EDIT:

I have another question. If someone finishes a stage early, may we offer to pass the game on to the next person? 2 weeks is a good, flexible amount of time, but could draw out the project longer than necessary.

We said to shrink it down to one week. I forgot to change it in the old post.
Asking for more time is okay, if one week is to short.

[MorpheusKitami]

I'm confused, is a design document part of stage zero or is it supposed to be an actual part of the stage order?

[marionline]

is a design document part of stage zero or is it supposed to be an actual part of the stage order?
I think, it should be part of the stage order.

[TMC]

Well, if it's a proper design doc, then it could be stage 1.

I think that the person responsible for stage 0 and 1 will probably provide guidance even if it's not in the form of design doc. For example, they might write the story, but leave the next people to decide what type of game it is.

It could be a bad thing if you receive a game and have to do the second stage but almost nothing has been decided yet, as you have to make some hard decisions. Or you might like that, because it lets you do whatever you want.
What if the first person is encouraged to provide a theme for the game (just 1-10 words) if they aren't going to write a design doc? Contests usually have themes, to give people ideas.

[marionline]

I don't want to set up a theme for the circle contest or a circle contest game. If you like that's up to you.
But I'd prefer just to work with the file I get from the others and build on their uncommented work. That makes this contest challenging, if we take it away, we seem to have something like "We build you game"-Contest. This would be fun as well, but was not what I planned.

Also to contest ideas: Did we ever have a summer contest or spring contest? Halloween in is autumn and Christmas contest is in winter. I was wondering if there's something for the other two seasons as well?

[TMC]

Fair enough.... but it's going to be pretty challenging anyway! Maybe too challenging.

Do you mean a regular contest held in summer/spring, or one that's summer/spring themed? There was the 2015 Summer Harvest Agricontest, but it was a one-off.

You could have a look at http://rpg.hamsterrepublic.com/ohrrpgce/Contests to see if there are any contests commonly held at a particular time of year.