Individual Circle Collab Contest

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marionline
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Individual Circle Collab Contest

Post by marionline »

Individual Circle Collab Contest

Everyone makes a game, but the process is cut into stages.
Each stage the games are exchanged among the participants, who work on another stage of the game.
(The game goes round in a circle from one dev to another). Everyone has to try to do every stage (besides the optional ones).
Each stage should take one week. But you can ask to get more time for a stage.
(That way dropouts don't block the circle flow for long.)

Does that sound easy?
Well, wet's change that.
The Stages can be diffrent for each game!
The first person sets up the order for the game's stages.

Code: Select all

EXAMPLE STAGE LIST:
Stage 1: Drawing
Stage 2: Attack & Item creation
Stage 3: Hero Creation
Stage 4: Enemy Creation
Stage 5: Mapping
Stage 6: Write Text
Stage 7: Music & Sounds
Optional: More Drawing (Drawing things that are missing for the story/plot)
Optional: Plot Scripting
Every Stage should be included at least one time, including stages as optional ones is okay.
Plotscripting has to be optional.
Writing NPC Dialogue, Cutscenes or Design Document or plot or background story / lore can be different stages.

Image
This is the circle for *one* game only. If three people take part, there should be three games going round.
Person A dies stage 1 and stage 4.


Dropouts and People who join late: We just proceed in the circle. Since the games have different stages,
it is unlikely that someone does a stage two times in a row.

Questions:
Does my game have to be an rpg?
No, it does not have to be one.

Is a design document part of stage zero or is it supposed to be an actual part of the stage order?
Design document is part of the stage order.

Where is more information?
For more information: Read the discussion in the Contest Idea Thread
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
STAGE 0: Sign up and Stage List Creation
Timeframe: 21st - 28th
If you want to take part write a stage list and post it here.
We'll then discuss the order of games so no one has to do a stage twice in a row.


We should be at STAGE 1: Begin working on the your game!
Timeframe: 28th-5th
Order of games to circle from one participant to another has to be set up.
Have fun! :)

Edit: time frame is one week
Last edited by marionline on Sun Jul 30, 2017 7:07 pm, edited 3 times in total.
TMC
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Post by TMC »

I'm entering. I haven't decided a stage order yet, but I do know that it will also be an entry in the Flavor Text Adventure Contest, because I always like to enter every contest simultaneously!

I'll be in Australia from August 7-21 and won't have too much free time, so I hope to not have to do graphics during those weeks.


If we have less than ~7 people entering, then contestants will have to do two or more stages for the same game. But that's OK.
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SwordPlay
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Post by SwordPlay »

I would like to enter, but I have no idea how to.
Could you post an example stage list, so we can see what it might look like?
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MorpheusKitami
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Post by MorpheusKitami »

I'll be entering. 2 through 5 can be readjusted if necessary.
Stage 1:Drawing
Stage 2:Enemy/Hero/Item/Attack Creation
Stage 3:Mapping
Stage 4:NPCs/Dialog
Stage 5:Music & Sound
Stage 6:Playtesting
Stage 7:Bugfixing/Making Slightly Coherent
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Post by TMC »

Re: MorpheusKitami:

What's the difference between playtesting and bugfixing? I guess that by 'playtesting' you mean balancing, not looking for bugs?

Interesting to put NPCs and plot almost last; I guess that the item/enemy/hero design will largely determine the plot.
(Does Stage 2 include formations too?)

Since enemies are created before maps, I guess either the mapper might opt for foemaps, or instead decide not to have foemaps and defer wandering enemy NPCs (or just a series of boss battles/etc) until a latter stage.

Oh, and should we assume that anyone can write relevant scripts? For example, you might add a parallax script while doing the mapping, or even script some music fades while adding music.
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MorpheusKitami
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Post by MorpheusKitami »

TMC wrote:Re: MorpheusKitami:

What's the difference between playtesting and bugfixing? I guess that by 'playtesting' you mean balancing, not looking for bugs?
I was going for the later one, but that idea does work better.
Interesting to put NPCs and plot almost last; I guess that the item/enemy/hero design will largely determine the plot.
(Does Stage 2 include formations too?)

Since enemies are created before maps, I guess either the mapper might opt for foemaps, or instead decide not to have foemaps and defer wandering enemy NPCs (or just a series of boss battles/etc) until a latter stage.
I would think stage 2 would include formations. As for the rest, that's pretty much up to whoever's doing that stage. They'll have to note if they didn't put in foemaps though.
Oh, and should we assume that anyone can write relevant scripts? For example, you might add a parallax script while doing the mapping, or even script some music fades while adding music.
Yep.
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marionline
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Post by marionline »

1) Drawing/Writing/Hero Creation, Enemy Creation: Heros Description, Hero Portraits + Hero Creation in Editor + Boss Enemies Descriptions + Boss Walkabouts + Portraits, Create Boss Enemies in Editor
2) Writing: Intro + Ending (Dialogue for Cutscene)
3) Writing: Draft of Plot
4) Drawing: Map tiles + Walkabouts
5) Mapping: Make Map (Tiles, Passability)
6) Item Creation: Add items and shops to the game
7) Drawing: some weak Enemies
8) Drawing/Attacks: Attak Graphics + Create Attacks
9) Drawing: Weapons + Equip Heros with Items
10) Hero/Enemy Creation: Give the Boss Enemies + Heros Attacks
11) Enemy Creation/Mapping: Give weak enemies rewards, create formations for weak enemies, place them on Map
12) Writing: create Dialogue for Boss Encounter Cutscenes
13) Mapping/Writing: Place NPC on Map + Give them some dialogue to say/show
(Optional: Give the NPCs some Quests :D)
14) Drawing: create backdrops for battles + cut scenes
15) Sounds&Music: Add Sounds + Music
16 (Optional: Plotscripting for Cutscenes or Optional: Give extra attacks to Boss or Optional: Create and add Minions to Boss or Optional: Add some game art as EasterEggs)
My list of stages got quite long. Some should be easier and faster to do than others. Still there are many stages.
If we combine 2 tasks there will be more or less as many as in MorpheusKitami's List. Maybe that could work?
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MorpheusKitami
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Post by MorpheusKitami »

I could increase the number of stages in my list, if that works for everyone else. It would make the contest longer, but it'd make it a bit easier. Also worth noting that if anyone wants to make a horror game, Halloween would be in the middle of stage 14.
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marionline
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Post by marionline »

14 weeks is a lot (more than 3 months). I think it's better to keep the contest shorter, because people might run out of motivation and energy during such a long time frame more easily or drop out for several reasons. If this one works out well, we could do another contest another time.
About Halloween, usually we have a Halloween contest around Halloween. If these two contests would collide, it would also not be good.
7 weeks sounds better for to me.
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marionline
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Post by marionline »

Here's my redone version of the stage list:

Code: Select all

1) Drawing/Writing/Hero Creation, Enemy Creation: Heros Description, Hero Portraits + Hero Creation in Editor + Boss Enemies Descriptions + Boss Walkabouts + Portraits, Create Boss Enemies in Editor + Intro + Ending (Dialogue for Cutscene)
2) Drawing/Writing: Draft of Plot + Map tiles + Walkabouts
3) Mapping/Item Creation: Make Map (Tiles, Passability) + Add items and shops to the game
4) Drawing/Attacks: some weak Enemies + Attak Graphics + Create Attacks
5) Drawing/Hero/Enemy Creation: Weapons + Equip Heros with Items + Give the Boss Enemies + Heros Attacks
6) Enemy Creation/Mapping/Writing:: Give weak enemies rewards, create formations for weak enemies, place them on Map + create Dialogue for Boss Encounter Cutscenes
7) Mapping/Writing: Place NPC on Map + Give them some dialogue to say/show + (Optional: Give the NPCs some Quests Grin)  
8) Drawing/Sounds&Music: create backdrops for battles + cut scenes  + Add Sounds + Music + (Optional: Plotscripting for Cutscenes or Optional: Give extra attacks to Boss or Optional: Create and add Minions to Boss or Optional: Add some game art as EasterEggs) 
TMC
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Post by TMC »

I agree, 15 is too much. Even 7 weeks is a long time for a contest (though some contests like the HotOHR contest do well with long timeframes)

I'm surprised that you decided to make all the stages combinations rather than 'pure' tasks like the example you originally gave. It's kind of the complete opposite way to split it up! It does seem like a decent idea to split up the graphics though. I'll probably split drawing over just 3 weeks though.
Also really interesting in your stages the bosses are defined before the plot. Well, that gives the person who writes the plot some challenges!
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marionline
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Post by marionline »

TMC wrote:I'm surprised that you decided to make all the stages combinations rather than 'pure' tasks like the example you originally gave.
I liked the old version better, but 14 weeks of contest are to long. Now the stages contain several different tasks...I am not 100% happy with that. I wanted to keep most parts split up as much as possible in different stages.
On the other hand, the whole process still needs to work, so that no one has to edit something thing twice. Example: Enemies need rewards, rewards that can not be given if there are no items created.

Will you also hand in a stage list?
There have been only 2 stage list posted so far and according to our time schedule we should be working on Stage 1 already.
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MorpheusKitami
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Post by MorpheusKitami »

Having given some consideration to TMC's statements, and to keep everything even, I've changed my stage list a bit:
Stage 1:Drawing
Stage 2:Dialog/plot (not the dialog of innkeepers or random guys on the street)
Stage 3:Enemy/Hero/Item/Attack/Formation Creation
Stage 4:Mapping (includes formation placing, but not dialog)
Stage 5:NPCs/NPC dialog
Stage 6:Additional graphics (plot graphics/additional NPC portraits/other backdrops)
Stage 7:Music & Sound
Stage 8:Bugfixing/playtesting
@marionline:
I want to point out that on the 8th stage, someone making their own music would have a lot of stuff to do, moreso if they wanted to do the optional stuff. Maybe move the drawing part to stage 6? Seems like that would be a natural fit, as that's already part of the boss's cutscenes...
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marionline
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Post by marionline »

MorpheusKitami wrote:I want to point out that on the 8th stage, someone making their own music would have a lot of stuff to do, moreso if they wanted to do the optional stuff. Maybe move the drawing part to stage 6? Seems like that would be a natural fit, as that's already part of the boss's cutscenes...
Good Idea. I seperated the backdrop task:
create backdrops for cut scenes -> Stage 1, because the bosses + heros are drawn here
create backdrops for battles -> Stage 4, because enemies are drawn here

Here's the newly optimized stage list:

Code: Select all

1) Drawing/Writing/Hero Creation, Enemy Creation: Heros Description, Hero Portraits + Hero Creation in Editor + Boss Enemies Descriptions + Boss Walkabouts + Portraits, Create Boss Enemies in Editor + Intro + Ending (Dialogue for Cutscene) + create backdrops for cut scenes
2) Drawing/Writing: Draft of Plot + Map tiles + Walkabouts
3) Mapping/Item Creation: Make Map (Tiles, Passability) + Add items and shops to the game
4) Drawing/Attacks: some weak Enemies + Attak Graphics + Create Attacks + create backdrops for battles
5) Drawing/Hero/Enemy Creation:  Weapons + Equip Heros with Items + Give the Boss Enemies + Heros Attacks
6) Enemy Creation/Mapping/Writing:: Give weak enemies rewards, create formations for weak enemies, place them on Map + create Dialogue for Boss Encounter Cutscenes
7) Mapping/Writing: Place NPC on Map + Give them some dialogue to say/show + (Optional: Give the NPCs some Quests Grin) 
8) Drawing/Sounds&Music: Add Sounds + Music + (Optional: Plotscripting for Cutscenes or Optional: Give extra attacks to Boss or Optional: Create and add Minions to Boss or Optional: Add some game art as EasterEggs)
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Post by TMC »

I've decided that I'm much too busy for the next two weeks so it will be impossible for me to take part during that time.
So instead of writing up a stage list and starting another game, I'd like to instead join two weeks late. It's better to have more participants than games anyway.
Maybe Virtuous Sword is still going to enter? Even with only a few participants it's going to be an interesting experiment even if it's not a high-profile contest!

Also, sorry for not being very active in this thread or making up my mind earlier.
Wait, has anyone started stage 1 already?

Also, what does "Give the NPCs some Quests Grin" mean?
Last edited by TMC on Sat Aug 05, 2017 8:22 am, edited 1 time in total.
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