Minigamecomp vs CGC
How come so many of you join the CGC and so few (me and Yerzmyey from WoS and Beyker) join the Minigamecompo?
Personally I think that Yerzmyey's ZX81 game fits better in the CGC (great introstory, but far too simple game) than the minigamecompo, but at least he tries.
Personally I think that Yerzmyey's ZX81 game fits better in the CGC (great introstory, but far too simple game) than the minigamecompo, but at least he tries.
Post edited by Dr BEEP on
Comments
I've got a couple of half-finished mini games that I might manage to get completed in time for this year's compo, but there's enough other stuff taking up my time so it's a bit of an outside bet right now.
Thanks for the compliment!
So, I ask myself why did I enter two games for the crap game compo last year, and none for the minigame compo?
The answer was indeed because I could put together a couple of "lazy" crap games within a matter of a couple of hours, whereas a minigame would require more effort and more time.
Having said that, we do have many games that have been programmed by people with obvious talent in the CGC this year. Some of them have also clearly taken a considerable time and hard work to make.
I think that the main difference between the CGC and a more "serious" competition is that for the CGC, talent and hard work is very much optional, whereas it is no doubt mandatory to do well in other competitions.
The CGC serves a different function I think than many of the other compos. It is generally more of a whimsical "bit of a laugh" than a purposeful showcase of programming talent.
I entered a game in the CGC last year which could have been entered into the one-liner compo - so it does sometimes seem the case that there is crossover between the competitions with perhaps inappropriate games or games in "the wrong category" being entered in some of them.
Of course anyone who has entered any game into any of the other competitions is also welcome to enter the same game into the CGC or vice-versa (provided the rules of the other compo allow it). The CGC rules certainly do allow it this year.
Part of me still wants to write another 4K "god sim", but there doesn't seem to be much point in sweating blood over a "mini epic" which will be played by such a small number of people, especially as a freely available 48K or 128K game can generate a hundred times as much interest.
Egghead Website
Arcade Game Designer
My itch.io page
I understand that the minigame compo is multiplatform. Therefore I guess it is less likely that the organisers would happen to use WoS or CSS than someone who is running a purely Sinclair related compo say.
For example aowen's question about the TC2068. I could answer right away for CGC2008 - the answer is yes, that platform is permitted this year in the CGC.
But if someone who knew the answer to this, regarding the minigamecompo, then it would be useful for them to post it on here.
I don't think you have to be on the forums all of the time - as I'm certainly not and we are all often very busy in real life. Perhaps though just pop in now and again to the most popular relevant forums - firstly to announce the competition (and the rules), and then later on to pick up on and answer any possible questions from time to time.
If the minigame compo is flagging, then I think that doing these things would help it to become more popular. As I say it may just be that the organisers are unaware of this particular forum for example.
EDIT: I know the minigame compo does have its own forum, like CSSCGC 2008, but it doesn't seem to be working right at the moment.
Why wouldn't it be? They've got everything from the Oric to the Colecovision so it sounds like anything goes, within reason. (The rules do specifically exclude Flash, which probably gives some idea of where the goalposts really are.) I must say it doesn't help that this year's rules seem to have been written for the benefit of people who already know the rules, though.
Did I detect a slight Commodore bias?
I wasn't convinced that all the judges were aware of the Spectrum's capabilities (and lack of them compared to the C64).
4K is just too small for me :-) My CCG entries are filling up 48K easy, and I have a special unfinished version of Flight Simulator 2008 which fills up all 128K of RAM. (It contains a full map of Scotland in it). Using just 1K or 4K of RAM really does require effort. Notice how few ZX81/80/Ace entries there are in CGC - It is hard to write a usable program in 1K.
As an alternative challenge, and if people want to submit really crap entries for CGC, they can write a minigame in the 6K of an emulated VIC 20 in glorious CBM Basic 2 using "Twenty Commodes"...
Just my 2p....
http://minigamecomp.org.uk
I think it was more a "shoot and no thinking"-mentality.
If you can shoot and don't have to do anything else then it was a good game.
I rated 3 games this year to fit in 0.5K (well that's what I can do on the ZX Spectrum with it). Maybe even 4. I tried to compensate lack of music with a lot of gameplay. I will see what this years games will do.
Yesterday I found a website with very simple but addictive games on it.
For next years 1K competition I have some ideas already.
Wha't's the best of these ideas ; the gameplay is quite new for the 1K competition since I haven't seen any of these game before.
It's a shame I didn't spot these games earlier otherwise I could have made the games for this years competition.
My own games this years ranked on most gameplay (according to me):
Freecell
Sokob-One
1K Othello
Amaz1ng
CUBE
My own games this years ranked on most coding-effort:
Sokob-One (how to compress 26 levels in 1K)
1K Othello (Redef/Multiplay/Start/Difficulty)
Amaz1ng (The effect of the word AMAZ1NG and the 3D display)
Freecell (Define a playcard that is small but recognizable, data costs 400bytes)
CUBE (Biggest challenge here was to think of all different killingmethods)
The main requirement is that there must be someone able to verify that the game follows the rules. If necessary I could it myself.
The problem with the TS 2068 would probably be that there are not many emulators for the platform, and, if a Spectrum game already got only 5 votes, TS 2068 would get even less.
There are several reasons for that. The main one probably is organization problems. In the first editions the organizers spent really a lot of time on it, attracting a lot of people. I have nothing against current organizers (I couldn't do better myself) but there have been problems in recent years (and lack of "appeal") that probably discouraged participants.
Another reason is that at the very beginning you could write a decent minigame in a short time (in some sense, to what happens in the CGC). In the following years, some entries were outstanding. Potential participants may feel that they are not able to write anything at that level, or it would take too much time. (And time is really needed!)
I regret to say that I personally may have been one of the causes for the loss in popularity of the minigame compo, when I submitted 4krace Refueled at the 2005 compo. Many people thought that it was a cheap way of winning the compo again by submitting the "same" game of the previous year. (The game indeed looks similar, but I really spent a lot of time on the newer version of 4krace.) People got discouraged from participating again. There is a long thread about that on the AtariAge forum:
http://www.atariage.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=81896
Another, very simple, reason why people are participating less to that compo is that we have less and less time for that (me included).
I agree. People spend 2-5 minutes average voting a minigame. So the game has to be simple and addictive. Comments can look harsh, but you can learn from them.
personally, i have to two unfinished projects for more than three years. really dont know when (or if) i will finish it.
Same for me. 2 hour trip to Amsterdam (single way) , 3 times per week.
gives me the time to code the games
Same for me. I wrote my minigames during school breaks. Now I don't have time to do anything that is supposed to be good.