Saturday 25 July 2015

C64 16KB Cartridge Game Development Competition!


The fifth RGCD C64 16KB cartridge game development competition concluded on the 1st of April at midnight with 9 new games (and two cartridge re-releases) for the C64.



RULES

So you can get started, the basic rules are laid out below:

  1. The competition deadline is 00:00 GMT on the 1st April 2016 (the beginning of the 1st April, not the end!) - this gives you over 6 months of development time.
  2. There will be no competition unless a minimum of six entries are submitted by the deadline.
  3. All submitted games must be in working 16KB cartridge ROM format (help is available to test ROM files on real hardware). Compression is allowed (and encouraged) but the final file size must not exceed 16KB (.crt (VICE) at 16.0 KB (16,464 bytes) or .bin (C64) at 16.0 KB (16,384 bytes)).
  4. The games submitted do not necessarily need to be new, but must be your own work, not sold commercially or released in cartridge format previously. Cartridge ROM hacks will obviously not be accepted.
  5. PAL must be supported, with additional NTSC support optional (but encouraged). If possible, please consider GS compatibility.
  6. The maximum number of single entries from a person or group is set at three. If more entries are made, the applicant has the opportunity to replace a previous entry with a new one.
  7. All applicants that submit a valid entry (see above) will receive one physical cartridge copy of their game for free.
  8. The applicant owns their work, so therefore submitted games will *ONLY* be released for sale at an agreed price via RGCD if the coder expresses a desire to do so.
  9. There will be a panel of judges (announced in full over the coming weeks), and entries will be scored on a point distribution basis across several criteria. The decision of the panel is final.
  10. Judges *CAN* enter games themselves, but cannot self-vote (award points to their own release).



FINAL 2015 COMPETITION LINE UP

Here is an alphabetical list of the games that were submitted by the deadline.














THE JUDGING PANEL

The panel of judges was made up of the following people:

Andreas Varga/Mr. SID (HVSC Crew)
Hedning (Genesis Project)
David Simmonds/Jazzcat (RGCD/Onslaught)
Jakob Voos/Jak T Rip (Protovison)
James Monkman/Heavy Stylus (RGCD)
Jamie Howard/Physcopanda (RGCD)
John Dennis (RGCD)
Matt Allen/Mayhem
Paul Koller/paulko64



SCORING SYSTEM

The scoring rules are very simple. Depending on the number of entries, the judges will award points to each game over several criteria (as discussed below). If there are 6 entries, 6 points go to the best, then 5, 4, 3, 2 and 1 to the worst.

If a panel member has entered a game themselves, then the number of points that they can award will be adjusted (in this example, to 5) and they will not score their own release. This may initially seem harsh (and disadvantageous), but is countered by fairly taking a mean average based on how many people judged each game.

The criteria that each game will be evaluated on are:

Originality (is the game based on a new idea or a twist on an established design?),
Concept (quality of game design),
Execution (execution of design, taking into account controls, NTSC/GS compatibility),
Presentation (quality of graphics, audio and overall presentation),
Gameplay (a measure of how enjoyable the game is to play),
Lasting Appeal (replay value, addictiveness).

When the panel has scored each game accordingly, the totals for each criteria will be divided by the number of judges to produce a mean average. These averages are then added together for each game to give a final score.

We are considering opening an element of the vote up to the public this year on CSDB, but how this will be incorporated has yet to be decided.



PRIZES

As well as a free copy of their submitted game on cartridge, there will also be prizes awarded to the entrants behind games that place 1st, 2nd and 3rd (as decided by the judging panel). Many thanks to Antonio Savona, Stian Søreng and Jens Schönfeld for their sponsorship!

1st Prize
£100 (paid via PayPal), a RR-Net MK3 cartridge board, a C64FC 'dev kit' and a selection of RGCD/Psytronik tapes and disks from RGCD's private collection.

2nd Prize
£100 (paid via PayPal) a RR-Net MK3 cartridge board, a C64FC 'dev kit' and a selection of RGCD/Psytronik tapes and disks from RGCD's private collection.

3rd Prize
£50 (paid via PayPal), a C64FC 'dev kit' and a selection of RGCD/Psytronik tapes and disks from RGCD's private collection.



RESULTS

01 - Icicle Race (John Christian Lønningdal & Saul Cross) (59.22 Points)
02 - Qwak (Daniel Hotop & Saul Cross) (42.89 Points)
03 - Platman (Andrea Schincaglia & Saul Cross) (42.67 Points)

04 - Bug Hunt (Eric Hilaire) (42.11 Points)
05 - Slime Deluxe (Mike Johnson) (40 Points)
06 - Ring On A String (P-a Bäckström) (36.67 Points)
07 - Vortex Crystals (Richard Bayliss) (31.89 Points)
08 - Alienator (Georg Rottensteiner) (31.11 Points)
09 - Blap N Bash Revisisted (Richard Bayliss) (26.67 Points)
10 - Pickle's Pod Patrol (Steve Ody & Saul Cross) (25.67 Points)
11 - Terra.Heaven.Eternity.Arctic. (Simon Quernhorst) (17 Points)

(Scores are out of a total of 66 points. For full details on the results, check the write up here.)

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