Hey.

Exciting... but no games on page.

Cheers

*Pees pants...* Not really, but, wheep, wibble and all those fangeeky sounds of pure joy.

Let the mayhem, I mean, er, merriment, begin!

2nd Post!

I dont see any games either.

Hotness!

It's a pain having to watch those silly mochiads before every game, though.

No games for me either. I'm looking for them on https://jayisgames.com/cgdc5/. The black rectangle just stays black! :(

Thats where I was looking too.

Very cool competition. If Jay doesn't mind (I don't think he will) I'll help host these games over on the warehouse. I'll have these up and ready by end of the day today.

Oh, some awesome gaming talent on display here!

Im using it on Firefox for PC.

It does work in IE7, but not in FF.

Oh, fwiw: I can see all the games just fine, have half of them downloaded already. Visiting this site via Firefox with a handful of extensions installed.

Yep, all fixed by either using Internet Explorer or disabling my Adblock :) Now off to the gaaaaameeees~~ :D

Ok, that worked. But normally there are no problems with adblock, so I dont know why this happens now.

Considering the theme, I was really hoping for a Metroidvania. Maybe a sequel to Bug Bug in Sky Tower. Aw well. I'm sure this batch is as great as always.

Yeah same here, blank box with FF running Adblock Plus. I never have a problem playing flash games before, so whatever domain the ads are linked to must be blacklisted in my Adblock.

So far, not off to a shining start if half of the visitors won't be able to play because of the preloader. Oh well, it's all about business in the end, isn't it?

[Edit: Correction: It's all about being able to continue to provide this site for you, the visitor, which isn't free for us that run this site. Nor is it free to spend the time required to organize, run, and administrate these competitions. So, while I understand your desire to have everything handed to you free of charge and advertisement-free, you might try considering exactly what a little advertising does provide you with next time you're complaining about it. -Jay]

I'm very unimpressed with many of the games.

After the last great competition, it is such a let down to see so many games with major flaws.

Wow

It's like a days worth of newgrounds submissions.

GL HF

:)

Is there a reason that there's a huge empty space below the flash thing?

Never mind... Maybe I should play games first next time :P Very nifty interface... I like it.

Blank screen for me too, with both IE and FF. Disabling popup blockers doesn't seem to help, and I can't find anything else to disable.

Hope it gets fixed. :)

Strange things happen if you try to readjust letter sizes. Oh well.

I think this batch is not as great as the last one. Maybe its the theme? Who knows?

Gah.. why does it have to be finals week...

How about the non-finalists? Will we ever see them?

I'm very excited about the Competition. Can't wait to strat playing!

I'm quite disappointed in the quality of most of these games :(

Looks like I got lucky: the interface is working great, and the random game order brought up an excellent game right in the beginning. Playing it right now! :-)

I can't comment on the overall lineup just yet, but the ones I've played so far range from good to great! :D

I like this interface better than the ones before. Especially seeing a description before playing, and being able to comment as I play, these are great features. Nice work, Jay! :-)

I can see why you gave them extra time. Even now a lot of games lack polish, especially "Pieces," which is a shame because it looks like it has a lot of potential.

No point and click games?? I like tower defense and platformers as much as the next girl, but c'mon, point and click is what I live for! Even Bonte didn't submit a point and click game! (Ok I guess the Grow clone is kinda P&C, but I was looking forward to having to upgrade something to escape a room, or something.)

First off, the implementation of the game presentation is the best yet. I really like being able to click on each game and get a quick synopsis and see other peoples comments. The old interface of having to wait for the logos and that little jingle was getting annoying. Also, having each game periodically introduced was nice because you got to spend more time on each one, but I like having them all right there this time.

That being said, this group of games is generally unimpressive (compared to previous competitions). There are a few gems in there, but it's a little disappointing to see so many clones and un-originality. I guess the upgrade theme was a little hard to live up to.

I would like to see more of the games that did not make the cut. I'm more interested in seeing originality and creativity as opposed to polished games that are just genre clones.

I have blank screen with FF and adblock disabled. I see a bit more with IE, but mostly black. I really want to play!

Everything is coming in clear over here. IE 7 and Firefox 2 both working on Vista (Flash version 9.0.115.0). Never really took the time to visit the Game Design Competition, might be interested in the future now that I see what it's all about :). Really slick interface.

-jmtb02

joye, your comment makes me really regret I didn't go ahead and try to make my idea into a game. :(

I was wondering if I'm the only one having problem voting and submitting highscores?

I have been playing Doggnation, and if I click the Submit highscore button, nothing happens. Same if I click Highscores in the main menu. If I click the big Vote button, the DIV tag with the game is just hidden, but nothing shows up in its place.

Well I'm one of the developers (R.O.B.O.T.) and it is my first Flash game so I'm excited to hear feedback. If you've played it please comment, I love reading what you guys think.

Thanks Jay. But unfortunately I never get a box saying Enter your name. If I choose Quit Game, I'm asked if I want to submit my highscore, and then brought directly back to the main menu. I guess it might be an issue with Firefox, as I have had problems with Flash popups before, but I have been able to get them from other Flash files now.

Pluto (March 17, 2008 2:21 PM) just voiced my opinion to the word. Exactly.

Sure thing.

http://img219.imageshack.us/img219/9695/doggnationut9.png

That's what I get when I click Quit Game during a game. Then I click the Yes button, but I'm brought right back to the main menu of the game, just like you'd expect if I click the No button, which also does happen.

So I'm not sure how much that screenshot is going to help. Maybe I'm overlooking something.

Thanks Jay.

Okay, now to actually comment on the competition.

First off, as others have already said, the new way to present the games is really top notch. I hope you'll stick with that for future CGDC's, as it is, like pluto said, the best yet.

Secondly, unfortunately I also have to agree with others. The quality of this batch of games is the lowest yet, IMO, and is rather disappointing. I see now why you decided to extend the deadline with 2 weeks, and while I think it was a good choice, I can't help but wonder just how the games looked back then.

There are a few good games in between, but there is no game that stands out so far of those I have played, as there have been in the previous competition. But to be fair, I haven't played all of the games yet, only those that immediately appealed me, judging from the graphics icon.

I've been looking forward to this for ages as I'm a big fan of games with upgrades but I have to agree with people when they say its disappointing. None of the games have really grabbed me as something mind blowing. Theres some interesting concepts in there but some are just re-hashes of existing games and they all seem to lack a bit of polish.

Maybe I expected too much. It was always going to be hard to come up with something amazing, especially in the short time frame.

I'm sorry to hear so much disappointment over the contest! Too much derivative gameplay, eh? I must admit, even my own game suffers from that particular malady.

;)

Well, we might as well make the best of it. Twenty-one new free games sounds pretty good to me. :)

I was so looking forward to this but I have to say, I'm really disappointed. Most of the games are either bugged (some won't even work to begin with), or they're just unimpressive. I don't think there is anything I haven't seen before. I don't even know what to vote for because it seems that there isn't anything decent enough.

Are we welcome to make comments about specific games here?

Hey Jay,
I suggest you have a clear link back to your homepage from the game page. Some of us are adding the page to Stumbleupon and such. :D \o/

WOW!

Made it to the bronze position of the alltime scorelist on Numbers Reaction 2!!!
True, the alltime list is also the monthly, weekly and daily list since the game is active from today, but never mind :DDD

By the way, so far this one, Numbers' Reaction 2 is my favourite. I like Boomshine type games and i think the upgrade idea here is good. The game ran smoothly, I experienced no bugs and felt the game is really user-friendly so thumbs up on that one, Freebreakgames.com!

The other one I'd like to mention is the first one, that guy with umbrella, the game title is the guys name but I can't seem to be able to get the games' titles unless I click on the icons.

I cannot get the games to run, or rather get past the inital flash movie (sponsors logos). Following this I get a HTTP 404 error for https://jayisgames.com/cgdc5/judging/?ref=sponsors . Can anyone advise on a way around this, or how to fix it. I never had this issue with JIG before

still can't view the games page
ill see if i can find out the issue

please ingnore last comment, following the post it magically started working :)

When someone posts a link in the comments, it opens in the same frame, and you can't go back to the comments. They should be opening in the window.

For meanstreak, and anybody else who gets the HTTP 404 error, just enter the url for the competition page again, and it should work just fine. It might also do the trick by just refreshing but I haven't tried that yet when I've gotten the error.

I actually the very first time I visited the competition page, got a dialogue box asking me to input my name and password to gain access. I didn't, of course, and when refreshed, the page worked just fine.

bioLarzen, you would be talking about Robert Plank, that's the guy with the umbrella. You're correct in that you can't see the game's title unless you click the game icon, but FYI, doing so will not close your current game and open up a new game, it will just change the part of the page where it has info about the currently selected game. So you can see the titles of all the games without trouble.

ThemePark,
thx for the info.

I prefer this method to the old one
Since I would often get tired of the old one because of maybe a few games that interest me but most of them not all that interesting and having to see new ones that dont really interest me every day And flash games that are not being reviewed because of the event
Now I can weed out all the games at once decide my favorites and Not have to put up with the rest

Jay, just out of curiosity, when you'll review each game from the competition, will you just use the competition page for each game, and thereby also all the comments that will be made for each game on the competition page?

I see. Seems I had a misconception of how the entries worked. But I see the chronological problem.

I asked because I wanted to post a walkthrough for Doggnation, and was considering waiting until the review, if the comments could not be transferred, but I think I will just post it in both entries instead then.

Thanks for the explanation, Jay.

New Lay Out: ↑ Games: �"

I hope next competition will be WAY better.

It just occured to me, since everybody loves the new game page layout so much, maybe Jay himself will be the one to win the audience and/or Viral award (I'm in the unclear of whether those are the same or not).

ThemePark-

That is a great thought! I think Jay and the other wonderful people who work on this site to make it so awesome should be commemorated and win the audience award for their wonderful design on the layout.

Hello everybody in JayIsGameLand :)

It shouldn't have to be said, but I'm gonna say it anyway. The gamemakers worked really hard on their games, in their spare time, while also going to school/day jobs.

One line, non-constructive comments like "not worth the trip" are NOT APPROPRIATE.

Give real advice for how they can improve, or just make an effort to keep your mouth shut. :|

I think I have seen negative one-line comments in every game's comment section I have visited so far, from several people.

Thank you from me to all the gamemakers and the JIG staff for making these games available.

While this was a bit of a disappointment, I understand that it is hard making a game in such little time. I also think the theme wasn't the best to create innovative games to. It's also very hard to match up to the quality of the other competitions because the games are AMAZING.

There were a few I thought were pretty cool though, like the shoot em up about trees, and the cow game. I thought Orbash was a very cool starting point, and could be something big with a few tweaks such as more enemy types and more upgrades. Robert Plank also stood out to me as being very cool, but I was not a fan of the controls. Drive also had a cool idea, but seems like it also needs some tweaks to make it more addictive. I'm not sure what you could do though.

All of these games were of good quality though, and could all have ended up on this site without the competition, it just seems like this time there was less innovation, which is what I have looked forward to in these competitions, but like I said before, I think it would be quite a challenge to innovate with this theme. Well yeah, I hope I didn't come off as being rude, I'm just trying to be constructive.

P.S. Could the next theme be sandbox maybe? That would be the BEST.

The new interface is awesome... I haven't had a good chance to play many of the games yet...

This time of year must be a busy one, because this is a relatively low turnout for quantity of games... I'm thinking an annual competition sometime around when CGDC4 was might work out best.

I also like the idea of the JiG community voting on a theme for the next competition. (I like "Elements" as a theme)

Yay, the games load on my computer now! :D Thanks for fixing it.

I've also fixed my game (dRive)! The colors are adjusted for brighter monitors and the text blinking has been drastically toned down. Much better! :)

If you didn't like dRive before, please give it another try now. You might be surprised what a difference an improved presentation can make.

Good feedback, iamnotrabid. Definitely came across as constructive criticism. And if you think of any suggestions for dRive, let me know. :)

And likephilshead, you might be right that the time of year affected the quantity of games in the contest. Maybe summer would be better?

Wow! This new layout is FANCY!

I think there's a glitch on the competition page. Almost every time I try to open it, it forces Safari to quit. It's usually after the sponsor animations close, before any games load/appear. (Flash Player 9, Safari 3.0.4, 2GHz Intel Core Duo processor)

"Gah.. why does it have to be finals week..."

I hear ya!!

So far, the handful of games I've played haven't been as great as those in the last competitions. Maybe I just managed to hit the lower end of the spectrum? Or maybe all my finals stress is doing something to my brain...

I think maybe people got their hopes up a little high after an especially outstanding competition last fall.

And it might also be the season. I think the best time might very well be to start the competition somewhere in the summer, and have the end-date somewhere around september or october.

So reading back to the first CGDC5 entry, I see that there is going to be an audience award as usual, besides the Viral award. But when will we be able to vote for/donate to our favourite games?

Charmander and Jay are right. Creating these games must have been a hard process and probably took a lot of their makers' free time. And many of us - including me sadly - seem to have forgotten about that - or at least recognizing this in our comments. That is true. And, although i can speak only for myself, I'm sorry about it and hope I'll be much more constructive from now on.

I think you are wining. Some of the games are really good.

I like Super Energy Apocalypse a lot.
+: Great story. Original strategy. Fun. I really like the garbage trucks, for some reason :)

-: The game was a bit too slow, maybe. Also, I had a problem with smog, and didn't figure out how to remove it.

I like this website and I like these competitions. I think that the new competition page layout is really cool. Everything worked perfectly for me. There was a game or two that begin out with a black screen for a while, before showing the Mochi Ad, so it will be good to show at least the word "Loading..." to make it clear that everything is working perfectly.

In general terms, I do like the games. I do like to try these casual games out, and I usually do appreciate the effort that's put forth to bring a new kind of experience.

I would like to comment on the violent games. Please note that I'm not a person to impose a view and that I've played a large share of violent games myself. However, I'd like to see more games that break away from the violence for the sake of originality and creativity. How about a "reverse" tower defense game? Instead of preventing creatures from making it to the other side how about making a game where various weak creatures want to get to the other side and you would place buildings whose various employees come out to help within a radius from time to time. There would be weak creatures that need food, delusional creatures that need rest, sick creatures that need medicine and sad creatures that need cheerleaders. :) Let's take another example. I certainly like the Canopy game, it has an enjoyable degree of originality in it. It is smoothly executed. But the theme is not what I consider to be the most pleasant. How about a game where the player is carrying a baby and making a "sprint flight" to a nest far away. Various creatures in the path want to help you and they throw you items to catch, such as milk bottles and stamina refills. You could also absorb special powers out of these creatures, such as faster speed or greater field of vision. Obstacles come from the environment, i.e., lots of forest trees or hot-and-draining, lonely desert. Let's take Super Energy Apocalypse. I also like this game, perhaps my favorite of the violent crowd. Again, I understand not everybody is of the same opinion, but I'd love to see a version of this game without the terrible zombies and world scenario. How about a game of building a new city that's self-sustainable and environment-friendly. The game could begin with a village that depends on unseen neighboring cities for various important goods. As challenges, smog could make workers slower because they tend to be sicker, or there could be unexpected delays in importing necessary goods such as food. And so on. I definitely like the mechanics and graphic style of MECI. How about a version that focuses on rescuing people. The rover could learn how to build bridges and throw rope ladders to people below. Since time is of the essence, the rover could also deliver food and medicine so that people can hold out longer as rescue operations are made.

Further opinion (I had to split my comment because it was too long):
Obelisk -- I like this type of game. Didn't finish but will get back to it. I like that there are two types of objects (one per creature), and the conversation is a nice touch.

Gride -- Very nicely executed. I wonder how it would play with randomized tracks and larger field of vision.

Pieces -- Love the art, and personally the lack of music does not detract my enjoyment from it at all.

Doggnation -- I like this one.

Orbash -- Nice and original, at least to me.

dRive -- I like the originality here. I wonder about being able to use six keys at the same time to drive the tracks. :)

MILO -- I like this one and it's nicely executed.

I've spent 24 hours playing all of the 21 games now, so I'm going to cast my meaningless, anonymous vote, if only to give others some tips on what you shouldn't miss out on.

1st place, for being a personal favorite and best implementation: Game 10 - Pieces

Even though I encountered three serious design glitches, and even though I'm told that it's a blatant rip-off of Knytt, this game has a story, it's cute, and it doesn't involve killing things. These are bizarre personal reasons, so here is a better reason: The upgrade theme is suberbly implemented - only The Last Canopy comes close to rivaling it. I simply couldn't tear myself from it because of this.

2nd place, for it's flawless implementation: Game 5 - The Last Canopy

I don't like shooters, but still this was a very good implementation of the Upgrade theme. Not only that, but I didn't encounter one single bug in it, which made the game enjoyable without interuption from start to finish.

3rd place, for keeping a good story: Game 18 - M.I.L.O.

What the programmer of this game seems to lack in advanced programming skill, he makes up for in keeping an interesting story. The upgrade theme isn't really that well implemented, and the game crashed IE which made me abandon it a couple of levels into it, but it's still a good game despite of this. Getting rid of the bugs just might help this entry to a second place.

I dunno. The ones that I liked most were really close clones, and they still had some glitches in them. (Could be my end but I'm a FileHippo junkie.)
Seems the first 3 contests had more whacked-out original submissions in them.

For anyone who's curious, here is my game, which did not make it onto the finalists list:
Grady's Adventure

As someone who has submitted games in the past few competitions, I understand why the judges chose not to include it (and frankly I'm grateful to not be subjected to the kind of harsh criticism that the finalists are getting).

The game fails on a few counts, in ways that some of the finalists, despite other problems, managed to get right, while others had trouble with:

• Lack of Robustness. This has to do with how much pounding a game can take and not produce errors. This relies on solid coding. Early prototypes typically are not robust, but with time are improved. The better action games in this competition are robust.

• Lack of Depth. How immersive is the experience? How many layers of discovery are there for the player. A good game should not reveal itself entirely within the first few seconds. Nor should it be too coy. Getting it right depends on a good idea, and lots of time to develop it."Super Energy Apocalypse" and "Tricked Out Trailer" are both surprisingly deep.

• To many Bugs. This also depends on lots of time to hammer out problems.

• Original Idea. Clones of existing games are not bad, but there should be a twist or significant change that makes the game unique. Sites such as nordinho and newgrounds and lazylaces post game clones primarily (escape the room, shoot the zombie, or whatever) while JayIsGames usually has new and unique games. I, like others, was surprised to see so many clones here.

However, I think users (particularly on this site) are quite forgiving of graphics and general interface polish.

Given that games should be better with more time devoted to development, why were there so many weak entries despite 2 and a half months to create them? I think it comes down to the creative well being dry for many developers. There have been 4 of these competitions in the past year, and it's hard to have 4 really good ideas and develop them fully in 12 months.

In the early competitions, it was clear that some of the entries had been well under-way before the contest was announced, and the contest was the impetus for completing it. But those games are complete now and these entries were likely all made specifically for this competition.

I regard all the entries here as prototypes and not complete games, and with that perspective I think this competition was a success.

Very nice post, Matt. Thank you.

Thanks to Jay and the other jayisgames people for putting all your time in organizing such unique competitions, which allow anyone with a flash license like myself to show their creativity to the rest of the world.

Developing a game, even just coming up with a new game concept takes a lot of time and energy.

Condsidered that all these games were developed for free in the spare time of working or studying people, it's really too easy to say you're unimpressed...

It's so interesting how different it is to play the games as a player, and to play the games as a developer.

All of these games are really complicated, very good, and very well done.

Just the process of creating the game and then coding and hoping that your idea can actually be coded is a feat in and of itself.

Congratulations to all the developers that submitted.

And thanks to all you gamers playing.

jorge

After Bart Bonte and Jorge Goyco has spoken, it's time for me to come in eh? :)

Well into nearly 2 days after the competition deadline, there's been a lot of drama going around. First it was the competition interface (which has superb usability, by the way!). Then it was the range of games, what with all the wonderful and nasty comments in each game page.

All the good points has been said, but to sum it up, I think it's best that we put ourselves in the each other's shoes.

Like Bart Bonte said, although it was for the spirit of the competition, the games were done during the little spare time that the developer had. So as a critic, I think it's best to view the game in light of its potential. Even if you hate the game's execution, there are better ways to voice opinions rather than being rude, yea? Every game has a lot of thought, planning and mental sweat gone into it, be it a simple game or otherwise. So be nice.

And big thanks to Jay for the crowd control. I can see his passion in making sure that everybody has fun and learn something outta all of this. We truly appreciate it.

On the other hand, though, as developers, we should take note of every feedback, be it nice or nasty. We shouldn't just say "How rude! I don't listen to rude people!". Everyone have their reasons for hating the game, so it's our duty to listen to them, dissect the game design and understand what's wrong. Then after that, you make a critical decision on whether to fix the issue or not. IMO, that's the duty of the game developer, to listen to his/her players. So I think being rude to your players is a no-no. Let the admin do that for you (sorry Jay!).

Yup that's my 2 cents. I'm a Libran, so I love balance :) Hope I didn't offend anyone.

Again, thanks to Jay and the team for giving us developers the opportunity to show our game creation potential. Also, good job to all the other entrants. I played all of them, and had a lot of fun. Thanks.

ps - Jay, I have a suggestion. Maybe we could have some form of information on each of the game page to show what has been improved in the latest update, you know, like a revision list. This is to encourage the players to try the game again. If it's too much trouble editing the HTML, maybe it could be a pinned comment, like how you place the Walkthroughs, which is always at the top?

Boy, now that's some great gaming right there. Can't wait til I try them all out. Thanks Jay!

Hey Jay, I too am having problems accessing the games. When I get to the CDGC5 page, the sponsors graphics will load, then the square (where I'm assuming the games would be) goes all black and my pointer goes to "thinking mode" and does not come out. I am unable to close the window and have to restart the computer.

I'm on a Mac using Firefox 3 Beta 4 using OSX 10.4.11

Ahhh...

So in this case, I was too soon to "upgrade" (insert high hat noise here)

Thanks for the help

Everything runs fine for me, and it's very pretty.

As no doubt many others have said before me, I really prefer this new layout to the old "Eject" system. It looks great, it's easy to use, and it's fast to navigate through all these entires. Great job, Jay (and/or anyone else who worked on it)!

I have to second (third, fifth, one-hundredth) all the comments on your competition page layout. That is an AWESOME interface!

At first glance, I thought the offering seemed light in comparison to the last competition, but then I started to think about it. There were so many last time it was almost impossible to make a clear decision about favorites. This time around, with the finalist selection and the amazing interface, it's easy to go through the games, see them all in one place, read about them and play those that interest you.

Now, I will never play all of them. I'll avoid every single shmup because I use a laptop with a touchpad which makes them impossible (and I'm not a fan of that genre). I'm also not much of a platform fan, but I've tried at least one. And the games I've been able to get into have been pretty wonderful (dogg nation comes to mind!).

All in all I think it's a great effort on the part of the designers, and a herculean effort on the part of everyone here at JIG. Thanks, Jay! Take all the time off from competitions that you need!

PS: Jay--would it be possible to open the link to the game page in a new window/page? I know you're busy, but it would just take a second!

You are so cool!

a) As always, more than full marks for Jay and JIG for getting everyone to make and submit the games

b) Whether the games are better or worse than other competitions in the past it doesn't matter, until I make a game and submit it RESPECt to everyone who made all of these games.

c) I really loved MECI

d) When's the voting?!?!?!

It's just a test here - I wanted to leave a comment at one of the contest games' comment box but it didn't let me sign in with this nick and password. That's why I'm testing it here. Sorry.

Jay,
any ideas why I got kicked out of my Typekey account there (the comment section of "Numbers' Reaction 2") unable to sign back in while the account is active and functional here? I remember not having to sign in for every contest game's comment section. Or am i wrong?

Yes, I left one or too.

I haven't cleared my cookies - and anyway, if i did that it would mean that i would have to sign in again here also - and i didn't have to.

I love the new interface - thanks so much for putting it together so well. It's so much easier to access the games, and to comment all of them. Thanks again for all of the hard work!

Jay, I really enjoy the CGDC's but it seems like we'd get more truly amazing games if only there were more time to develop. :/ I think this time around the entries have been much less polished than usual, and some are just riddled with bugs and others are clones with a few new things added on. Maybe it'd be better as a twice-a-year event or something?

What's the theme this time?

I had an idea for a competition.

Someone would come up with a small piece of OOP. Like a bouncing ball controlled by the spacebar, or a little guy controlled by the arrow keys, or a spaceship that shoots, then anyone could take that and make it into their own simple game.

Maybe not so much a competition, but a way to develop flash game skills.

Maybe this isn't the place for that. Just a thought.

Or another idea would be to make a game that is small as in file size. Nothing over 10K or something like that.

Or one that only uses the color red. Everything has to be a shade of red.

Anyway, I like themes. They really set JayIsGames apart from most every other competition out there.

jorge

jorge

To game developers:

http://mochiland.com/articles/marketing-flash-games-the-other-half-of-the-battle

Read this article. It's really good. And it could help with the Viral award for this competition.

And after the competition, it can help too.

jorge

My biggest problem with most of the games in this release?

No way to mute sound. I like to listen to my own music, especially when the games are really loud and annoying.

i've heard a lot lately about more time for developers. 6 months, a year even.

i am a developer. my game in this competition is MECI.

personally, i feel the time restriction is great. it forces developers to think creatively about their game. there won't be time to spend ages refining and refining and refining and making graphics super fancy and being professional. there will be time only for making a sweet game based off a clever concept.

also, from my perspective, 6 months to develop a game requires a real time commitment. and i don't mean straight up hours, i mean overall. i have a real job, and doing this on the side is something that will start to seriously drag on after a month.

i built my game in the last 10 days when the contest was extended, and had a vision larger than my ability in that time frame. there are serious flaws in my game because of this. given the full 1.5 months, i could have had the game to a nice completion point. given six months, i would expect to burn out.

just my two cents :)

drMikey

There are some truly impressive games in this competition. I am seriously in love with a couple of them--as in, they will go in my favorites here when the competition ends.

Jay and all of you who are developing games for us--you guys (and gals...I live in the west where "guys" is generic!) are the best! I'm laid up for a couple of days--guess what I'll be doing? Woo hoo!!! Playing!!

I'm occasionally using Opera Mini for reading reviews. It is not possible to run flash games on my mobile phone but it is nice to read reviews and even comment them using cell phone. Unfortunately the competition page used this time is not working on mobiles because flash is used :(

I, too, am bothered by the uninciteful negative comments, though by the time I'm posting this, most have those have stopped. Many people are reacting to these games as if they are simply free games on some site, not as a competition for people learning or experimenting with games. Such comments are simply not helpful.

But I have mixed feelings. I am sympathetic to the fact that many of these games were developed in scant free time, or as hobbies. However, this is still a competition. Unless we're going to call it "the competition of games that have been developed during free time or as hobbies and therefore might be buggy and not entirely well developed" the game is what it is, as its been submitted it. To claim there were errors made because it was developed during free time seems a bit counterproductive to me.

I write fiction during my free time. I submit it to contests and publications. If it comes back with scathing reviews or fails to win I don't then explain to the editor or reviewer, "You see, you shouldn't expect it to read all that well--I wrote it in my free time. I'm an interior designer by profession." The work I submitted should stand on its own merits, regardless of the amount of time and energy I was able to put into it.

I'm not actually commenting on the quality of the games in this competition, which, in fact, amazes me. I can only marvel at the skill and time required and know it's something I would not even know how to approach. But I try to be as constructive and positive as possibly in my comments. To have these games qualified as being less-than-perfect because they were developed during free time etc is perfectly understandable, but seems to me to undermine the motive behind a competition of games.

I like the concept of these games as prototypes, and maybe that's the attitude that should prevail. This might avoid those negative comments that simply state the games are half-baked, not work the time, etc.

Taking Bogus' comment in mind, I kind of had to breathe a sigh of relief to find that a lot of people were feeling the same way I did regarding this batch of entries. But in expressing my disappointment, I also didn't want to offend.

Let's face it, I barely know any HTML, forget having enough computer knowledge to actually create a game of the worst quality ever posted here.

I think, and I'm really sorry Jay if you take this the wrong way, but the "upgrade" theme may have ended up being a pretty difficult obstacle to overcome, and may ultimately have resulted in the general malaise that a lot of people seem to be expressing here. Ball Physics and Replay proved to be excellent indicators because they left a lot of room for creativity, but one thing that kind of jumps right out at you with upgrade is the fact that there are several variants on the tower defense theme alone.

A lot of these games are kind of rehashing old themes and I guess that's to be expected, but it strikes me as funny that in general the games can be characterized as either too familiar because the upgrade theme lends itself automatically to a handful of styles of games, or more unique, but really straining to fit the upgrade theme in there.

Again, I still think all of the developers did a good job; the final products in a lot of instances are very well polished and I think take the theme as far as it will go, but there is definitely something missing this go around that was there in the last couple of contests.

I'm sorry if anyone takes offense, but that's just how I see it.

Well, blah blah blah. I just posted 103,340 on dRive! I have NEVER had a high score on a game ever in my life.I need someone to celebrate with me!

haha...thanks Jay! I was ridiculously excited about it!

So... You've got a viral award, but no easy way to link to specific games? And email forms don't count. Email forms are a pain in the wang.

I can't say that seems very well thought out.

hey can someone tell me the best game here or one i should try