My personal take is that it’d benefit from being given a break. It’d be cool to see it again in a few years, but you’d see diminishing returns if it became a regular event.
I do think that it’s ideal to have a moderate-stress minicomp at least once a year, but it keeps things fresher if it’s a different formula, with a different focus, and perhaps run by different people.
Well, we’ve done sound, and sight (Cover Stories), so obviously the next step is – SniffyComp! A Leather Goddesses of Phobos tribute. Everyone sends and receives a “playlist” of four unusually smelly substances and your task is to write a game inspired by one or more of the odors.
Sam will organize it.
I am willing to assent to TasteComp, in which everybody buys me a beer and then if I’m still standing I write a game about the tastiest one.
A ratings/reviews comp/drive? Within a given period of time, awards for best new review, most new reviews over N words, most reviews/ratings of games previously unreviewed/unrated on IFDB, most new links to already-existing reviews that are not already on IFDB or IFWiki…
Spitballing here.
DreamComp: entrants submit brief (1-3 sentences) descriptions of memorable dreams (fantastic, mundane, terrifying, kinky, what have you), which are then redistributed a la ShuffleComp.
Wait. I can do better.
Comp of the Weird: everybody submits bizarre tabloid headlines (think Weekly World News), which are then redistributed a la ShuffleComp, giving entrants a wacky newsreel from which to take inspiration. For example:
Bigfoot spotted in ice cream parlor
Wasp Girl leads cops on aerial chase
UFO pilot asks for directions at Grand Canyon
Severed hand found in jellybean jar
Entire Oklahoma town vanishes, lawnmowers remain
K’Krong the Destroyer wins democratic primary
Cat saves fireman from tree
Eh?
In light of Sam’s recent blog post, how about NameComp? Enter a list of names for characters that could be used in the game–maybe as an author avatar if nothing else.
[rant]And it’d be nice to promote soundtracks for games, even those without built-in support, submit a soundtrack that could be scattered around and that authors could draw on for extra inspiration if they like.[/rant]
More seriously… I’ve thought it’d be nice to have something like a location comp, encouraging people to use locations, perhaps real ones. One challenge would be to figure out how to submit them. Pictures or short descriptions? An idea I just had was something similar, except for places of larger or smaller scale that could be described as short or long as the submitter likes–so someone might submit (or get) a list that read “Garden,” Memory Grove (the link would be part of the list), The Cathedral of Learning, “A bridge over an algae-soaked stream,” “Spaceport, Aldebaraan VI–North Airlock,” and a fifty-word description of, well, something. (This would have to be done a bit carefully for accessibility reasons–wouldn’t want to send pictures to a blind participant.)
Or RetroactiveComp. Gather as many past themes as we can and give people a second chance at them. Grab some songs from ShuffleComps past, write a parser game (or not) about sunrise, The Return of SpeedIF Prompts, make a game about travel, or do any combination.
I also like DreamComp–but a problem might be coming up with enough dreams for everyone to have a menu. Review drives are also a great idea!
I’m on board for doing something different.
How about a game that starts from something in the IF Name Generator?
All those ideas sound great [emote]:D[/emote]
I’d be really interested in LocationComp or something using the IF generator ! Or how about another WalkthroughComp? I’ve been intrigued by it for a little while [emote]:)[/emote]
(And for something completely different, an IFDB drive needs to happen at some point too!)
A contest/prize/incentive for a solution to streamline/automate adding new works pages to IFWiki…
I like the idea behind the Snoman Sextet, where each author, with the briefest of outlines, made a part of a larger story.
But, I imagine this might be more fun to play than to actually author.
I really loved ShuffleComp (thinking of songs for it, writing for it, testing for it, and playing it - although I haven’t played all the games yet), and I think it would be sad to see it have a multi-year hiatus.
I don’t know if this idea will resonate with anyone, but maybe an ongoing ShuffleComp would be possible? (Maybe even practical?) Entrants submit a list of songs, get a list of songs, complete a game on their own schedule (easing up the deadline pressure that I know kiboshed a few authors’ plans this year), get another list of songs if they desire and create another game, and on and on as they care to. Folks would be able to enter the Comp at any time. Folks could leave the Comp at any time. If people wished to continue the commendation aspect of it, possibly commendations could be given out every ten games or so.
It’s a thought. It might be something that I’d be willing to do the dirty work on.
Yes, I would hate to see a hiatus. Maga might be right, but then again, does EctoComp have a diminishing return? It might- I haven’t checked. Also IntroComp? They seem pretty steady to me. But again, I’ve not done any counting or anything.
EctoComp had fewer entries than it did the year before (that was a boom year thanks to opening it up to non-Adrift stories). ShuffleComp had about half of the entries that it did last year, so my guess is that there would be another dropoff if it was done in the same way and at the same time, so my inclination is that something should change about it if it’s to be an ongoing thing. What that thing is, I’m just throwing jarts at.
I think ParserComp may also have taken a bite out of ShuffleComp this year–I was certainly a bit fatigued. And the deadline pressure was a big thing, although it may just be that I had bitten off far more than I can chew.
OTOH I think deadlines really motivate people (at least me) to actually finish. Maybe one thing to do would be to have a release deadline every two months, if you’re going to do a rolling ShuffleComp?
Wasn’t the first ShuffleComp a SpeedIF?
I would’ve entered ShuffleComp but doing ParserComp and Spring Thing back to back wiped me out.
Introcomp’s first year was its (joint) best; after that it averaged about half its first-year entries, until choice-based entries started showing up. Novelty’s a big draw.
Kinda. An ancestor to ShuffleComp was SpeedIF Jacket, which wasn’t music-oriented but did have some similarities (you wrote pull-quotes from reviews of imaginary games instead of songs). It had four iterations between, uh, 2002 and 2011?
I at first misread this as StiffyComp. Maybe a comp where everyone has to make a game about everyone’s favorite(?) IF porno hero?
Also, I think the close timing of ParserComp → SpringThing → ShuffleComp produced reviewer fatigue.
It was not.
Then I’m the only one who coded it in 3 hours? How is that possible? Am I thinking of something else?