Thanks for the info, Brian!
In any case, I’ll just wait to see if someone remembers it (my puzzles). That will mean it was good enough, and I wouldn’t feel cool doing it by myself.
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There were some other comps for ink and twine:
InkJam:
Twine Survival Guide:
Edit: the Vampire: the Masquerade Jam also had a lot of IF (there was a choicescript game and a few twine games). If you’re into visual novels, there was NaNoReNo.
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Adding a link to games published from the text adventure community in 2021…
http://solutionarchive.com/list/year%2C2021/
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Another game you actually enjoyed (which was not part of a compo) was Hibernated 1 Director’s Cut, thanks again for your five star rating 
Not sure if you didn’t pick it because it’s based on an original story I did in 2018? In every aspect, whether it’s narrative, technically or in terms of the game-design, the Director’s Cut is a complete rewrite, which only shares the basic story with the original game. Not sure though how the rules for the XYZZY Award are.
In terms of technical achievements I would definitely add @ChristopherDrum’s StatusLine Z-Machine interpreter for the Pico-8 (it’s super cool) and definitely @sijnstra’s M4ZVM.
My Puddle BuildTools had a large impact on those who use PunyInform to target retro systems, it might be worth an inclusion as well.
Hope this helps 
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At least for tech developments, the year of initial release isn’t important. It’s enough that there’s been significant activity or updates to a tech tool during the year to warrant a nomination. I guess the same thing would go for a game? (Also, I think your game should be eligible anyway, since it’s a new release in all ways that matter, the way I see it.
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Thank you very much, this gives me hope that H1DC might end up on the real nomination list! And in this case actually Puny should be up there as well. No Puny, no BuildTools! 
When I voted for a couple things on the poll, I just skimmed the first few pages of most rated games from 2021 because I couldn’t remember what came out. That’s why I didn’t remember it, but I appreciate the reminder! I’ll revisit it later today.
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I have trouble remembering what game was when, too. Is there some reason why XYZZY awards happen so late? I would have had a much better grasp on what happened when if things got moving in January. Of course I say this without being responsible for any of the work to do it.
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In fact, what even are the XYZZY awards and who is in charge of them? It’s all rather mysterious and esoteric, judging from the website (the Xyzzymposium?) I mean, that’s fine by me: I love a good mystery. But it does seem just a tad opaque.
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I am no xyzzyologist, but I’m pretty sure these days they’re organized by Sam Kabo Ashwell. I also remember seeing mention in previous years that the thing that makes them so labor-intensive (and therefore come late in the year) is the methodology for determining the list of eligible games, which currently requires a lot of manual diving into IFDB. There’ve been discussions of moving to something less onerous, like having the community offer up the list of games they might be interested in nominating as a sort of zeroth round (currently there’s a nomination round then the actual voting), but don’t believe anything’s come of that yet.
I agree it would be nice to have them come earlier in the year, though - there’s probably some helpful volunteers around here who’d potentially be able to help lighten the load.
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Thanks for the shout-out; I didn’t even know there were technical awards!
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In 1995, Eileen Mullin started a fanzine called XYZZYnews. The first issue was dated January/February 1995. It was published bi-monthly for the first two years, then a little more erratically.
XYZZYnews included news, interviews, reviews, hints and other articles aimed at the text adventure community.
Following on from IF Comp 1997, Eileen announced the XYZZY awards in XYZZYnews issue #14. People could vote for one game that they considered the best in each of ten categories. All games published for the first time in 1997 were eligible. The rules were quite strict. For example, “Voting by dead people, fictional characters, and inanimate objects is strictly prohibited.”
Anyway, the tradition continued and it looks like it’s still going in 2022.
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Thanks Garry!
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Perhaps the XYZZYs should be another candidate for takeover by the neocabal (i.e. the IFTF). IIRC it already shares infrastructure with the IFComp site, deeper integration with IFDB might make running the awards smoother.
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Just wondering, are the XYZZY awards still happening this year? Last year the first-round voting started in early September. Is there a need for additional staff or assistance?
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I haven’t heard anything yet. Usually @maga announces them without prior notice, and they’ve generally gotten later and later, occasionally a bit earlier.
Many people have offered to take over or help so it could run earlier in the year, but he’s always declined and they’ve always eventually gone off.
It could be possible for the community as a whole to start over and organize it themselves, but @maga has a lot of infrastructure that was built up over the years and/or inherited (specifically the xyzzyawards website including it’s voting forms) as well as a lot of experience (including contacts who help sort the database and anti-cheating methods).
I would like the awards to be earlier in the year (like February), and have wanted that for a while. But every time the awards actually happen I forgot about it until next year.
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It would be nice if they happened sooner, but I suppose the Nobel-like delay between effort and reward lends the process a bit of gravitas? Or perhaps I’m being too generous.
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