My entry for the October GDS at BGDF.com took second. The entries are here - mine's #5. I'm happy about that - the first place game was very creative, and I voted for it.
I've played my game a few times now, and it's super fun. I'll post revised rules and some other stuff on here soon. I'm trying to make better art for my gameboards, but I need to work up my Illustrator skills some. And develop some sense of visual art.
Showing posts with label Competitions. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Competitions. Show all posts
Sunday, October 23, 2011
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
Bones and more bones
Ten entries in the BGDF challenge this month. The theme and restriction has made several of them seemingly similar within a couple broad categories - including "sort out body parts" and "undead things beat each other up." It'll be interesting to see how it's judged - the outcomes in this competition always seem a little bit random to me, although the winner is usually a good game.
Sunday, October 9, 2011
BGDF contest for October
Got my entry in, after sitting one out. This one's requirements are the dead and a Mancala-style choosing mechanism. We'll see how I do; I haven't made a game like this entry before. I'm hoping to get to playtest it some more with some friends this week. I'll report how it goes, and how it does in the contest.
Still trying to figure out what I'll send off to Hippodice this year. I might try this game, and I might try Warped, my entry in TGC's vehicle contest. Or, I might resubmit Yoggity with some rules changes I came up with over the summer. Hmm...
Still trying to figure out what I'll send off to Hippodice this year. I might try this game, and I might try Warped, my entry in TGC's vehicle contest. Or, I might resubmit Yoggity with some rules changes I came up with over the summer. Hmm...
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
TGC Vehicle design contest submissions
Vehicle Types |
Game Types |
By my (admittedly idiosyncratic) standards, I'd say roughly half of the entries I categorized as flawed in some significant way and not a threat to win. This was not usually based on looking at the rules, although I did read through some of them. The problems included very crude art, very crude or simplistic design, poorly-written or incomplete descriptions, or other reasons.
My easy dismissal of these might be wrong - there could be a gem of gameplay in there, hidden behind bad art, in the same way that visually beautiful games can often suck in terms of gameplay. About 1/4 of the games had good to great art. My art isn't the greatest, but it's OK, and the game behind it is fun. I'm not certain the rules will make it clear how fun it is, and there are some complexities that I'm not sure I got across. The fact that I'm competing with six other space-trading games is troubling, too.
Well, we'll see how it goes. As usual, I'm sure I'm over-thinking this.
Saturday, October 1, 2011
New space game nearly ready for release
My entry in TheGameCrafter's vehicle design contest is in, and just under the wire. I haven't gotten a copy yet (although it's ordered), so I haven't published it in the shop, but here's what the page will look like when I do. I like the game - I've played it a number of times now with friends (thanks, Derek and Bob!), refining it each time, and it's pretty darn fun. It centers on trading goods between worlds, but it quickly evolves into a race to complete missions and build technologies.
Plus, there's pirates. What's not to like?
Plus, there's pirates. What's not to like?
Thursday, September 22, 2011
Art for space game
Here's a sample play board (one of a 2x2 grid) for my new unnamed space game that I'm submitting for TheGameCrafter.com's vehicle game design contest, due in about a week. In the game, players control ships and trade resources from planet to planet while completing missions and building ship upgrades.
The game board background image is NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day from June 30, 2011, seen here:
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap110630.html
It is of Star Factory Messier 17, taken by the European Southern Observatory's VLT survey telescope's OmegaCam.
The planets are textures from http://www.mayang.com/textures/ that I altered, recolored, and mapped to spheres.
The green grid I created in Adobe Illustrator, with shadows added in GIMP. The wormhole art is a GIMP plasma rendering with a bunch of effects. The pirate icon is clip art from the Open Clip Art Library (http://openclipart.org). The starlanes (blue paths) are a path trace in GIMP with some gradient filling and border effects. The text and disks around the planets I made in PowerPoint 2007.
The game board background image is NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day from June 30, 2011, seen here:
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap110630.html
It is of Star Factory Messier 17, taken by the European Southern Observatory's VLT survey telescope's OmegaCam.
The planets are textures from http://www.mayang.com/textures/ that I altered, recolored, and mapped to spheres.
The green grid I created in Adobe Illustrator, with shadows added in GIMP. The wormhole art is a GIMP plasma rendering with a bunch of effects. The pirate icon is clip art from the Open Clip Art Library (http://openclipart.org). The starlanes (blue paths) are a path trace in GIMP with some gradient filling and border effects. The text and disks around the planets I made in PowerPoint 2007.
Saturday, August 27, 2011
Vehicle Design Contest at TheGameCrafter
Described here. The prizes are promotional points on TheGameCrafter.com's site, which is interesting - you can get your game entry (or another game) featured there, which is nice, and obviously winning the contest will give you some small notoriety/marketability.
The restrictions are interesting, too - the most restrictive parts are that the game must use their vehicles (although only one type makes it not too bad) and that your game must price out at under $20, which is pretty limiting, since even Diggity (which is only 100 or so cards plus rules, no extra parts) comes in at about $15. If you want a board or other tokens, it could be tricky to hit that limit. Another "prize" is getting to judge the next contest, which is interesting also and comes with some free games.
There's not much info on what the criteria are, too, which is a bit tricky, although there are some suggestions (artwork, polish).
Deadline is October 1. Obviously a better fit for people with new vehicle-related ideas who are used to the TGC production system.
The restrictions are interesting, too - the most restrictive parts are that the game must use their vehicles (although only one type makes it not too bad) and that your game must price out at under $20, which is pretty limiting, since even Diggity (which is only 100 or so cards plus rules, no extra parts) comes in at about $15. If you want a board or other tokens, it could be tricky to hit that limit. Another "prize" is getting to judge the next contest, which is interesting also and comes with some free games.
There's not much info on what the criteria are, too, which is a bit tricky, although there are some suggestions (artwork, polish).
Deadline is October 1. Obviously a better fit for people with new vehicle-related ideas who are used to the TGC production system.
Monday, August 1, 2011
Contest at TGC
TheGameCrafter.com is running a game design contest through their site. Prizes are from their new point system, which you can use to get your games featured on their site. I have no idea what the value of featured status is - whether it translates to more views or more sales - but it's an interesting idea, and I've been entering contests with no prizes for a while now at BGDF and at Hippodice.
Unfortunately for me, the contest focuses on their vehicle parts, which isn't really my thing - I guess I go more for abstract stuff rather than using fiddly miniatures. Of course, I could just use some of the vehicles as pawns or markers, I guess. I'll have to see if I can think anything up.
Monday, July 18, 2011
GDS - Europoly
I've got an entry in the newest BGDF design showdown after sitting the last one out. We'll see how I do - it's a bit of a challenge, to make a Monopoly game that keeps the mechanics and pieces but is more "euro" and fun. Of course, if people played original Monopoly like the rules say, they'd have more fun to begin with...
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Dicestorm
Below is my entry in the huge February BGDF Game Design Showdown contest. It nearly made the cut for the finals, but not quite. I think it would be pretty fun; over the summer, I think I'll try to put a set together (wouldn't be too hard - just need lots of six-sided dice) and see how it plays.
Dicestorm
(c) 2011 by Dave Dobson / Plankton Games
2-4 players
2-4 players
Introduction
In the olden days, the Ur-gan clans of the Stonetop Mountains vied with each other under a strict code of mortal combat. To the losers, a decade of defeat, shame, and self-pity. To the winners, ten years of dominion over all the other clans.
You lead one of these clans in a battle to the death! Your warriors are represented by dice - each die is a warrior. When you are out of dice, your clan has lost, and you are out of the game. Will you fail, and lie unsung in a coward's grave, or will you roll to victory? (Get it? Roll? Get it?)
Components
- 30 white six-sided dice
- 1 black six-sided die
- 2 red eight-sided dice
- 1 green 10-sided die
- 4 Restoration mini-cards
- 14 Tide of Battle mini-cards
Object
Be the last player with surviving armies in the game
Setup
Each player gets a set of normal warriors (white six-sided dice). The number of starting dice depends on the number of players as follows:
- 2 players - 15 dice each
- 3 players - 10 dice each
- 4 players - 7 dice each
Each player also gets one Restoration card. Shuffle the Tide of Battle cards and place them face down nearby. Roll to see who goes first.
Game Play
Game play consists of two phases, the battle phase and the draw phase
Battle Phase
On each of your turns, you will battle with the opponent to your right. To conduct a battle, you and your opponent each roll all your warriors (your dice). Battles are resolved from the die rolls according to these rules:
- Each roll of five or higher counts as a hit
- The number showing on each die is the number of hits needed to defeat and remove that die
- The player dealing hits may decide which of the opponent's dice the hits affect
For example:
- Gollum has six dice and rolls: 6 5 4 4 2 1
- Frodo has seven dice and rolls: 6 6 5 3 2 1 1
Gollum has scored two hits, and he may either take out Frodo's two dice showing 1's or Frodo's one die showing a 2. Normally, it would be better to take out two dice rather than one, but if the die showing 2 is a special die, Gollum might want to get rid of that one. Frodo scores three hits and would probably use them to take out Gollum's two dice showing 2 and 1.
Draw Phase
After the battle is resolved, the player draws one card from the Tide of Battle deck. The player may choose to pay the cost shown on the card (the cost is paid in dice), or he may pass it to the right. The next player has the same choice - pay or pass. If the card makes it back around to the original location, the cost is reduced by one and the process repeats. Eventually the card will be bought, or the cost of the card will drop to zero, at which point it may be taken for free.
Losing
If you ever lose all of your dice, you are out of the game immediately, even if you could add more dice by playing a card.
Cards
There are two types of cards - Restoration cards and Tide of Battle cards. Restoration cards bring a player's force back up to its starting total. Tide of Battle cards can have many different effects. The following rules apply to these cards:
- Some cards have permanent effects; others can be played once only and are then discarded.
- Some cards are played at specific times in a battle or during a player's turn. Other cards can be played at any time as long as the player still has dice.
- Some cards call for additional dice to be added to a player's army. If those dice are not available when the card is played, they are not added or owed - they are lost. Partial adding is allowed (e.g. if a player is instructed to add five and three are available, he or she gets the three dice).
- If a player is ever out of warriors, he or she has lost and can play no cards, even if they would restore warriors to the player's army.
- Tide of Battle cards that are used are discarded. When all of these cards are used, shuffle the discards to restore the Tides of Battle pile.
- Restoration cards are never re-used once played.
Tide of Battle Cards
Explanations of the Tide of Battle cards are below.
Sunday, March 13, 2011
Word from Hippodice
I didn't make the finals - I don't know where I was out of the hundred or so games they took. A good experience the first time around, though. Full results are here. If (A) means Austria, it looks like 11 of the 12 mentioned on the finals page are from at least partially German-speaking countries (the other one is from the U.S.) - it hasn't been so strongly Germanic in the past, if I remember past lists.
Not that that means anything; the German gaming community is huge and diverse, with many great designers. Just an observation.
Not that that means anything; the German gaming community is huge and diverse, with many great designers. Just an observation.
Monday, March 7, 2011
Biggest Game Design Showdown ever?
This month's Game Design Showdown over at BGDF is huge - 37 entries! I think the biggest one I've ever seen is twelve or so. I've got one in, so we'll see how it looks compared to the huge field.
Why so many? Probably because there's a publisher interested (Michael Mindes of Tasty Minstrel Games), and the restrictions in the contest are actually his design specifications for a potential publication. Also, because those specifications are mostly just that you use dice with only limited other components, and nearly everybody can think of a design for a dice game.
There's no guarantee that any of the entries would be published, of course, and no guarantee that the winner of the contest would be the one that TM selects, since they'd have different ideas about marketability and design than the contest voters, but maybe that has people interested. I'm not sure the regular voting apparatus (up to six votes, no more than three per game, no voting for your own) are going to be workable here - it's usually a bit mysterious who wins, and usually few people vote. But maybe having so much interest will make for more voting and less quirkiness.
Should be interesting - I'll let you know how I do, and we can see if any of the entries sparks Michael's interest.
Why so many? Probably because there's a publisher interested (Michael Mindes of Tasty Minstrel Games), and the restrictions in the contest are actually his design specifications for a potential publication. Also, because those specifications are mostly just that you use dice with only limited other components, and nearly everybody can think of a design for a dice game.
There's no guarantee that any of the entries would be published, of course, and no guarantee that the winner of the contest would be the one that TM selects, since they'd have different ideas about marketability and design than the contest voters, but maybe that has people interested. I'm not sure the regular voting apparatus (up to six votes, no more than three per game, no voting for your own) are going to be workable here - it's usually a bit mysterious who wins, and usually few people vote. But maybe having so much interest will make for more voting and less quirkiness.
Should be interesting - I'll let you know how I do, and we can see if any of the entries sparks Michael's interest.
Friday, February 4, 2011
Interesting contest
Reader Wordman (a Shadowrun compadre from many years ago in college) directed me to the Thousand Year Game Design Challenge being run by Daniel Solis. An interesting concept - create a game that will be playable and relevant for a thousand years.
That, of course, means that using cultural memes, metaphors, or current technologies is not a great idea. To my way of thinking, actual current thousand-year games are mostly dice and boardgames like chess, go, ludo, backgammon, nine men's morris, mancala, etc - simple rules, abstract parts, but enough complexity to keep it interesting. I guess it wouldn't need to be all boardgames, either - there's evidence of dice from thousands of years ago, and playing cards or the like have been around for a long time, so maybe those would work too.
A fun challenge. Maybe I'll try to put something together. The deadline is the end of July. The judges are Solis and his wife, and they seem to be fans of storytelling-style games, although I'm not sure that kind of game would fit this challenge.
They definitely state "unpublished," so given my current fiasco with SaltCON, I'll be careful...
That, of course, means that using cultural memes, metaphors, or current technologies is not a great idea. To my way of thinking, actual current thousand-year games are mostly dice and boardgames like chess, go, ludo, backgammon, nine men's morris, mancala, etc - simple rules, abstract parts, but enough complexity to keep it interesting. I guess it wouldn't need to be all boardgames, either - there's evidence of dice from thousands of years ago, and playing cards or the like have been around for a long time, so maybe those would work too.
A fun challenge. Maybe I'll try to put something together. The deadline is the end of July. The judges are Solis and his wife, and they seem to be fans of storytelling-style games, although I'm not sure that kind of game would fit this challenge.
They definitely state "unpublished," so given my current fiasco with SaltCON, I'll be careful...
Thursday, February 3, 2011
Publishing hurts, at least for contests
So, word from the Ion Award competition at SaltCON now is that they've thrown Diggity out of the contest because it's published. Which seems kind of off to me, although I guess it's a gray area.
The contest literature says the contest is for unpublished games. The eligibility rules, however, say only this in that regard:
That's definitely the case for my game. Nobody's looking at it, and I'd have happily licensed it to any of the publishers at the conference. Their problem is that I've got it up for sale at TheGameCrafter.com and listed on my site here. However, I've only sold six copies through TGC, and it hardly seems like that's the same as a commercial print run or "publication" in any accepted sense of the word. I can't imagine they'd care if somebody had come up with a game design, had some printed up, and sold them out of a suitcase at conventions - that's basically no different than what I've done, and actually more aggressive marketing and investment than I've done.
Apparently a sticking point for them was that my rules say that the game is "published by Plankton Games." I guess that was a dumb move on my part, but it seems kind of arbitrary that those four words of text on a document are definitive. The reality remains the same - I have no print run and no company looking over the game yet, and the judges at the competition are representatives of big companies looking for good new games to print and distribute, which mine potentially is, or it wouldn't have made it through the first few rounds.
Hippodice has a much more workable rule for these situations in their competition - they say the game can't have more than 100 copies created. That allows some space for people to create and distribute small print runs while still ensuring that the competitions will be populated by game designers rather than established games from bigger companies.
Very disappointing. To the organizers of competitions, I'd say consider the new reality of print-on-demand and web distribution by individual designers, allow for the fact that these micro-publishing efforts don't somehow make a game "published" in any traditional sense, and whatever your call, make your guidelines very clear on this point. To other designers, I'd say that if you're interested in entering your game in competitions, you should probably not put your game up on a POD site unless you're sure the competitions you want to enter allow for it.
The contest literature says the contest is for unpublished games. The eligibility rules, however, say only this in that regard:
2. The game cannot be under consideration by any company at the time of submission or judging.
Apparently a sticking point for them was that my rules say that the game is "published by Plankton Games." I guess that was a dumb move on my part, but it seems kind of arbitrary that those four words of text on a document are definitive. The reality remains the same - I have no print run and no company looking over the game yet, and the judges at the competition are representatives of big companies looking for good new games to print and distribute, which mine potentially is, or it wouldn't have made it through the first few rounds.
Hippodice has a much more workable rule for these situations in their competition - they say the game can't have more than 100 copies created. That allows some space for people to create and distribute small print runs while still ensuring that the competitions will be populated by game designers rather than established games from bigger companies.
Very disappointing. To the organizers of competitions, I'd say consider the new reality of print-on-demand and web distribution by individual designers, allow for the fact that these micro-publishing efforts don't somehow make a game "published" in any traditional sense, and whatever your call, make your guidelines very clear on this point. To other designers, I'd say that if you're interested in entering your game in competitions, you should probably not put your game up on a POD site unless you're sure the competitions you want to enter allow for it.
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Upcoming stuff
It got quiet around here towards the end of the year as my semester ended and we traveled to see family. Then the new semester began with a fury. So, I haven't been posting much, but I do have some good news to report:
- The new artwork for Diggity is complete as of late last year, and it's neat-o. I'll put up some samples soon. I ordered some copies from TheGameCrafter.com after tweaking my art uploads. Their printing is always pretty dark (they prefer the term "rich") relative to how the images look on the screen, so I had to lighten it after getting one made up to test it.
- Diggity was selected as a finalist for the Ion Award at SaltCON, a boardgaming convention in Utah. I tried hard to find a way to get out there for the convention, but it ended up being too hard to get away from teaching and my committee work for those days (plus it would have ended up costing me about $700 - not impossible, but pretty expensive). The competition organizers are willing to demo Diggity for me, so I've got a copy in the mail, and I'm working on a how-to-play movie for it which I hope will help.
Diggity's also in the running in the large field for the Hippodice competition in Germany. I'm guessing I'll hear something about that in the coming weeks.
Saturday, December 11, 2010
A look at the competition
Here's another game that's made it to Hippodice for 2011. Looks pretty polished (and very Carcassone-like). I really like the artwork; fanciful and clear, with neat colors. No idea how it plays.
Looks like a very professional prototype, with a box, even. Neat. I may be outclassed there if the game is as polished as its presentation.
Looks like a very professional prototype, with a box, even. Neat. I may be outclassed there if the game is as polished as its presentation.
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
New BGDF Showdown
A weird topic this month from the game design showdown at BGDF. They want something that relates to the holidays, plus something that relates to internet spam, plus a dexterity component.
I can't think this will produce any games with any lasting appeal, but I'll try. Hmm. Maybe throwing green and red darts at meat substitute and then blogging about it?
I can't think this will produce any games with any lasting appeal, but I'll try. Hmm. Maybe throwing green and red darts at meat substitute and then blogging about it?
Sunday, November 21, 2010
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
Hercules: The Later Years - Rules
The following is my entry for the BGDF design showdown for October. Enjoy...
Monday, November 15, 2010
Hippodice preliminary results on Nov. 17
The Hippodice site says they'll have the preliminary first-round results up on November 17. Pretty exciting. The games that make it through this first round (based only on rules, a short description, and some pictures) will go on to the next round, where you send an actual copy of the game in for them to play. I'm hopeful that my two entries make the cut, but we'll see. I'll have to figure out how to get my two games to them and through customs before Dec. 1, but there's probably a way.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Hercules: The Later Years
Story:
Parts:
Setup:
Turns:
Phase I: Card Auction
Phase II: Playing Cards
Victory: