Second Life Game Developers Contest 2005

Aimee your so cute don't cry

Man, I'd like to be in again.....But RL took a kick square in the nads last year (due to the short dev. cycle the competition requires). I've gotta think about this and dust off some old ideas to see if they would fly

To the other entrants from last year- I hope you join- everyone did a great job last time around!

-Bone

I had to pull my game last time around before the finish - which, btw, had nothing to do with terraforming. It was an RTS called Terrain, where players build out and manage resources, in real time, to attempt to destroy their opponents home base. Everybody who played the early version loved it and a lot of people expressed disappointment when I removed it from the competition.

Why? My artist had far too many other commitments to keep up with the schedule (which was, show up a few hours a week, EVERY week, please) and my tester had some RL dilemma and stopped playing SL for a long time. Linden Lab rejected my request to recruit a new team member. I knew I couldn't go it alone and didn't want to submit something dumbed down, so made the decision to put it off until some other date. It was really hard for me to do but sometimes you gotta know when you're beat.

Anticipating another contest, I tucked the code away. If I can build a team again this year I'll resurrect it; I need a tester and a texture/builder sort. However, and I can't stress this enough, you HAVE to show up, and when you do, other matters, like, "a friend asked if I could MC some party so I have to go sorry cya whenever" are put aside. I don't ask for a lot of time; just show when you say you're going to, stay until the work is done, and try to think about the project when I'm not standing in front of you asking you, "what do you think".

In other words...be interested in the project.

Failing assembling my own team, I'd be a scripter/builder for another. In fact I might prefer that, but we'll see.

there is more to game dev than scripting. someone needs to make the pieces and places and all the cool looking stuff. and with your building skills i'm sure someone will want you.

I've managed to crash MYSELF, if not the sim, just in doing some tech tests to see if what I want to do is even possible in SL. Just this one bit of the code is so complex that one mistaken if-then can cause it to unbalance and go into a saturation mode that brought my fps down to 1 frame every few seconds. At least I managed to select the 100 or so objects in the test and kill them before my client died from being whispered-at too much.

But while I could script the whole game myself (and will do so, most likely) and I could make enough 3D bits to carry it along, I need a pair of builders on my team to make it a visual treat as well as a fun game. Being a sci-fi themed game, I need excellent spaceship modeling skills for one, as well as quality texture and sound creation. I can handle the video elements it will require (since 1.6 will be around by then) as video effects are another hobby of mine.

For now, I'm talking with my team from last year to see if they are interested in giving it another go and if they even have the time this year to try. If the old team doesn't re-form, I'll be looking for others with similar super-skills to bring this idea to life.

Hmm... an intresting point: Looks like SL wants the -real life- names of the team members, not their SL names.

What if some of the team members prefer not to tell me their real life name due to privacy concerns? Shouldnt SL be able to contact these people on their own and ask for this information without passing it trough a standard community member?

It was the same last year and the reason I'm not likely to be involved in this kinda thing. Just because I might be prepared to work on a script with someone does not mean I want to divulge my real life details to them. And I have no idea why the hell LL, who are always bleating on about privacy concerns to avoid giving us basic information, would expect or want us to.

Wouldn't LL be able to match the avatar names to the person's RL information that they have on file anyway? So why do they need to ask for it? I don't see any valid reason why they need to have this information submitted, thus meaning that other members of the team know their RL details. Seems a little redundant to me.

Not necessarily; the name that pays for an account doesnt have to be the name that plays it. But still, thats neither here nor there. I dunno why they need it. Maybe for marketing blurb. But why now? Why at entry stage? If thats all they want it for - in fact, pretty much whatever reason they want it for - why can't they get it later? They can always add a rule that stipulates that if you win you must divulge your rl details or forfeit or something.

I see no good reason for needing the information in the first place, and I CERTAINLY don't see why they're asking that you give it to some designated other resident to hand in. If they really want that info at this stage, why don't they ask for the SL names and then have each of those residents mailed to go to a link themselves and confirm their participation and details privately.

It seems ridiculous to implement this kind of requirement and yet in the same breath continue to refuse to even divulge the nature of your crime for suspension/ban punishments in case you put two and two together and realise which avie name reported you. Oh, and of course we still have that nice little 'feature' in bulk image uploads that has been the cause of revealing more rl information about people than pretty much anything else in SL

Even if I wanted to be involved in the game developers contest, I have no intention of doing so while it's implemented this way.

If they don't have your name, how will they send you your prize?

Are you being sarcastic, or just ignoring every point in my post? o.o

To reiterate; if it's about bloody prizes, why do they need a name at the point of entry, way before it's even certain you'll be accepted to even compete?

I guess they never ever thought it would be a big deal to anyone. I guess 1 in 23,000 times it is wrong tho.

I still don't get why it's a big deal...

Because you never know if that perfectly nice scripter/builder that you decided to team up with for the purposes of a virtual competition is a real life psychotic fucking nutjob?

Indications are that there are many strange people in SL.

And like I said, the 'big deal' is the fucking hypocrisy of a company that on the one hand are always telling us what lengths they go to to protect our privacy, and then on the other say 'oh, if you could just hand your real life details to someone else for them to pass to us...'

It is extremly common on net socialisation to NOT reveal your personal identifying information - including "just" your real name - to the person you are socialising with.

It is very common in SecondLife to have long term social relationship with people, without ever revealing your real life identifying information.

Also, food for thought: Games that run on LSL are best made by LSL programmers. LSL programmers tend to be geeks. Geeks tend to be net-paranoid and never give away their RL data.

By forcing the team members to provide their real life name to a common SL resident, you end up skipping the service of many expert LSL scripters who would definetly be intrested in joining in and developing quality scripts.

Smart move, eh? =P

If it's a real real problem then perhaps you could be the person to fill in the form? Chances are no one else will object. I mean, paranoia can't be that rampent in SL can it?

What? Where? I can't find this announcement!

Gosh I've gotta get in this time. Last time I was so disappointed to not be part of it.

*waves his arms in the air hoping to get noticed*

RL electronics/software engineer. New to SL, but picking up LSL rapidly. I've used most of the LSL functions to this point and I'm very interested in game building in SL. In fact, I've built a couple of really simple gambling game under cell Neutra *smirks* to get familiar with LSL. This contest is the kind of thing that got me interested in SL when my friend introduced me to it.

I'm good with general logic / AI / algorithms, but not so experienced in buliding. I havent come up with a game idea that I'm really satisfied with yet, but really dont' wanna miss out on the contest. If anyone needs a scriptor that's dedicated IM me in-world under either Rayve (general use) or cell (development for Spinnakers Aquarium and Gaming).

The InnerLife team plans to enter a concept. Since we haven't started work yet, what we develop will be original, and we do own all the rights to the concepts.

Can anyone tell me how tight the restrictions on team members really are? Can only people on the team build on the competition site, etc? We have more people who want to be part of the project than the form has room for.

neko

anyone need someone to build, texture, and or animations?? o.o i'm soooo bored. i need a project to work on.

I could use you Hikaru. I'm still trying to decide what game to make though! XD

If I have a team mate maybe it'll help to decide, plus you're cool so that's a big bonus.

I really want to enter this year but alas all my SL friends seem too busy to enter.
I'm a LSL scripter with pretty good understanding of LSL and have made a few games in SL, board games mainly. I'm also good at building but my texturing skills suck.
If anyone looking for a group or just a scripter wants to talk about it I'm up for almost anything

If you want to see what I've done check out the Mesede skate park (look in the finder).

Last year Robin(?) said it was alright to submit real name/address info to her directly.

They probably need the real life names at the start for legal reasons. It's a real contest with real prizes, after all. And with the time and communication levels it takes to get a full-scale project done in time, you need faster methods of communication that chatting in SL. Phone, email, and internet chats are a must.

From my experiences in the contest last year, it is acceptable to get aid from people outside your registered team, BUT they can not be compensated for their help. They can provide free volunteer assistance, however.

Oh, and you can't give out prizes, rewards, or L$ as part of the game, according to last year's rules. (I'm surprised all the questions we had last year that resulted in rulings weren't added to this years rules from the start...)

Gah. And now I have THREE competing game ideas in my head.