ATC, info and development *Competition over! Thanks for your participation!

[Ginny]

I'd suggest some kind of evaluation system for the games. For example, the organizer and/or the judges would receive a full game plan from each team.

At the end of the evaluation week, everyone would hopefully have a good plan for a game that could be made in the given time frame.

I agree, an evaluation system might be a good idea. That way if a team wants to achieve more than the approximate limit, the evaluation will help determine wether or not they can manage the task.
But, weren't judges supposed to be a ecret until the end? Doesn't really allow them to do the evaluation that way. I do think they could be more involved from the start, judging goals versus achievements (it's not neccessarilly bad if you achieved less than you were hoping for, it shows that you were able to restrict yourself in order to fit the time frame. lots of good ways to look at it, not sure it's even possible to do this wrong, but it's fun to look at). Perhaps Andail (or the host if it won't be Andail) could send the evaluations to the judges and the responses back. Like an oracle "The force (of judgemnet) tells me you have set you're goals a bit too high.."

I also like the idea of application forms, as people may sign up and then forget about it or lose their starting enthusiasm. People siging up in an area they aren't skilled in could also be prevented (though I don't know if this happened or not).

As for restrictions, limitations of the MAGS sort sound interesting. A limit on rooms won't really help in my opinion, it may even restrict uncomfortably. You can make a game with 40 rooms with nothing to do in some, or some of them being close-ups, and you can also make a 3 room game packed with many puzzles and twists. That's why setting such a limit can be difficult, with the exception of the one-room game, which is a challenge in itself.
I think making it a bit more MAGS-like, with the option of having obligatory inventory items or other things. The theme should be the main part of the rules though.
Naturally, rules would still be set by the organiser and/or host, so they would be reasonable and that should assure good results. Hopefully there'll be more finished games each time.

Not sure if the time limit should be a bit longer, or maybe it was just holidays interferring. Then again we had, in essence, a month and a week, and even the finishing teams seem to have finished at the last minute. Perhaps a period of a month and half to a month could help, though it's probably better to just set goals lower and thus not need more time.

Andail, I remember you mentioned wanting the next competition of this sort to only take place next summer, do you still think that's best? Possibly holding it more often (maybe not as often as MAGS, like every 2nd or 3rd month) would help this competition progress and improve upon the "mistakes"(more like just improve the methods).

[lightman]

But, weren't judges supposed to be a ecret until the end? Doesn't really allow them to do the evaluation that way. [...] Perhaps Andail (or the host if it won't be Andail) could send the evaluations to the judges and the responses back.

Yes, I did try to address that. I basically said the same thing here:

the organizer would give feedback to the teams

The judges wouldn't be in direct communication. But the evaluation panel could also be an entirely different group.

[Andail]

Changes for the next round:

1. Longer time, let's say two months. Not more, that would make people less focused
2. An application procedure. The participants will have to send a short email, including age, previous merits, etc, and if they apply for artist/musician, they'll have to present a small work sample.
I know this is pretty harsh, but chances are one person will ruin the project for an entire team, by being completely unqualified for his duties.
3. Evaluation period; after the first week, an evaluation committee will recieve the project outlines, and give some feedback, plus decide whether it seems feasible or not.
4. More articulated restrictions, more similar to MAGS. Not necessarily amount of rooms, though.

Also, as a bonus, I will ask CJ if the members of the winning team in the future could be awarded custom titles, like "ATC winner" or something.

The amount of competitions should probably not exceed two or three per year. If we called the previous one a test round, we could start one during this autumn, one during the spring and an extra summer edition.

Lastly, I've thought of another thing... what if one of these editions was open for custom teams? Like any five people can team up and partake in the competition. I think this could result in more veterans signing up, and maybe old friends who just want to have fun.
Still, two competitions per year will have randomly selected teams, for the pedagogical value.

[Ginny]

That's a nice idea, having for example the summer competition be for custom teams, and the two yearly ones with random teams. All those improvements sound good to me

[Vel]

Sounds great, Andail. However, can we hold one competition in winter, since there are almost a month-long holidays?

[auhsor]

Just for these international peoples - Saying stuff with summer/winter etc doesn't mean a thing to alot of people, cos its different everywhere. Saying months would make much more sence.

[Andail]

Hm, Auhsor, that's a slight exaggeration...it's practically only the australians who belong to the south hemisphere here, and they're pretty used to our definitions anyway.

But sure, for the sake of clarity:
For instance, one round could be somewhere in the beginning of september, ending in november.
The other one could be in march, ending in may. The summer edition could be june to august. Something like that.
It's not really a hurry to decide those late dates anyway. But I think the beginning of september could work well, given that we've sorted out the new changes and stuff.

[auhsor]

Well maybe a slight exaggeration, but it just makes thing alot clearer. Thanks.
I might be able to participate in the next one. I don't mind what time, I'll probably be busy anyway. But I'd still like to participate.