VOTE NOW! Chain Story - Broken Telephone Edition!

[Vince Twelve]

Phew, 2.5 weeks!  It's been a long haul!  But all the stories are in and here for your judging!  For those who are just showing up to read these crazy stories, you might want to understand how it worked by reading the rules here.

The three people who started the chain stories were given four sentences to choose from to start their stories.  The sentences were provided by our "celebrity" guest writer: Britain's reigning "Lit Idol" (because they cancelled the competition after he won it in 2005), my father, Otis Twelve! 

1)  Totally, completely, deliciously, and no doubt illegally naked, Tanya knew her clothes had to be in her car, but she had no idea where she’d left the damned thing.
2)  Randolf’s feet were beginning to burn, and the piano was getting heavier by the second.
3)  Poised on the event horizon, Sheila took exactly one billion years to sneeze.
4)  Melanie knew their marriage as over when she caught Harry eating baking powder straight from the box.


And what you're all here for: the stories!  Here they are!

Set 1!

Set 2!

Set 3!

We will have a vote to pick the best Chain Story, best Telephone Story and the best individual Image Contributions.

Here's how voting works:

*

Best team Chain Story - Vote for your favorite of the three Chain Stories.  These are the stories with the purple background.  Choose the one where you think the team worked together the best to create an interesting and entertaining story.  Just choose one.

*

Best team Telephone Story - Vote for your favorite of the three Telephone Stories.  These are the stories with the beige background.  Choose the one where you think the team worked together the best to create an interesting and entertaining story while sticking closely to the images that they were provided.  Just choose one.

*

Best individual image contribution - Vote for your favorite three images that you think best represented the story sections that they were assigned to illustrate.

EDIT: Just in case there was confusion, the three votes for images do not need to be one from each set.  They can be from any story.

All discussions welcome below!  I will reveal the names of each author/submitter after the voting is done.  Congrats and well done to all participants!  Voting lasts 48 hours.  GO!

*Awesome trophies by Jim Reed

[Igor Hardy]

WOW! Just Wow!

And why the hell is every deliciously naked woman's name Tanya?

[Privateer Puddin']

WOW! Just Wow!

Indeed!

And why the hell is every deliciously naked woman's name Tanya?

It's from the starting sentence.

Thanks to Vince for organising and running this! Thanks to Otis Twelve for the starting sentences (shame only 2 of them were used, I want to know what happens with the other 2! Is the Harry from 4 the same Harry from Set 1? )

Now it's time for me to make my mind up for voting.. hmm!

[Igor Hardy]

It's from the starting sentence.

Ah, you're right! Somehow I've missed that.

The funniest story for me is definitely Blue. I now know where the teased about sex change took place. 

[Stupot]

Yeh, the blue-skinned woman was originally a blue-skinned man.
But there also seems to be a bit of confusion about the gender of Sam in 'The New Breed'

[Igor Hardy]

But there also seems to be a bit of confusion about the gender of Sam in 'The New Breed'

About the gender? I think the gender is 100% consistent. But the identity of Sam can be a bit...

[Jim Reed]

Telephone Story 1 has two parts that are the same, from two authors, which is highly improbible. I think something went worng there.

Author 5 and 7:
**And then I remembered. I took off the dream inducing helmet, thanked the four doctors and pocketed my five hundred. I mean, us poor students have to manage somehow. I strolled with a smile, exiting the laboratory and heading off to the "blood donation for money" foundation. As I was crossing the university park I saw my sister, naked, running towards a crowd. The rain started falling, and I wondered what kind of mess did she get herself in to now.**

Votes:
Chain story 3
Telephone story 3

Story 1 Image Submission 7
Story 2 Image Submission 1
Story 3 Image Submission 6

[Igor Hardy]

Telephone Story 1 has two parts that are the same, from two authors, which is highly improbible. I think something went worng there.

Author 5 and 7:
**And then I remembered. I took off the dream inducing helmet, thanked the four doctors and pocketed my five hundred. I mean, us poor students have to manage somehow. I strolled with a smile, exiting the laboratory and heading off to the "blood donation for money" foundation. As I was crossing the university park I saw my sister, naked, running towards a crowd. The rain started falling, and I wondered what kind of mess did she get herself in to now.**

That's probably supposed to be the classic "dream loop" - you wake up and experience the same thing as happened a moment earlier inside the dream, then wake up again - exactly the same happens, and so on...

[discordance]

SUITE NOT SWEET

Sorry, I honestly can spell, usually. ANYWAY, covering up that little mistake, I guess I will very impartially VOTE:

Chain story 3
Telephone story 3

Story 1 image 5
Story 2 image 6
Story 3 image 5

Thanks everyone, it's been a hoot

[Vince Twelve]

Telephone Story 1 has two parts that are the same, from two authors, which is highly improbible. I think something went worng there.

Ack.  No. That's a copy/paste error on my part.  I fixed it.  Sorry.

Also, just in case there was confusion, the three votes for images do not need to be one from each set.  They can be from any story.

[Wonkyth]

Chain Stories 1 and 2 have the same starting sentence, is that supposed to be the case?

Votes:

Chain Story 3

Telephone Story 1

Story 1, Image 6
Story 2, Image 7
Story 1, Image 1

[Atelier]

Chain Story 2
Telephone Story 3

Story 1 Image Submission 7
Story 2 Image Submission 7
Story 3 Image Submission 5

[Igor Hardy]

Chain Story 3: The New Breed

Telephone Story 1: Untitled

Story 1 Image Submission 3
Story 3 Image Submission 1
Story 3 Image Submission 5

[Wyz]

Well that was fun

Votes:
Chain story 1
Telephone story 1

Story 2 Image Submission 5
Story 3 Image Submission 5
Story 3 Image Submission 7

[Tuomas]

Sorry for bailing out on my last story guys. I'm looking forward to reading these and will be voting later on-.

[Bulbapuck]

These are great! So excellently weird

My votes:
Chain story 3: The new breed
Telephone story 3: Blue

Story 1, Image 5
Story 2, Image 3
Story 3, Image 4

[Sinitrena]

Funny - and great. I enjoyed all stories!

My votes:

Chain story 3: The New Breed
Telephone Story 2: Nightmares

Story 2, Image 1
Story 2, Image 3
Story 3, Image 7

[tzachs]

Hmmm, it seems that the last paragraph I've written for my entry in chain story 2 is missing (author 6)! It would have probably changed the ending quite a bit if it weren't cut away...
Other than that (and the fact that my blue skinned man decided to turn into a woman  :o), great stories!

I vote for:
Chain story 3
Telephone story 3

Story 2 Image 3
Story 1 Image 6
Story 3 Image 4

[Vince Twelve]

Oops!  That is a mistake only on the html version.  If you download the doc from the top of the page you'll see it in there.  I'll put that last paragraph into the html version ASAP.  It was on the document passed to the last writer and didn't affect the ending, so no worries there!

EDIT: One more day for voting!

[Privateer Puddin']

Votes:
Chain Story 1
Telephone Story 3

Story 1 Image 7
Story 2 Image 7
Story 3 Image 2

[Stupot]

Chain Story - 2
Telephone - 3

Image - 1.7
Image - 2.6
Image - 3.7

I feel kind of bad that I've voted for both the stories I was involved in, but I'm really pleased with the way they turned out.  Hats off to everyone though.  Some great stuff all round :-)

Looking forward to the next game.

[Vince Twelve]

Ok, I declare this activity officially over!  Congrats to all the participants and to all the participants' pants.  Also another big thanks to Jim Reed for the trophies I'm about to give out!

The wieners are:

Best Image Submission

Third Place (tie):

Story 1:
    Submitter 5: Andail
    Submitter 6: AtelierGames
Story 2:
    Submitter 1:  Bulbapuck
    Submitter 6: [Cameron]
Story 3:
    Submitter 4: Tuomas

Second Place (tie):

Story 2:
    Submitter 3: Jim Reed
    Submitter 7: Ascovel
Story 3:
    Submitter 7: Babar

First Place:

Story 1:
    Submitter 7: Wyz

Story 3:
     Submitter 5: Wyz

Wyz went twice because of me having to skip a couple people and wound up spiking TWO first places!  Well done!

Best Chain Story

Second Place (tie):

    Story 1: The Steel Balance
         Authors:
              Jim Reed
              Tuomas
              ShiverMeSideways
              Privateer Puddin'
              [Cameron]
              Babar
              Akatosh

    Story 2: When the Moon Doesn’t Watch
         Authors:
              Stupot
              AtelierGames
              Vince Twelve
              Andail
              Wyz
              tzachs
              NsMn

First Place:

    Story 3: The New Breed
         Authors:
              Scarab
              wonkyth
              Dualnames
              discordance
              Ascovel
              Bulbapuck
              discordance

Best Telephone Story

Third Place:

    Story 2:
         Authors:
              Babar
              Privateer Puddin'
              Akatosh
              Vince Twelve
              discordance
              Andail
              AtelierGames

Second Place:

    Story 1:
         Authors:
              Ascovel
              Wyz
              AtelierGames
              NsMn
              Bulbapuck
              Dualnames
              Jim Reed

First Place:

    Story 3:
         Authors:
              [Cameron]
              tzachs
              Jim Reed
              ShiverMeSideways
              Andail
              Stupot
              Scarab

Congratulations to everybody!  Let me know if I screwed anything up here.  I'll be updating the HTML pages to show who did what for each story and image.  Hopefully you all had a giggle.  Now put your trophies in your sig and make everybody else jealous for not taking part in the coolest forum activity ever!

[Andail]

Eh, "my" picture has to be disqualified, as I just picked a random Benjamin Carre drawing. I didn't have the time or inspirational force to draw one on my own, and Vince sounded so desperate, so, well...

Anyhow, thanks all for participating!
Congrats to those who managed to nick two or more golds.
And thanks to Vince for hosting

[Igor Hardy]

According to my counting, Image Submission 3.5 had exactly the same number of votes as Submission 1.7, which means Wyz snatched 2 golden pens.

Also, thanks very much people for seeing something in my image - I thought it was rather ugly and unimpressive!

Finally, would there be anyone against if I linked to the 3rd set of stories on the front page of HardyDev? I think those 2 are really worth to be read by a larger number of people.

[Wonkyth]

Suits me. 

[Andail]

I think we should vote for best individual contribution!
Using google docs.

[Vince Twelve]

Sure. Are you setting that up?

[Andail]

On a second thought, that should have been done before the authors were revealed...not sure it's a good idea at this point.

[Bulbapuck]

I can't believe my picture won something

Anyway, thanks everyone! I had a lot of fun. Special thanks to Vince for hosting and Jim for the awesome trophies.

[Stupot]

Yeh, this was a hoot.  Thanks Vince.  And Jim... Sweet, I've just realised I get a gold phone.  Yay!

Can't wait for the next one.  What did people think of my tie-the-mysteries-up-at-the-end idea?  I'd be happy to host that if people wanted.

[Vince Twelve]

As a postmortem on the activity, I think it went off relatively well.  A few mistakes I made:

-Starting batch of sentences should have been larger.  I had originally planned on just assigning one to each team, but instead decided to let them pick, which led to having two (four?) stories with relatively similar plots.
-Roping people into a writing activity and making them draw.  I tried to make this as easy as pie, requiring only a google image search, but some people still had trouble with this step.  Sorry!

Other than that, I think things went really well, despite the handful of people who vanished without a trace (or worse, kept saying they'd finish, got extensions and THEN vanished without a trace).  I told myself I wouldn't do another one of these that required me to serve as the hub because it's kind of a lot of work, but then I had this wacky idea and it pretty much needed someone to serve as the hub.

If I host again, it will definitely be something where the order gets listed in the forum and when you're done writing you just send it straight to the next person.  But maybe require them to CC me on the email so I could make sure people were meeting deadlines.  Without someone serving that function, this activity stands too high of a chance of just falling apart.

Stu, if you want to host next, it's all yours.  If you want to flesh out your ideas or talk about some of the lessons I've learned from hosting this, PM me!

[Jim Reed]

Bulba and Stupot: You're welcome!

My thoughts....
It was a nice idea, handled very well (thanks to Vince), and I say we should have another one, with different rules this time, so it remains fresh.
I predict interest tapering off, so I suggest the next one should be a bit smaller.

Definitly the hardest compo to organise!

[tzachs]

Congratulations to the winners, and thanks Vince for the hosting and whacky idea, I loved it!

Can't wait for the next one.  What did people think of my tie-the-mysteries-up-at-the-end idea?  I'd be happy to host that if people wanted.

I'd be interested, the idea is cool. One of the themes should be an island  

[NsMn]

I can't believe I didn't win any section at all....  :

[Vince Twelve]

According to my counting, Image Submission 3.5 had exactly the same number of votes as Submission 1.7, which means Wyz snatched 2 golden pens.

Holy crap.  The man is right.  Darn my finger counting!

Wyz got two golds!  Niiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiice.  8)

[Wyz]

Wow, I did not expect gold, and even less a shared first place with myself. Cool! Thanks for voting guys. This was so much fun, I'm already looking forward to the next one. I hope to return them sooner then.

Speaking of a next time, maybe some sort of web trinket could ease the load. I'm capable of building something like that; I can't host it though.

Well, to the rest: good job all! I had fun reading the stories.

[Vince Twelve]

I just labeled each section on those stories/pictures with the name of the submitter.  If you're curious, take a look.  And let me know if I mis-labeled any!

[Igor Hardy]

Just published the 2 winning stories on HardyDev: http://hardydev.com/2010/06/03/the-new-breed-chain-story-3-blue-telephone-story-3/

Hopefully they'll generate some outsider comments.