Announcing OSGameCon 2011

Announcing The First Annual Drupal Open Source Game Contest!

The BOF today was great! We made a couple of minor changes to the base rules. Also, nosro has volunteered to make a simplified version of the rules, so we can plug that in (and click through to the longer "fine print" explanations for more clarification).

My intent for launching this effort is to encourage us all to finish some games! There are only a very small few Drupal games out there, plus a smattering of flash games in nodes, and the potentials for using Drupal as a framework for gaming, as everyone in this group knows, is an untapped reservoir of awesomeness.

We're planning to build up & market the site & contest over the next few months, with a date of May 1 to open for submissions of "intent" by game author wannabes. Then we'll use DrupalCon London in August as a final deadline, and open it up for judging.

We'll also solicit prizes, ala the ifcomp, so that if, for example, we have 14 prizes and 23 submissions, then the top 14 authors will get to choose from the prizes in order.

Basically, once open for submissions, authors will be able to create a "secret" node on the site, where they announce their intent to create a game. During this phase, things are still hush-hush -- no one's generally allowed to talk about their projects before the August deadline. However, I think it might be useful on several levels to have at the very least a running list of authors. The arbiters will also be available to answer questions during this time, for instance, "I'm making a WarCraft clone in Drupal, will that count?" (Yes, but don't use any copyrighted info. And good luck on that one.) or "I'm going to create a flash game and stick it in a node. And I don't want to release the source. Does that count?" (No, wtf get out of here.)

At London, we'll open the contest for judging by the public. Although we're still working out the details, I think that IFComp has the best idea there: a simple 1-10 rating by people. People will be able to base their ratings on whatever they want, and are encouraged (required?) to write their reasons in the comments ("Excellent game play, great graphics," "Tight integration with core Drupal functionality," "Breakout wtf?"). Authors will need to release both a playable version of the game at this time, and a recipe of the modules & custom code. Judges are not required to examine the code if they don't want to (or don't know how to). But they are more than welcome to base some (or all) of their rating on the source.

None of this is written in stone, but I feel that this is a solid start, and imagine that anything further will just be tweaks.

So a reminder, if you're planning to write a game for this contest, make sure your public release coincides with the August deadline -- you'll be disqualified if you make the site generally available before then. (Although, please, please recruit a few beta-testers when you're getting closer. They won't be able to vote on your game, but they will do much towards making your game sweet.)

Also, discussed at the BOF, if your game is to be commercial, all parts of it MUST be freely available to judges during the judging period. (If you want to charge for level ups or whatever, that's your business, but that cannot be part of the game for the intents & purposes of this contest.) Also, you'll need to plan to write up a recipe of how you built it, which must include 100% GPL released code. (You don't need to release data, themes, or images, with a few caveats discussed in the rules.)

So w00t! Let's make some games! And make Morbus Iff proud...

(Cross-posted at AaronWinborn.com)