Looney Labs Icehouse Mailing list Archive

RE: [Icehouse] IGDC Tallying and Other Procedures

  • FromDavid Artman <david@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • DateFri, 28 Sep 2007 11:17:05 -0700
> -------- Original Message --------
> From: Dale Sheldon <dales@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> > that, by merely stating something like "you may rank games as tied for a 
> > particular rank, in which case the next rank is lowered for each extra 
> > game in the tie (e.g. if you rank three games as tied for first, the 
> > next game you list is ranked fourth)."
> That wording is a bit confusing, but sure (and the numerical ordering 
> doesn't really matter, just the relative ordering, so it doesn't matter 
> what number you put next to each group of tied candidates.)  (Also, 
> allowing people to vote more tied contests into their ballot does increase 
> the chance of a tied final result, if that is a concern.)

True. Maybe I could just put something like "ranked from "best" to
"worst", with each rank on its own line (put ties on the same line)."
Then the numbers won't matter... but, hell, in the end it doesn't matter
if they do numbering, whether right or not, because *I* do it when I
build the rankings table and, further, the algorithm wants the rankings
in a format which has no numbers (using punctuation to distinguish a new
lower rank from a tie).

> > Should the judging period be longer, perhaps adjusted for the number of 
> > games submitted?
> That's a good idea.

It seems the "two games per week" thing is a good ballpark, so I am
happy with this, though it makes it impossible to post a complete
schedule until all submissions are in.

Hmmm... and it means we have less certainty of what the end of judging
conflicts with, when choosing submission deadlines: right now, on the
IGDC Talk page, I am proposing a "fixed" schedule for submission
deadlines (judging begins) of June 21st and December 23rd--the first
days of the solstices after which the IGDCs are named. So a four-entry
Winter IGDC would end barely after the holidays (a problem, if we want
college play groups judging). Conversely, a twelve-entry Summer IGDC
wouldn't end until August, possibly dragging on too long (of course, a
twenty-entry IGDC could drag into the next school year, that way, which
is good, given the Summer IGDC pretty much can't occur during a
traditional school calendar).

OK, I can't decide. Part of me likes it, part of me thinks the month is
a "magic length" that's long enough without being too long. Further, a
one month deadline on a high-submission-count IGDC will "force"
selectivity, which I feel will encourage better rules writing,
presentation, and so forth--if a judge feels time-limited, he or she
will have to choose based on first reading. Is this bad or good?
Hmmm.... Well, the goal of IHG.org is to PRESENT games and thereby
promote sales, not to proliferate them for designers' sakes to the
detriment of user comprehension or enjoyment. So, in the end, the IGDC
is about making good games better (via design feedback) and presenting
them "perfectly" for the consumer  (via corrections and clarifications).
A high time pressure will not only make designers polish their games
more prior to submission, but will also make the bulk of the games
better across the board.

Basically, it "folds in" another mini-competition: the competition for
player interest (which *ahem* I "won," this time, so I'm biased). OK,
now I waffle and say NO, leave it a static month, regardless of
submissions. But that only makes it my 1 vote against 2 who seemed to
like the idea of making judging time variable.

(Man, maybe we need to break out every rule on the wiki and put weighted
Pros and Cons for each potential option, to determine the "best"
competition structure. I kind of thought this was all worked out
already, when I was copying the IGDC rules from the original competition
home page....)

David