End of 2017 Programming Contest
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So, games must be responsive. That seems logical, fair, and super easy to achieve. Thanks for the clarification.
The top 3.75 competitors from the previous round (those that received over 10 votes) have moved on to a second voting round. Good luck to the finalists, and thank you very much to everyone else for participating!
You can only select one entry this time, so please choose wisely.
Voting will end in um 2 days I guess
[poll=p293][/poll]
I guess I skipped the explanation:
Lumage feels that the ratio of votes encouraged to entries submitted, as well as relative quality of each entry, made the distribution of the highest-scoring entries unclear. This second-round protocol was outlined in the first contest, but never used. This second round should provide a clear distribution for the winner between the high-scoring entries, and break the tie between Hex Circuit and Virtual Buffalo.
So a "let's try it" kind of thing.
Grats, people. Pre-grats for your inevitable victory, kantackistan :)
Woah, curveball! Was not expecting another round. Looks like I get a few more days to work on 1.0.4 after all.
Best of luck, second rounders!
If 2 are already tied for first place, you are 3rd at best, as obviously one of those 2 will have less votes than the other, but more than you. The only way that could not be is if the first round is irrespective to the 2nd in which case there's no knowing where you stand yet.
Lumage feels that the ratio of votes encouraged to entries submitted, as well as relative quality of each entry, made the distribution of the highest-scoring entries unclear. .So, the amount of votes is not the only determining factor? At what point do the individual entries get evaluated by their 'relative quality' and how does that affect their standings?
Sorry, "relative quality" comes from the user choice--the first vote. The truth is that I'm not sure if this was the right choice or even a good choice, but the idea is this: Users voted for 3-4 programs on average, as instructed. However, this doesn't mean that they consider all of the programs they voted for to be equal. In the poll, each vote is only a yes or no for their "favorites." If there were only 3 programs submitted and 3 votes required, the final distribution would be flat--Everyone would have voted for the same 3. Obviously, we do not have only 3 entries, but also they are not of equal quality, as is the point of a contest. Undoubtedly the highest-scoring entries share a large number of vote casts. These, then, are the top "3.75," but within these top few the exact order is obscured by the multiple votes. If program A and program B differ in public opinion by .10, this would have been masked by equal votes. The same applies to the two trailing them: the gap may not be significant. I'm not entirely sure if this reasoning is correct; it may just have complicated things. But to answer your actual question: no, it is entirely decided by user vote. "Relative quality" is meant to refer to your opinion.Lumage feels that the ratio of votes encouraged to entries submitted, as well as relative quality of each entry, made the distribution of the highest-scoring entries unclear. .So, the amount of votes is not the only determining factor? At what point do the individual entries get evaluated by their 'relative quality' and how does that affect their standings?
Having just now figured out to check the results of this contests poll I have drawn the following conclusions:
1) These competitions are clearly thinly veiled popularity contests that are dependent upon voters who either did not fairly test all entries or are completely and utterly deranged. How does SNOW get more votes than Christmas Night, for instance? Christmas Night is an actual creative, playable game and SNOW was only ever meant to be a joke. How in Hades did White: the Game tie with This Game Does Not Yet Have A Title 2? TGDNYHAT2 in any logical frame of reference should have placed much higher than it did. Most perplexing, how do what are essentially largely unfinished tech demos beat out fully fleshed out games that are essentially complete?
2) There is absolutely no incentive for future developers to enter any submissions under these competitions as they currently are being judged. It makes no logical sense, in fact. For instance, you had 2 submissions tie. (They fully deserve the 1st and 2nd place awards, no doubt about it- It fully makes sense for them to have placed where they have, popularity aside.) My doubts are for everything that placed beneath them, such as: why does the second round include anyone other than those 2?
I am of course disappointed in my poll results, as anyone who puts serious time and effort into their work would be, however, it is the overall lunacy of what I have just witnessed happening to everyone involved that has led me to decide never to enter another competition. But since I am addressing my momentary lack of humility already, my submission definitely shouldn't have beaten out at least the top 3, but it should have placed much higher than it did. And it certainly shouldn't have been one vote away from Snow for Cthulu's sake.
3) Shenanigans such as these will not draw more high-quality submissions for this forum, which by admin's admission is the whole point of them in the first place. Indeed, they will likely have the opposite effect.
I may continue to contribute my work to this forum, assuming I'm not banned or the such for sharing my opinions, but I most certainly won't labor under a deadline to compete in a farce like this again. To those of you who entered a VALID submission, one that is at least mostly complete and clearly took innovation and creativity, I salute you, respect you, and wish you the best. To those of you who didn't, why are you here?
Having just now figured out to check the results of this contests poll I have drawn the following conclusions: 1) These competitions are clearly thinly veiled popularity contests that are dependent upon voters who either did not fairly test all entries or are completely and utterly deranged. How does SNOW get more votes than Christmas Night, for instance? Christmas Night is an actual creative, playable game and SNOW was only ever meant to be a joke. How in Hades did White: the Game tie with This Game Does Not Yet Have A Title 2? TGDNYHAT2 in any logical frame of reference should have placed much higher than it did. Most perplexing, how do what are essentially largely unfinished tech demos beat out fully fleshed out games that are essentially complete?mdj1deddeefrff petiteria gets u hyped for full version
To address SageScript:
1) "These competitions are... dependent upon voters who either did not fairly test all entries or are completely and utterly deranged."
It is likely. A problem with allowing the community to vote is that the community is voting. However, I would discourage interpreting results literally. There's probably at least a ±2 vote error on the counts after the drop.
2) "There is absolutely no incentive for future developers to enter any submissions under these competitions as they currently are being judged."
I suspect that the monetary prize continues to be an incentive for many. That it is illogical? Possible.
I'm sorry you feel that the contests are not worth the effort of participating in them. I hope you can continue to enjoy the rest of the website's services.
I will also admit that my handling of this contest isn't as sharp as in previous sessions due to not having followed it for its duration and only switching in to close it. Usually they run more smoothly. I'll leave my other thoughts until after the voting.
Then I suppose I am disappointed in Democracy in action. I wouldn't be the first and won't be the last. As for the rest of the sites services, I find no fault and am deeply passionate about the furthering of SmileBasic games and resources. For that reason I will continue to improve my submission and post future ones.
I'll just opt out of the stress of entering any competitions with no quality-control and all will be kosher.
I think it's perfectly fine to make fun of someone's program when they didn't even put any effort into it. Also, how is this "lash[ing] out"?Having just now figured out to check the results of this contests poll I have drawn the following conclusions: <snip by admin>Please don't use other people's programs as examples of a bad program. It just hurts the feelings of whoever made the game. You can't lash out due to people not liking your game as much as others..
Having just now figured out to check the results of this contests poll I have drawn the following conclusions: 1) These competitions are clearly thinly veiled popularity contests that are dependent upon voters who either did not fairly test all entries or are completely and utterly deranged. How does SNOW get more votes than Christmas Night, for instance? Christmas Night is an actual creative, playable game and SNOW was only ever meant to be a joke. How in Hades did White: the Game tie with This Game Does Not Yet Have A Title 2? TGDNYHAT2 in any logical frame of reference should have placed much higher than it did. Most perplexing, how do what are essentially largely unfinished tech demos beat out fully fleshed out games that are essentially complete? 2) There is absolutely no incentive for future developers to enter any submissions under these competitions as they currently are being judged. It makes no logical sense, in fact. For instance, you had 2 submissions tie. (They fully deserve the 1st and 2nd place awards, no doubt about it- It fully makes sense for them to have placed where they have, popularity aside.) My doubts are for everything that placed beneath them, such as: why does the second round include anyone other than those 2? I am of course disappointed in my poll results, as anyone who puts serious time and effort into their work would be, however, it is the overall lunacy of what I have just witnessed happening to everyone involved that has led me to decide never to enter another competition. But since I am addressing my momentary lack of humility already, my submission definitely shouldn't have beaten out at least the top 3, but it should have placed much higher than it did. And it certainly shouldn't have been one vote away from Snow for Cthulu's sake. 3) Shenanigans such as these will not draw more high-quality submissions for this forum, which by admin's admission is the whole point of them in the first place. Indeed, they will likely have the opposite effect. I may continue to contribute my work to this forum, assuming I'm not banned or the such for sharing my opinions, but I most certainly won't labor under a deadline to compete in a farce like this again. To those of you who entered a VALID submission, one that is at least mostly complete and clearly took innovation and creativity, I salute you, respect you, and wish you the best. To those of you who didn't, why are you here?I agree with this fully and am happy but also disappointed to have seen my game get such high votes compared to the many other better games, as I've stated a lot I did not enter this to win (and if i somehow did i would give the reward to whomever actually deserved it, so if I somehow win 2nd or something you can hold me to my word on that) but just to put my newly in development game out there. I'm very happy to all those who voted for me but if all you were being honest you will say that that my game is a tech demo at best. Games such as Pictoblitz, snow battle, christmas night, cave roller and body toss were much better and a whole lot more deserving compared to mine (even a white screen got higher then 12me's game which was great too!!!!!) There needs to be some better way of maintaining a fair voting system
A fair way to do voting would be to ask the voter if they downloaded all the games and played them, and then ask them to number them greatest to least in their opinion of greatness.
It was a toss up between a couple of them so I had to use a random item chooser I found online.
I don't feel like using the links to specifically highlight quoted text from people... but I think SAGESCRIPT deserves a lot of appreciation for not only calling out concerns with the way in which people voted - but systematically walking through a rational argument behind the reasoning. I found myself applauding the entire way through the read.
And then - PICY3 showed tremendous humility to acknowledge that the voting results didn't make sense even if favorable for PICY3's cause. Such comments are both courageous and honorable.
LUMAGE: I admire your efforts to maintain sanity on this forum. Reading the activity log can sometimes be entertaining as I follow your efforts to keep the machinery running smoothly. At no point would I think to blame you (or your secret/silent co-admins who keep the ship running) for head-scratching voting results. I look forward to your comments after the final votes as I respect your commitment to the forum... but I sense that we the participants in the forum own the voting results....
I am looking forward to playing the next version of Pictoblitz. (even though I stink at these types of games....)
