Length of competition vs. multiple simultaneous competitions?

Summary:

Discussion on how long the competition should last for, and whether we can or should have multiple simultaneous competitions with different lengths.

Length of competition vs. multiple simultaneous competitions?

rbwhitaker 22 Apr 2014 18:13

I've heard people talking about wishing the last (or next) competition lasted longer than one month. While I love the idea of being able to tackle more ambitious projects, the other side is that the longer the competition, the more you have to put your "normal" life on hold. Longer probably won't work well for everybody, but it will probably work better for some.

So I think we should have a discussion about how long Competition #2 should be, and whether we'll have enough people to support running multiple lengths. (Or does the number of people even matter?)

So here's a few lengths that could be interesting:

• 1 Day (8 hours or 24 hours?) Challenge: This is the 100 meter sprint version of the challenge. Putting together anything that resembles a game would be the goal. The advantage: just about everybody can afford to give up a Saturday for a game. With the 8 hour version, you still even have time to do stuff after it ends.
• 1 Weekend Challenge: A longer challenge that gives you room for building more complete games. Interestingly, a lot of top-selling games (like Flappy Bird) have been made in this kind of time span. Again, this doesn't require a long-term commitment to the game. When you go back to work or school on Monday, you can just forget about it and move on.
• 1 Month Challenge: This is what we did last time, and I think we all mostly liked it. It's long enough that you should be able to complete a game, perhaps even with some bells and whistles. It's short enough that you'll be feeling pressure from day 1.
• 3 Month or 100 Day Challenge: A version longer than what we've done in the past. This is the marathon version of the challenge. It's long enough that it's not unreasonable to imagine building something that you intend on selling. (Though I do worry about people dropping out as time goes on.) By the time this competition ends, it will be time to start the next one!

Thoughts?

Re: Length of competition vs. multiple simultaneous competitions?

PiscesMike 24 Apr 2014 20:38

I know I've made my thoughts abundantly clear in chats with RB, but since most of us aren't privy to those conversations, I'll throw my two cents in here.

I was a big one for making the competition longer (ie: three months) and making the competition more challenging. I think the consensus me and RB came to was that we needed to do a few more mid-range ones first. It would give everyone a chance to polish their skills a little more before taking on something that was bound to be much harder. With that being said, at this point, I'm mostly in favor of keeping them at about 30 days. That seems to be a good time frame to create something decent, without getting too stressed, while also giving time for testing and revision should things go awry. I think a couple more like this would go a long way to getting people ready for the longer competitions where we could so something like an RPG game.

Other than that, I'm pretty much open to whatever everyone else wants to do. Have a great day, and happy coding!

On the lower end of things, such as the 8 hour or 24 hour competition.. I like the idea of those as well, but I worry it might be compressing things a little to much. Perhaps if we had a lead-in where we could flesh out the game idea, and perhaps locate some on line graphics resources before hand would be good. I think trying to come up with an idea, find graphics and music, sound effects, etc all with in 8 hours could be quite a challenge and hamper the end product. On the other hand, it would definitely teach us the value of being able to work under pressure (something I could use help with). I know I've spent more than just 8 hours trying to find stuff on line for some of these challenges. Also, with just 8 hours (or 24) hours, that leaves very little time for beta testing and finding problems. Considering all of that, if we are to do a very short challenge, I think we should split it into three parts: ideas and concept before hand, the actual coding of the project which lasts for 8 or 24 hours, and then a little time (perhaps another 8 or 24 hours) just to polish things and find problems. Anywho's thats just my thinking.

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"May the mercy of His Divine Shadow fall upon you." - Stanley H. Tweedle, Security Guard class IV, The League of 20,000 planets

Re: Length of competition vs. multiple simultaneous competitions?

Marcus42 26 Apr 2014 06:04

Originally I was thinking that the competition should be two months, but you guys have got me sold on the one month again. It is a pretty good length, and it sure was a blast last time!

Some of the time frames I don't think that they're necessary, because there's only a few of us, and it just makes things more complicated. The one weekend is good, so if someone wants to do something quickly they can, but the 8 and 24 hour lengths are too short - I don't think that anyone would go for those. As for the three months, I agree that we should probably work up to that one.

So maybe we have a one weekend competition and a one month competition that run simultaniously?

Re: Length of competition vs. multiple simultaneous competitions?

rbwhitaker 27 Apr 2014 15:15

I think you make some really good points, Marcus.

The shorter the competition, the more people who will say, "Yeah, I've got time for that." The one day version is pretty dang short though.

And I agree that with the number of people who participated last time, and the number of people that I expect to participate this time, I don't think it justifies more than about two lengths of time. I like the one month length, and doing a weekend long thing seems like a pretty decent length to me.

I think as of today, we can still wait a bit longer for more people to chime in before making a final decision.