[games_access] Thinking about GDC 08's competition

[d. michelle hinn]

This all seems good. And if we can't get part of his session, we can 
also make our own. I'll email him over the weekend and see what he 
says.

So the prof from France that was at Arcade was the prof of the 
student who designed a game for the DonationCoder contest. And we had 
quite a few other DC winners there with us showing off stuff (Ethan 
for instance). So...if we put our heads together and come up with 
contest rules, DonationCoder is a great way to get the word out to 
indies -- and we can also ping lots of people to get them to enter 
the contest. Getting a free GDC pass is quite a great reward for an 
indie developer -- they get a giga pass. The other thing that is cool 
about DC (ok, I'm plugging my own company BUT games created there 
REMAIN the intellectual property of the designer) is that we already 
have the companies that were super happy with the resulting games -- 
so we might be able to get some more prizes from game companies since 
it was already a success.)

So shall we have a fall contest then and aim to show it off at the 
experimental session? The set up is easy -- the webmaster there is 
great and already has things in place for uploading games, etc. And 
I'm good at getting prizes (we had almost $20k worth of prizes for 
that contest -- and I only had a week to get the companies locked 
in...so starting now I bet I can get a lot more!!)

I'm also wondering if we could have an "arcade" session based on the 
awards show -- perhaps at the IGF kiosk or at our expo booth? I have 
emailed the IGF peeps and they may have answered me already but my 
email in box is insane!! That would be pretty cool if we could get an 
"accessibility" award into the big awards show. Hell, with the 
thousands that go to that...they'd be forced to be there!!! :)

M

>Like the Dogma idea... Restrictions do tend to encourage creativity, 
>I belive that too. Why not make the game limits analogue stick/mouse 
>only? Would work for head-tracker/white-board/touch screen/etc.etc. 
>users too then.
>
>Barrie
>
>
>
>
>
>----- Original Message ----- From: "Eelke Folmer" <eelke.folmer at gmail.com>
>To: "IGDA Games Accessibility SIG Mailing List" <games_access at igda.org>
>Sent: Wednesday, June 06, 2007 12:10 AM
>Subject: Re: [games_access] Thinking about GDC 08's competition
>
>>Hi,
>>
>>I think we as the IGDA/GA SIG should consider organizing a small
>>accessibility contest in the fall on gamedev or some other sites or
>>our own and report the results in the experimental game play workshop
>>of jonathan blow. (There were like 800 people attending that one this
>>year). 20 minutes in workshop showing some accessible games that the
>>contestants came up with can give us more exposure than organizing our
>>own contest. Besides most of the "big" game designers like
>>falstein/adams where already there this year and I don't see them
>>wanting to do it again... unless you can book will wright I don't
>>think people are eager to come see us.
>>
>>Especially from an effort/result point of view I see this as a much
>>better and feasable option (There's plenty of indie game developers
>>that want 2 minute exposure of their cool blind/deaf/physical disabled
>>games) and we just report upon those in the workshop (basically
>>showing 2 minute shots of each game).
>>
>>What do you think? they have the numbers, and accessibility is kind of
>>a "experimental" gameplay. E.g. I'd like to compare it to the dogma
>>movement in film (which basically puts severe restrictions on what you
>>can show & how you make your movie (e.g. no special effects),
>>essentially forcing game developers to be creative. Same with
>>accessibility. Design a game that only uses 2 buttons and one analog
>>stick (so robert can play it with his quad control) game developers
>>really have to be creative to make up for the lack of having 20
>>buttons less.
>>
>>Lets get in touch with jonathan blow and see if he's interested?
>>
>>Cheers Eelke
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>On 5/31/07, d. michelle hinn <hinn at uiuc.edu> wrote:
>>>Hey guys,
>>>
>>>So I'm working on next year's design challenge for GDC and I'm taking
>>>the advise of the competitors from 07 into consideration:
>>>
>>>* Keep it to one hour
>>>* No judges at all -- if judges have questions about why they felt
>>>that way...I'll email you off-list
>>>* Include accessibility "extra info" between the contestants or do it
>>>all up front
>>>* NO VIDEOS unless they are realllllllllly good and reallllllllllly
>>>short (we left people in the dark with our video as fun as it was to
>>>make it wasn't nearly as hilarious in real life) :)
>>>* Keep things more serious without being boring
>>>* Ax the "reality show" idea
>>>* Cut down the number of contestants to 3
>>>
>>>So right now I'm talking to people who might be involved -- Raph
>>>Koster (wrote "theory of fun") is interested in either being a
>>>contestant or being "mini" presenter on the challenges of
>>>accessibility and fun (those of you at GDC 07 probably remember that
>>>we were up against him so maybe if we get everyone famous somehow
>>>involved...hehe) and then Will Wright, Dave Perry and Keita Takahashi
>>>who said they were interested for 08 -- I'm imagining all will not
>>>say "yes." Raph is really interested in being involved in some
>>>manner. I'd like for them to be involved during even the early stages
>>>so that we can present a coherent show. So I'd to have the spirit of
>>>being a publisher with many competing design studios and only one
>>>will get the "go" in a "go/no go" audience vote (this was Noah's
>>>suggestion). So the contestants would have "checking in" meetings
>>>with us as they go (to prevent "non-game presentations...we had a
>>>few") and such. And I'm imagining that all contestants would have
>>>"accessibility mentors" assigned to them from the SIG to make things
>>>even more challenging and fun for all of us and get us all involved.
>>>
>>>So this isn't THE proposal...I'm just still riffing on some ideas. So
>>>YOUR opinion counts so please do give it! None of last year's
>>>contestants said that we should drop the whole idea -- but instead
>>>change it and do it in a way that seems much more put together.
>>>
>>>So let's go! Let's think about our cool street cred session that
>>>might get people in the door for an hour and then get them to come to
>>>the expo for more! Let's think about how we can have the coolest, yet
>>>non-hospital inducing sessions to raise the roof!!!!
>>>
>>>Michelle
>>>_______________________________________________
>>>games_access mailing list
>>>games_access at igda.org
>>>http://seven.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/games_access
>>>
>>
>>
>>--
>>----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>Eelke Folmer                           Assistant Professor
>>Department of CS&E/171
>>University of Nevada              Reno, Nevada 89557
>>Game interaction design        www.helpyouplay.com
>>----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>_______________________________________________
>>games_access mailing list
>>games_access at igda.org
>>http://seven.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/games_access
>>
>
>
>
>_______________________________________________
>games_access mailing list
>games_access at igda.org
>http://seven.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/games_access