Hi,
It's written that the top 20 of DBP entries will be known about 1 week after the deadline. Does this mean we can expect them to be known very soon or is it going to be delayed? Or maybe, knowing that there are so many contest entries, I should ask: how huge will be the delay?

Regards,
Pawel

How many entries are there? I haven't seen any numbers at all, would be fun to know. :)

A couple hundred.

DaCoder:

Hi,
It's written that the top 20 of DBP entries will be known about 1 week after the deadline. Does this mean we can expect them to be known very soon or is it going to be delayed? Or maybe, knowing that there are so many contest entries, I should ask: how huge will be the delay?

Regards,
Pawel

Where do you see that written?

There are sooo many entries, I would think it would take more then a week to go through them all.

Hope they release some of the better ones to the public to play :)
 (obviously not the winner because of hte arcade contract)

L0STlogic:

DaCoder:

Hi,
It's written that the top 20 of DBP entries will be known about 1 week after the deadline. Does this mean we can expect them to be known very soon or is it going to be delayed? Or maybe, knowing that there are so many contest entries, I should ask: how huge will be the delay?

Regards,
Pawel

Where do you see that written?

In the rules. :)

(i) Semi-Finalist Round of Judging. Commencing on or about July 9, 2007, all Entries will be reviewed, considered and judged in a Semi-Finalist Round of Judging by a panel of qualified judges supervised by an independent judging organization, which will score each Entry based on the Judging Criteria. Those Entries ranked 1st (highest number of points, based on the Judging Criteria) through 20th from amongst the pool of Entries will advance to the Finalist Round of Judging and Participants will be so notified commencing on or about the week of July 16, 2007 (based on the Registration contact information provided and maintained by Participants on the Site). Promotion Finalists will be posted on the Site on or about the week of July 23, 2007.

I too hope that they will put all games up for people to download. It might be nice if you were able to give them an updated version though (we found some pretty serious bugs since we submitted the game :) ).

All winners will get announced on August 13th as planned.  We'll highlight the top 20 at that point in time.  Have seen a great many of the game submissions, everyone did a hell of a job.  It definitely won't be easy for the judges!

--dave

Dave Mitchell [Microsoft]:

All winners will get announced on August 13th as planned.  We'll highlight the top 20 at that point in time.  Have seen a great many of the game submissions, everyone did a hell of a job.  It definitely won't be easy for the judges!

--dave

So we won't know which entry made it to top20 until August 13th ? What about the rules quoted just above your post ?

"on or ABOUT" :)

Also in the rules:

"Sponsor may, at its sole and exclusive discretion, extend an invitation to Finalist Participants willing and able to attend the 2007 Microsoft Gamefest Conference in Seattle, Washington, U.S.A. from August 11 to August 13, 2007 (where the Finalist Round of Judging for the Promotion will take place and where Promotion prize winners will be announced)"

I'll happen to be in Seattle at that time (huge coincidence) , does this mean that Microsoft is no longer extending this invitation?

-Thanks,

J Liechty

Dave Mitchell [Microsoft]:

All winners will get announced on August 13th as planned.  We'll highlight the top 20 at that point in time.  Have seen a great many of the game submissions, everyone did a hell of a job.  It definitely won't be easy for the judges!

--dave

That's a bit of a shame.  I (along with others I imagine) was waiting to see if I was in the top 20 before booking a flight to Seattle.  I certainly won't be going now under the assumption that I'm going to get Gazzumped by several people working silently on killer games.

Dave J

The rules say the semi-finalists will be notified at that time (July 16). It doesn't say the finalists will be announced to the community at that time.

 

David Hunt:

The rules say the semi-finalists will be notified at that time (July 16). It doesn't say the finalists will be announced to the community at that time.

 

From what I can tell anyone that submitted anything is a semi-finalist.  The finalists seem to be the top 20 games, which we were told would be announced sometime this week.

Dave J

Semi-Finalist Round of Judging. Commencing on or about July 9, 2007, all Entries will be reviewed, considered and judged in a Semi-Finalist Round of Judging by a panel of qualified judges supervised by an independent judging organization, which will score each Entry based on the Judging Criteria. Those Entries ranked 1st (highest number of points, based on the Judging Criteria) through 20th from amongst the pool of Entries will advance to the Finalist Round of Judging and Participants will be so notified commencing on or about the week of July 16, 2007 (based on the Registration contact information provided and maintained by Participants on the Site). Promotion Finalists will be posted on the Site on or about the week of July 23, 2007.

___

It seems to say everyone is a semifinalist, but the top 20 are finalists who will be notified that they are finalists on or around the week of the 16th. The actual winners (their position in the top 20) will be announced at gamefest. But it seems the finalists will be posted on the site the week of the 23rd, so it seems very likely taht there will be some indication before Gamefest

David Johnston:

From what I can tell anyone that submitted anything is a semi-finalist.  The finalists seem to be the top 20 games, which we were told would be announced sometime this week.

Dave J

Those Entries ranked 1st (highest number of points, based on the Judging Criteria) through 20th from amongst the pool of Entries will advance to the Finalist Round of Judging and Participants will be so notified commencing on or about the week of July 16, 2007

The last time anything was supposed to happen "on or about the week of" it ended up happening Friday (or the next Monday...I don't remember).  I'm not even going to expect anything until Friday, and if I hear anything earlier, I'll be happy to have heard something early.

Hello Microsoft & the DBP team.. 

As you know, there are hundreds of people waiting to hear about the results of the contest and whether or not the finalists are being invited to go to gamefest.  I would say over half those contestants live oversees, and every day they have to wait is causing the plane flights, hotel bookings, etc,  to skyrocket in prices..    These people need to book the arrangements ASAP if they are going to make it to gamefest. 

So if possible, can you please elaborate more on the details of the invites:   who, when, where, how much?, etc..  Specifically, most people want to know if the invite includes a free entry into gamefest, how many entries per finalist team, and when can they know if they need to book flights or not.. 

I realize there are a ton of entries to go through & judge, but i just wanted to bring awareness that the delays are causing these contestants hundreds or thousands of dollars...

Thank you :)

And good luck to all the contest entries!

(sorry for the re-post..  it was ZMans idea :D )

Helius:

As you know, there are hundreds of people waiting to hear about the results of the contest and whether or not the finalists are being invited to go to gamefest.  I would say over half those contestants live oversees, and every day they have to wait is causing the plane flights, hotel bookings, etc,  to skyrocket in prices..    These people need to book the arrangements ASAP if they are going to make it to gamefest. 

I'm sure Microsoft is well aware that people want to have the answers as quickly as possible.  However, the rules say that they will start notifying finalists "on or about" this week (July 16th) and post finalists on the website "on or about" next week (July 23rd).  I can understand getting antsy once the dates posted in the official rules have passed, but until then I don't see that pressuring them is helpful.  Also, I'd rather have them take their time and be thorough in judging rather than rush to get the results out quickly.

That said, I would like clarification from Dave Mitchell about whether his post above represents a policy change from the official rules, since it could be read as saying that the finalists won't be announced until Gamefest in August.

Tom

SwampThingTom:

I'm sure Microsoft is well aware that people want to have the answers as quickly as possible.  However, the rules say that they will start notifying finalists "on or about" this week (July 16th) and post finalists on the website "on or about" next week (July 23rd).  I can understand getting antsy once the dates posted in the official rules have passed, but until then I don't see that pressuring them is helpful.  Also, I'd rather have them take their time and be thorough in judging rather than rush to get the results out quickly.

That said, I would like clarification from Dave Mitchell about whether his post above represents a policy change from the official rules, since it could be read as saying that the finalists won't be announced until Gamefest in August.

My thoughts, exactly :) (or QFT, as they say)

I would like to know if all the finalists have been notified yet, or if they have started notifying them... the suspense is killing me.

an news? The suspense is killing me too!

Let's hope today is the day :)

Ditto :-)

I do hope we get some feedback on our efforts. Whilst knowing your place (in top 20 or not) is a form of feedback. I'd certainly like to know what was good (or bad) about my submission. Perhaps knowing your score in the 3 marked areas would be enough... It would certainly give me useful steer for my next effort.

"Innovation" ... gets quite a high rating - Probably the hardest area to score highly as you look come up with new twists on game play (lets not get hung up on the meaning of "innovation" vs "invention" right!?!).  

"Fun factor" - Hmmm ... Had been programming my game for so long... I lost the "fun factor" many moons before completing it!

"Polish" ... Interesting to see what entries made the cut thanks to this (Perhaps an area that favours man power to clean-up the experience).

...My nails are so short now (The suspense... The suspense!!!!)  

 

Didn't you see that they tweaked the judging areas?

"Navaleyness" - 30%

"Seaworthyness" - 30%

"HowWateryIsYourGame" - 38%

"SimultaneousMovementTurnBasedNavalStrategy-ness"- 2%

I was suprised that shuggy didn't pick up an aqualung, and the dishwasher didn't grow little fins (ok.. little bladed fins)

Joopsy ...

ps.. sorry, my tiny mind is snapping under the strain
:)

pps.. gl all  (again!)

LOL!!!

You have it "in the bag" (or is that boat?)!... How stupid am I... Should have read the rules again... All that effort!... All that concentration... Not a drop of sea water in my game anywhere... I am doomed!  ;o))