vRAGmAZTER:

Yes there you are right, I know that problem with innovation... Magnetic Mind... Magnetic Mind... Magnetic Mind... But what is innovation?...

Actually I don't think that we refer to the same problem...

Matthew Doucette:

vRAGmAZTER:

my Video for Magnetic Mind produced a lot of unintentional furor (over 40.000 Views of the youtube-Video within a few days). Unfortunately at the wrong group of persons: the Sony-Fanboys ;-) If you want something to laugh, have a look at the comments: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YS6TGv8uCjs

I think this showcases that your "innovation" score was probably low.  As it would have been for Duality ZF.  Let's say we only got 5/30 for innovation, then our top score could only be 75%, pretty easy to beat.  However good Magnetic Mind is, what if you only got 5/30 or 10/30 on innovation, too?  75% or 80% is easy to beat.  Innovation can be in terms of technology, too, but everything in your game appears to be like another game (even now including the water! how crazy is that?)  Sorry to hear you didn't place, as I am for everyone who thought they should be there, but this actually wasn't a surprise for me.  I predicted it, only due to the innovation score.  I'm sure you scored high everywhere else.  You just didn't fit the portfolio, that's all.

My opinion/thoughts at the moment.  What do you think?

yes, first part was cause of Magnetic Mind, but forget about it.... I know, that there is not much innovation in it...

I think, that we concentrate too much on those percentages. I think, when a game rocks and makes fun it gets a high score, regardless of how it looks like, how innovative it is, etc... And this is, what I think all those games have, the make fun to play and keep you up for hours (at least they look like)...

The one problem with innovation is that once you stray from the set formula, you risk turning off as many people as you turn on. I think my game was pretty innovative, and I knew from the start that I would have as many people thinking its the stupidest idea they've ever seen as I would have people thinking its clever, but at the end of the day, that's what I think Indie is all about. I made a game that would never have been made in any other setting.

As for the my game's actual ranking, I really don't want to know. I'm pretty sure I wasn't 7, and to be honest, if I'm not in the finalist section of the dashboard, then it really doesn't matter what they thought of it. Now I'm more concerned about how the general public feels.

But who can complain about the those titles that made it? Those are six very impressive looking games

In the end, do you want to keep playing the game or not?  That's all that matters (EDIT: outside of a competition).  But most competitions have score cards, and it would interesting to see the individual scores.

You raise an excellent question:  What is innovation?  Games that come off the top of my mind are Metal Gear Solid (1) (breaking the "forth wall" if you can call it that on so many occations), Little Big Planet, Ikaruga (the polarity innovation brought not only innovation to the shoot'em up genre, but innovation that almost all shoot'em up fans love, pretty huge in this genre), Braid, etc...

So maybe looking at these games, or the ones you find innovative, you can define what innovation is.  I know Duality ZF did not have it, and you are right that the majority of games in this contest largely lack it, too.

I have to say I'm a bit surprised with the top 6.  I had a good 15 months into my FPS that had dynamic lighting, extremely accurate hit detection, 16 player online, and two unique gameplay modes I've never seen in a fps.  It was completely playable but lacked more than one level and didn't have the polish of some of the other games.  I felt these two areas would keep me from being a serious contender and felt games like Magnetic Mind and Masters of Belial would fare better.  Looking at the top six, I see five games that I'm not surprised beat my game and possibly the others but as far as the sixth one goes, I'm just scratching my head right now.

do you have a video/trailer about "Silent Outpost" ?

I did but removed it yesterday.  I'll repost it if you want to see it.  It was a rush job made during the final day of the competition as I ran out of time.

oh yes, please, I am interessted in!

I'm hoping that my own failure was due to my last-minute level balance and slightly flaky control response times. I really need to get Battle Beat out there for a wider audience to test, to make sure it's fun for THEM and not just me :). It was so last-minute that I found out that my game was much too hard for anyone but myself, and I had to rework the difficulty curve at the last minute. That's the best we can do in this situation. If you're disappointed in not making the final 6, try to delve into your game and find out why, perhaps in a more general sense, that it wouldn't catch people's fancy over other games, and improve on it.  I know there was a lot of stiff competition this year, so I'm hoping that I'm at least close enough that I could improve my work to, at least in the marketplace, become an effective product.

One other thing that I'm going to toss out for the DBP to think about. Given all the work that this community did for DBP (after all, these forums are pretty much the heart of most of the DBP developments), I was pretty disappointed that I had to find out the results by going to G4tv.com and that they weren't posted here first - or at least simultaneously - or a least a simultaneous posted link to G4.

Congrats to all the finalists! Your games look extremely impressive and well deserved of the place they earned. And nice job to everyone who entered. You all deserve a pat on the back for getting your submission in on time. I can't wait to start playtesting your games as you start walking them through the process for release on Xbox LIVE Indie Games!

And it's good to see everyone is such a good sport too ;)

Flowchart Revival LLC:

One other thing that I'm going to toss out for the DBP to think about. Given all the work that this community did for DBP (after all, these forums are pretty much the heart of most of the DBP developments), I was pretty disappointed that I had to find out the results by going to G4tv.com and that they weren't posted here first - or at least simultaneously - or a least a simultaneous posted link to G4.

I think this gets back to my thread earlier.  I'm disappointed I wasn't a finalist, but my game was just entering production (all I had was the tutorial and the first level out of more than 20 complete), but I was really hoping that if I put in the effort to enter the contest I'd at least receive some kind of feedback.  At this point I almost wonder if they even played my game.

Transus:

but I was really hoping that if I put in the effort to enter the contest I'd at least receive some kind of feedback.  At this point I almost wonder if they even played my game.

How they judge is not really disclosed but in previous years I've been told that LOTS of game playing goes on to whittle down to the final ones.

Every year people ask for feedback and we have to explain that its just not practical with so many games.

If you want feedback then put it in playtest.

vRAGmAZTER:

oh yes, please, I am interessted in!

Here you go.  It was rushed so the clips are not what I really wanted to use.  In the first commander clip I moved the view too much and on the teleport clip the player turned the wrong way when he came back in.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJUjS0qG9nY

Reggie

Some surprises, some non-surprises, but congrats to all who made it in there!

We'll be looking at polishing up what we have and releasing it on Indie games (which reminds me, I really should activate that four month freebie period).


All the best,
Mkm
Team Mecha Kiwi

Flowchart Revival LLC:

One other thing that I'm going to toss out for the DBP to think about. Given all the work that this community did for DBP (after all, these forums are pretty much the heart of most of the DBP developments), I was pretty disappointed that I had to find out the results by going to G4tv.com and that they weren't posted here first - or at least simultaneously - or a least a simultaneous posted link to G4.

Same for me! A friend of mine found the finalists on this G4TV-thing before I did and I didn't at first know whether it was just a fake because I didn't know the platform at all. I expected that once the finalists were determined every member of every team should receive an email.
To have to go looking for whether I won felt somehow like a lack of respect after all those months of hard work.

On the other hand I really have to point out that I enjoyed in every other aspect the great service of the DBP team. I wrote ~5 emails before the submission deadline and they were all answered very nicely. Especially we had missed to add my friend to my team and although the deadline for team fluctuation was over they put him in. I really appreciated that so thumbs up for the general service and all.

When I saw the news I was frantically scrolling down the page to see if I could find a screenshot of my game. I'm sure I wasn't the only one, but nope, it wasn't there :(. I've got over the initial disappointment and I'm glad to see that most of the comments here have been mature and it hasn't descended into a flame war about who's game is better than whose. I must say that the quality of the games is pretty impressive (that's just judging from screen shots/videos though).

Anybody up for joining forces and putting in a kick-ass game worthy of being in the top 6 next year? :)

I checked the contest rules recently and the state very crearly that there will be 10 finalists. Probably there will be some sort of official announcement in the DBP website to include thoose yet to know last four finalists.

Nivel21:

I checked the contest rules recently and the state very crearly that there will be 10 finalists.

No, the rules do not state this. The section of the rules you refer to goes like this:

Up to ten (10) eligible Entries will be selected as Contest Semi-Finalists and potential winners of the Semi-Finalist Prize, subject to verification. In addition, four (4) of the ten (10) Contest Semi-Finalists will be selected as Contest Finalists and potential winners of a Finalist Prize, subject to verification.

With the finalist prizes being the money-prizes, and the semi-finalist prizes being the option of maybe being offered a XBLA contract (and since the finalists are also semi-finalists, they are also eligble for maybe getting an offer for XBLA).

So I guess what is currently called the "6 finalists" is actually the "6 semi-finalists", and 6 is certainly in the range of "up to 10". :-)
And we only know the actual 4 finalists once the winners are announced.

And before I forget, I also congratulate all the (semi-)finalists !!!

Doc

So are you saying we won't find out who the top ten are? Seems a little open to interpretation because the part that says: "In addition, four (4) of the ten (10) Contest Semi-Finalists will be selected as Contest Finalists" implies there will indeed be 10 semi-finalists while the "Up to ten (10) eligible Entries will be selected" bit is a bit more ambiguous. Anyway, I guess time will tell. I'm just hoping that those who didn't make the top 6 will still get a chance to have the game be a part of the "Contest finalists" section of the Xbox 360 dashboard.

I just got an email from dbp support, telling me, that the 20 finalists will be anounced next week!!!

Next week? Omg I'm gonna die waiting. Anyway thanks for posting that information.