I want to do a test run for my Community Arcade idea. This thread is not an official announcement. This is what I have organized so far. Please keep in mind that the details are subject to change. I am specifically looking for feedback in the areas that are "to be determined" or TBD. Having said that, all feedback and discussion is welcomed and appreciated. Halo 5 Forge Commission Commissioner: Woodsman907 Judging Panel: 1: TBD 2: TBD 3: TBD 4: TBD 5: TBD 6: TBD 7: TBD Commission Title: Get Your Scripts Together Prize pool: $1,700 Commission goal: 60,000 Points generated minimum 300 Prefab submissions minimum 3 Prizes About $567 each 20,000 Points each 1: Xbox One X 1 TB console 2: Dell 2-in-1 Inspiron 5000 laptop 3: da Vinci Jr. 1.0 3in1 wireless 3D printer Edit: 1 minimum Script Brain per Prefab 1 Legendary Prefab = 100 Points 100 minimum objects 4 minimum scripts 1 Heroic Prefab = 75 Points 75 minimum objects 3 minimum scripts 1 Normal Prefab = 50 Points 50 minimum objects 2 minimum scripts 1 Easy Prefab = 25 Points 25 minimum objects 1 minimum script Bonus Awards 10 Points each Maximum 10 Awards per Prefab No duplicate Bonus Awards on individual submissions 1: Mutiny Award 2: Extra Scripts Award 3: Extra Objects Award 4: Classic Halo Award 5: Edit: Evolved Settings Award 6: Edit: Outstanding Use of Objects Award 7: Edit: Outstanding Use of Scripts Award 8: Edit: Custom Games Standards Award 9: Edit: Matchmaking Standards Award 10: Edit: Originality Award
hey I organized a contest too judge: me 1st place: 1 million dollars 2nd place: 2 million dollars 3rd place: 3 million dollars and a printer expecting 4 hundred thousand map submissions minimum
Just to clarify, I'll buy the prizes myself as soon as I get enough volunteers to be judges. All the judges have to do is load up the submissions in Forge, make sure they meet the criteria, and administer the Bonus Awards as they see fit. Edit: And if there is any dispute, the judges can vote. If there is a tie, the commissioner will cast the deciding vote.
Well, it looks to me like some people have come in here and read the OP and then asked themselves, "So, what's the contest? How do you win?" If you read the entire thing you might be wondering if you're supposed to make a new map or something and then it gets judged and one will be the best and win the grand prize. You maybe even looked at the prize list and thought, "Well, the top one must be first prize, the middle one is second prize, and the third map that get's picked gets the third one." Actually, none of that is how it works, according to my understanding. This is not my thing and I don't have anything to do with it other than moral support. The idea came up in another ForgeHub thread a few months back about alternatives to contests. In that discussion the OP was trying to find a way to get more Forgers to actively Forge. The argument for contests as we know them seemed to be that if there is a contest, people will try to win, and the result will be more forge maps for everyone. There have been several contests since that thread. If there are, indeed, more maps out there as a result of these contests I must admit that from where I sit it's hard to tell. I'm not saying there aren't. I'm just saying that I can't tell that the pool of maps out there did any significant swelling, at least not more than what we would have gotten had there been no contests. Do we have more Forgers now? Hard to say. All I know is that if you compare the number of people that actively play Halo multiplayer to the number that actively publish Forge maps, the difference is far larger than it ought to be. I'll tell you what. "Competitive" players get all sorts of "rewards" and recognition for playing Halo mulitplayer. Little stuff like reg packs and big stuff like a shot at HCS cash money. This makes some people play Halo. This doesn't drive anyone to Forge. So, is there a way to get people to Forge that is not a contest? He's calling this thing Community Arcade. What does that mean? When I was a young man, before consoles became a thing, we went to an Arcade to play games. Some Arcades awarded points for playing games. There were prizes behind the counter, and if you had enough points you could claim a prize. In order to get something, you had to play some games. In this instance, the game you have to play is Forge. When you play Forge you make things. You can win points for making things that are requested. If the things you make actually work and meet the requirements, you get points. Earn enough points and you can claim a prize. When the prizes are all gone, the Arcade closes. There's no "winner that made the best map". If you earn enough points you can claim two prizes. Or all three. It's not about how much better your stuff is than the other person. If you want to look at it like a contest, I suppose you could say that the person that makes the most cool stuff will "win", but really that person would have to want all three prizes really badly. A person that makes only "Legendary" prefabs and puts enough work into them to get bonus points from the Judges will probably get first choice, and I suppose if some people wanted to make a contest out of that they are free to do so. Doesn't matter. This is just an experiment. He's actually putting his money where his mouth is and providing this opportunity. The money is there and the prizes are real. If you want to claim a prize, you'll have to Forge. It's that simple. I can say that if this works, the next prize pool will be larger. Right now he needs eight judges and your feedback and ideas. He brought this to ForgeHub because he believes this community is more serious about Forging most likely to produce cool Forge stuff. I hope I didn't get anything wrong. He understands that this whole thing might be unrecognizable, but it's not that hard to get. If something is not clear you should ask questions.
This is true. If people only want to play competitively, the can just play for Points. (Big "P") Nobody has to claim any prize they don't want. And if nobody wants the prizes, I can change them. I picked these three because they were the first three things I thought of, just to give people an example of how the Points are budgeted. If the community prefers smaller prizes at a higher quantity, we can go that route. Quantity being the keyword. That's what I'm after. I need mutiny themed, scripted prefabs for my map. There are nine other possible Bonus Awards that are still open for suggestions. Think of the Bonus Awards as "quality control" if that helps. I've been planning this for a while, although I never had a name for it until the thread Stardriver mentioned. I know, it's a radical concept. I have had to explain the idea to Stardriver many times. Questions are indeed helpful. It is also true that, if things go well, the next commission will be bigger, allowing for multiple tiers of prizes. I prefer the term "commission" over "contest." Ideally, the Community Arcade would be an ongoing thing with an open prize pool. Community members from different interest groups could then make their own commissions and share the same prize pool. But that's where it gets complicated. Something like that is not sustainable unless the Points are somehow monetized. I'm order to do that, we settle on a concrete dollar value. So it makes sense to see how successful the idea is on a small scale. That is what we are talking about doing here. At the moment, I need volunteers and ideas.
Honestly I would take all the ideas you get from this thread, and polish it until halo 6 comes around. The arcade idea could gain some momentum, but I don't think you'll get the volume you want unless it releases next to the next game.
Thank you for being honest, but I am not inclined to wait that long. The more work we get done before Halo Infinite comes out, the better. I can run the commission for as long as it takes to achieve my goal. Part of this first test is to find out how long that might take. Once I have enough people to be judges, and everyone is settled on agreeable Bonus Awards, then I will purchase the prizes and the test commission can begin. All of the risk is mine alone, and I am not risking anything that I am not prepared to lose. Yes, a new Halo title launch means the community will have more momentum. But that also means more people trying to use that momentum. It means more tournaments, more clans recruiting, more Forge contests, new people wanting to make montages, more people looking for voice actors, more people doing give awards on their streams, more Youtubers looking for subscribers.. Everyone in the entire Halo community will be competing for that same momentum, something at intricate and sophisticated as the Community Arcade is sure to get buried next to that abundance of easier options. I believe that this very phenomenon is a major underlying factor behind many of the communities that end up failing as soon as the game loses it post-launch force. Which is precisely why I came up with the Community Arcade in the first place. The Arcade is meant to instigate activity in situations when the game has little or no force of momentum. If that means I have to run some unsuccessful test commissions before I get it right, then so be it. And I'll know I've gotten it right when a full commission can be run from start to finish, autonomously, by a group of thirteen year old kids. People at that age can be absolutely insistent on having things their own way. So that's why it's on me to be the mature one, and handle responsibilities of the Arcade. To the point where running a commission is, basically, effortless.