February 3rd, 2010
“The Reality Bytes Flash Game Contest” announcement!
by Alexander Shen
The fine folks at SPIL Games have teamed up with Mochi Media to bring you the year’s first big contest! Welcome to the Reality Bytes Flash game contest! Here you will have three months to create a game of the simulation or resource management genre!
The contest will be running from February 2nd, 2010 to April 30th, 2010.
Check out the prizes! There’s $15,000 waiting for you!
- First Place – $7,000
- Second Place – $4,000
- Third Place – $2,000
- Honorable Mention (x2) – $1,000 each
Please check out the official contest page for all the information you need and official rules!
Good luck!
Alexander Shen has been working in the gaming industry for the past three years. He has worked at companies like SCEA, Leapfrog and Namco Networks of America. In his spare time, he's often writing and illustrating comic strips and working on his own game creations. In between that you'll find him writing music and playing guitar. Sometimes he finds time to sleep and eat cereal. (alexandershen.com)
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Good to see a big contest up and running already. I’ve never really brainstormed concept ideas for the genres listed, but if I finish up what I have on my plate now, I may consider doing so. Good luck to all who enter.
if your game is good enough to win this competition, it’s probably good enough to get a 7k sponsorship anyway without entering!
I guess people can always try to get a sponsorship first, and if they don’t succeed, they can enter the contest.
What do you mean exactly for a resource managment genre?
Do you have any example of these two genre?
Is it possible to have a multiplayer game in the contest?
thank you,
emanuele
Reasons to not take part:
- Spil group have never allowed mochi ads on their main sites. Suddenly Mochi and Spil are best friends. We should ban them for the way they treat Mochi based game developers.
- they are asking you to make up to 15 versions of the game. That is a lot of work, especially if they need translating into 15 languages.
- they want exclusivity
- no offence but the type of game will take a lot to make and the prize fund is pretty poor.
- the only incentive is that they are allowing you to keep mochi ad revenue (incentive to make a good game), yet they have the cheek to then make you whitelist their sites (some of which get many hits and would have be a major incentive to forget all other issues with this competition).
This competition is win win for only one side, Spil.
pre-lesson: read the small print
GOD! they’re pissing on us and not even giving us the courtesy of calling it rain! whitelisting? unbeliveable!
@Pete: Exactly. Developers have done this in the past and it works. We just see a huge influx of games at the last moment. :P
@Emanule: Resource/Time management is like Diner Dash. Simulation is like Sim City or Rollercoaster Tycoon. Multiplayer games should be fine, as long as they adhere to the rules.
@Monkey Tree: The 15 versions aren’t too bad, actually. I’ve had a game sponsored by SPIL before and it’s basically compiling 15 versions, changing one variable each time. Most sponsorships use the exclusivity model. They actually encourage you to distribute freely, as long as the SPIL preloader is there. Your concerns are definitely valid and we’ve done our best to make a contest that keeps anything “unfair” to a minimum.
I wonder if I’m allowed to have MochiCoins implemented (getting the profits myself of course) in the game without breaking any rules/exclusivity restrictions?
Dear all,
In answer to some of your concerns:
- SPIL Does allow developers to integrate MochiAds in their games, but due to some technical and commercial reasons we cannot allow the ads to show withon our network. However, it’s perfectly ok to have ads enabled in the viral version of yuor game.
- Unfortunately, we cannot accept games in our network with MochiCoins or MochiScores implemented. However, in the viral version it would be perfectly ok to have MochiCoins or MochiScores.
- Unfortunately, we cannot accept games that need a multiplater-server to run the multiplater mode. However, having a multiplayer version that requires two people behind the same computer is fully acceptable.
- We have branding packages availible in AS2 and AS3. For AS2: Yes, we do require you to create 15 versions, but just like Alexander said it shouldn’t be too much work. For AS3 we have a new API that allows the developer to integrate all our brandings in one SWF. Easy :)
- We do not require translation of your game. Only the localized branding as described above.
- We do not require full excpisivity. Winners will win a Primary Sponsorship, which still allows them to sell sitelocked non-exclusive licenses to other parties.
Coming months I will be attending Casual Connect in Hamburg and the Flash Gaming Summit and GDC in San Francisco. Please don’t hesitate to flood me with all of your questions and concerns. I’d be happy to answer them.
Is a ‘post nuclear war simulation’ eligible for this competition? Or does it have to be real-real?
Pete’s got a point :\
Whaaaa? 18 years? Sad face :(
i’ve had a game sponsored by SPIL games from the past, and personally i think that they’re one of the best sponsors i’ve had. pays fast, sends clear instructions.
i have a question for the contest though, does the simulation have to be real as in real-life real? or can it be like a sci-fi thing?
would a game like max damage be okay?
@Askel: We don’t mean “real-real”.
@JP Tiangco: It can be sci-fi. It’s mainly simulation or time/resource management themed. “Reality” is just a fun play on words.
@Raikado: Max Damage is more like a physics-puzzler.