Chippit recently posted an announcement about Game.Dev’s Comp 23 (which, in Internet time, might as well have been years ago). The competition is focused on how well an entrant’s game gets marketed, rather than focusing on the game itself: an idea which some may well raise their eyebrows at, but which I personally deem to be quite important. After all, only about 0.001% of the gaming population ever really bothers to hone their mad marketing skizzles, which is a terrible shame and a bit of an obstacle to fame, glory and the rock-n-rolla lifestyle that we all know famous devs enjoy.
I’m particularly proud of one community member’s entry, which is an action/puzzle game based on TF2. It’s dammit’s first game project ever ever ever, and it’s already enjoying loads more polish and publicity than most first-timers would ever dare hope for.
This bugger is a valuable example to tout: most beginners quietly drop a piece of haphazard code onto a forum somewhere, make big promises and then don’t do anything else about it, either because they’re too shy or too lazy. In this case, I like to think that our new dev is receiving a far more encouraging — and exciting — introduction to game development: let’s hope this spawns more games in the future!
TF2 Goldrush isn’t a very long game, but it’s a fun little romp when you have a few minutes to spare. Also, it has achievements in it. Gosh-darn cute, that they are.
I’ll try spotlight more Comp 23 entries as the weeks wear on: that’s kinda half the point about the “marketing” premise, you know?