Stencyl Jam #13 - Win a Stencyl Studio Subscription! - Ends Nov. 15th

Do games have to be exclusively for the jam or can they be for other things like LD? Either way this should be fun.

No exclusivity restrictions. In fact, we've had LD's happen during the course of a jam and a few of those placed in the top spots.

I'm In - This will hopefully give me the kick in the backside that I want to motivate me to start and finish a game in a given deadline.   Usually I start something, and because this is more a less a 'hobby' for now, I tend to drift a way mid development and only go back to it late on, as there's no motivation for me to finish something. 

I got a couple of ideas floating around in my head atm,   might start doing something now to see what I can do about it. 

needs a theme!

I know the last one didn't have a theme.. but I always thought it needed one... Not naming names but I'm pretty sure I know some people entered things that they had worked on prior to the jam.

Pete, not sure about last time but it's allowed to enter games people work on before the jam, as long as they weren't released before the jam.

I think a theme would be nice but either way, i may give it a go.

Yeah games can be entered that were started before the jam, and I can't say if this is quite what Pete means - But I think the thing that I felt last time, was some entries entered that fair enough hadn't been released prior to the jam, had been worked on for many months before hand - which to me kinda went against what a jam was.. a short'ish period of time to see what you can throw together.

needs a theme!

I know the last one didn't have a theme.. but I always thought it needed one... Not naming names but I'm pretty sure I know some people entered things that they had worked on prior to the jam.

Pete, not sure about last time but it's allowed to enter games people work on before the jam, as long as they weren't released before the jam.

I think a theme would be nice but either way, i may give it a go.

Yeah games can be entered that were started before the jam, and I can't say if this is quite what Pete means - But I think the thing that I felt last time, was some entries entered that fair enough hadn't been released prior to the jam, had been worked on for many months before hand - which to me kinda went against what a jam was.. a short'ish period of time to see what you can throw together.

It's also to see peoples' interpretation of the theme. That's part of the fun too. People entering games that they'd already put 200 hours of work into beforehand seems against the spirit of it.

Does it have to be a game, or it can be an app ?

Thanks

does it have to be an app or can it be a picture of a cat?

On a more serious note I'd vote to include apps ^^

This coincides perfectly with me deciding to make a new game. Thank you Stencyl
Good luck to everyone

Yeah games can be entered that were started before the jam, and I can't say if this is quite what Pete means - But I think the thing that I felt last time, was some entries entered that fair enough hadn't been released prior to the jam, had been worked on for many months before hand - which to me kinda went against what a jam was.. a short'ish period of time to see what you can throw together.

I didn't come up with the rules, but I think the problem is that the rule isn't easily enforced. There's no way to know whether or not someone started working on a game before a certain date. Even if you have a suspicion, what would you do? You could say, "This game is too good to have been made exclusively during the competition period", but ultimately you're just guessing. You could mistake a hard worker for a cheater and deprive them of a prize they legitimately earned.

Yeah games can be entered that were started before the jam, and I can't say if this is quite what Pete means - But I think the thing that I felt last time, was some entries entered that fair enough hadn't been released prior to the jam, had been worked on for many months before hand - which to me kinda went against what a jam was.. a short'ish period of time to see what you can throw together.

I didn't come up with the rules, but I think the problem is that the rule isn't easily enforced. There's no way to know whether or not someone started working on a game before a certain date. Even if you have a suspicion, what would you do? You could say, "This game is too good to have been made exclusively during the competition period", but ultimately you're just guessing. You could mistake a hard worker for a cheater and deprive them of a prize they legitimately earned.

Give it a theme and all will start to work on a new game

I didn't come up with the rules, but I think the problem is that the rule isn't easily enforced. There's no way to know whether or not someone started working on a game before a certain date.

This is exactly the reasoning.

I didn't come up with the rules, but I think the problem is that the rule isn't easily enforced. There's no way to know whether or not someone started working on a game before a certain date.

This is exactly the reasoning.

I understand the rules aren't easily enforced and isn't always easy to know whether someone has worked on a game before a certain date/time - so I understand that reasoning.

Now I understand a hard worker could throw a game out real quick, and its hard to distinguish between those and someone stretching the rules some - but in the previous jams case, there were games that had been posted about months before on the forum, and cases of 'haven't been published before' rule being used, even though they had been worked on for weeks/months before. In the first few days there were a number of entries already entered in the Jam thread - infact I seem to remember 3 or 4 entries on the first 1-2 days.

So I understand it isn't easy to enforce - but its the above examples I hope don't occur again.

Yes my earlier statement was actually pretty offensive to some really smart hard working and honest dudes, sorry about that.

It still isn't a fair play field, but it's not just stencyls problem, even Ludum Dare suffers from similiar issues.

Even having themes doesn't stop it as themes can often be forced into the narrative or artwork somewhere.

But guess what, the world of games production is not a fair playing field. And most people are there because they want to be. I'm entering the stencyl jam again, with my buddy, we're starting an entirely fresh project for the event, but it's because we were about to start an entirely fresh project, if we were a few weeks in I'd feel it was within the code of honour rules, but I personally would always state the start date of my entry.

The stencyl community is pretty honest and decent, so let's just assume everyone is playing fair, because if they aren't it's tough, and therefore not worth worrying about.

I didn't come up with the rules, but I think the problem is that the rule isn't easily enforced. There's no way to know whether or not someone started working on a game before a certain date.

This is exactly the reasoning.

I know it's probably too late now, but having a theme almost completely addresses this. Unless someone just happened to have a project already going that fit the theme, AND that person was also dishonest about it, unless both of those things were true at once, no one would be able to enter a pre-existing game into the contest.

A game could be modified so it fits a theme in some way over the course of a month.

Does the game have to be made entirely in Stencyl?  I'm starting to put together a multiplayer game and that would require the use of PHP.  Would I just have to disable the multiplayer features for the Stencyl Jam?