skacky on 6/12/2018 at 19:05
We definitely have plans for a Thief 2 20th Anniversary contest, but we're not exactly sure how it'll be. We may throw a poll a month before the contest launches so people could tell us what they'd like to see (e.g. stock resources like this one or anything goes).
mtk on 6/12/2018 at 19:27
Quote Posted by skacky
We definitely have plans for a Thief 2 20th Anniversary contest, but we're not exactly sure how it'll be. We may throw a poll a month before the contest launches so people could tell us what they'd like to see (e.g. stock resources like this one or anything goes).
Im big fan of stock resources for anni contest. It's really fun having some limitations, and well, I can make fm with custom stuff anyday.
But I would like to be able to alter existing textures by for example changing its colour to add variety, or mixing 2 existing textures together in some way.
McTaffer on 6/12/2018 at 19:46
Quote Posted by Yandros
I realize a smaller, shorter contest would be a welcome break but we don't really get to decide when the 20th anniversary of Thief 2 is. :D
I can think of at least one idea for a contest that's been brought up before that might fit in the interim, and wouldn't likely interrupt people's workflows too much:
This could be the perfect time for the Total Crap Contest V2. I remember the possibility being discussed at least once, and the guidelines for such a contest would be loose enough not to stress anyone out too much. Building the worst pile of trash conceivable could be the perfect stress reliever after many of us have spent a lot of time trying to build the best possible mission. If there's enough interest I'd be happy to try organizing such a thing, despite my general lack of experience. I'd be surprised if no one at all was interested; after all, the original contest had 21 entries.
DrK on 6/12/2018 at 19:50
Quote Posted by mtk
But I would like to be able to alter existing textures by for example changing its colour to add variety, or mixing 2 existing textures together in some way.
That was allowed for this contest, and I think we should keep it that way : limit the custom content to stock derivatives, not only for textures but also with models this time.
This stock limit allowed for creativity and ingenuity, and that's what makes this contest so interesting.
gamophyte on 6/12/2018 at 22:14
Yeah it's mind spinning to hear of this. I could have guessed but it's too much awesome to deal with lol.
The current work I'm doing is teaching me a lot of new things. It would be good to make a small warehouse mission for T2 contest, being that, by then I should be able to make some new from the ground up bot AIs for the player to encounter. I already had one I was working on for my slow-along city mission. A very interesting civil bot that does a interesting thing to being spotted.
Synopses: Garrett has a dream where the Mechanists are in full power in a metal laden city, and there is way too much security. Poof, it was all a dream. Garrett is informed that a warehouse, highly locked down, has nearly unstoppable metal beasts created by what's left of the most militant of the last of the Mechanists. He must infiltrate with the help of victoria's associates to destroy the new bots.
Edit: Hrm this sounds like a FM I've already played haha.
PinkDot on 7/12/2018 at 23:21
How about not having a contest at all, but instead collaborating on a small campaign? We could gather a solid team and make it epic. So, whoever decides to contribute would focus on the area they feel the strongest in - be it storytelling, texture creation, modelling, level design, motions, dromeding, scripting, project coordination etc... So, it wouldn't be about having a huge amount of missions to play, but instead a short to medium campaign but with the quality pushed to the limits. This way, people most likely would not have to spend entire year 24h on it, but just dedicate most of their time at only certain stage of production, which should be easier to fit between their RL and other personal projects.
In the project like this, I would see a need for a project leader/main designer kind of a role - a person who has a vision. Actually yeah - there could be a contest - but a contest for the best idea, published on the forum (but without spoiling everything). Then, whoever wins would direct the team of volunteers. A bit like it happens in real companies, where everyone has their role. This would be to prevent a situation where everyone involved would like to push their own ideas and the project would never get past the concept design stage.
Once selected, all the work and team communication would happen through separate communication channels with occasional update in progress on this board.
I think this could be a good experience for the community, hopefully making it stronger.
Marzec on 8/12/2018 at 00:39
@PinkDot, I think your idea deserves a new thread. There already were projects like this - for sure you will find a few or more people here being interested.
I think we can set contests aside for a moment or make one, but shorter. Year-long contest gave us 24 missions. That's good, because it's a lot, yes. On the other hand, there were less releases during that one year period.
I generally like ideas to create things on collaborative basis. While PinkDot's idea sounds to me like a well known idea of team-made campaign (or mission), I would suggest to try something more independent than team-leader managed projects derived from big companies. There is nothing bad about it, but if you want a larger group of people to participate, you will face organizational problems, figuring out everybody has a real life, plus some of them already have a job and they are not interested in a job-fashioned activities. You will need to design a flexible style of organization or you will end up with a group of a few people. Maybe the solution is simple and you just divide the project in parts and everyone is doing their own part simultaneously. While one can easily achieve it with level building itself, still I think such initiative will require a full-time effort or really strong organizational rules when it comes to combine everything with a story, place objectives or other aspects of general gameplay.
What I am trying to say is, if we decide to do something different than a classic contest, we should decide on something more decentralized and less flow-based. I don't know yet what it should be. I have a few ideas. Everybody, feel free to brainstorm.
How about this one: A megaproject of a city-themed megamission, which might sound as a nightmare to a city theme haters but has a potential to be an epic product of collaborative dromeding between independent taffers.
Rule: Everyone publish your own town house made in DromEd 2 with stock resources and derivs only.
Optional: you can create the interior of the building, too.
Bonus: you can make other buildings like museum, hotel, police station etc.
Bonus: you are not limited to submitting one building only.
Important: ROLES. We need at least two people with following roles:
City Planner: A guy designing the city map and selling land to interested taffers, so that they can build their dromed architecture there.
City Builder: A guy loading multibrushes submitted by participants and joining them together in one city, according to rules set by a city planner. The city builder should be allowed to glue everything with city walls, street vertical design, decorations and other details making it possible to receive something that resembles a city in a final product.
If you ask me, you can either join these two roles into one person or split the roles to quarters if we want a larger city.
Mission itself objectives: Loot objectives only
bbb on 8/12/2018 at 01:27
As I think back in time, we were given a lot of fun missions because of contests in the past. I believe the TDP 20th anniversary has given the best, but that is my bias.
Any contest is a good idea in my opinion. As an aside, I committed to the 20th anniversary contest and failed miserably to hit the deadline. Creating confines in size, time, type, etc. just makes it easier to get authors focused. I would be happy with a one year, stock resources contest. It would result in a good number of missions and also would create missions that are not huge and can be maybe completed in one sitting. That to me is a lot of fun.
Renault on 8/12/2018 at 06:41
The problem with working on a campaign for the T2 20th instead of a contest is, you're excluding all the beginner to intermediate dromeders who want to participate. Any campaign should be of the highest quality, and likely only the seasoned community veterans around here would be able to do it justice.
Of course, there's no reason we can't do both (a campaign and a contest). Any group project like a campaign would require a strong leader, whereas a contest kind of runs itself and people are free to do what they want at their own pace.
mtk on 8/12/2018 at 07:54
Very good point, Brethren. Ttlg should keep in heart encouraging new people to make maps for thief, and there's been plenty of newbies during this contest (includin me :c) which is awesome. And refreshing.
Collaboration campaign sure sounds nice, but it's a much more complex endeavour.