Opf user mission creating competition...

[Placebo 29]

Ok well as everyone knows their are squillions of fantastic add-ons for us to play with, but very few missions getting released these days to use them in, so we need to do something to get the activity levels back up in terms of missions being made and released, to that end I thought a mission creation competition could be a way forward.

So that's what we'll do in a few weeks, in the meantime I'd like people to suggest ideas for how it could be implemented, any guidelines we should perhaps consider? Anything you can come up with really, it's your game, your missions to create, your missions to play, so if you were the one to create a mission creating competition how would it be?

Update: 19/05/2004.

Anyone interested in being a judge for the competition please PM me (please note judges cannot submit entries to the competition).

Anyone who is able to offer hosting for the competition please PM me.

Submissions of banners will end at 9am CET Friday 11th June, I will then run a poll to choose the best one which will close 9am CET Monday 14th June at which point the competition proper will start.

[Winters 1]

I think we should give awards for the following

Single Player

Campaign

Co-Op

CTI

Deathmatch

CTF

And we can also have one category "Best Overall Mission" this way all types could be submitted and given proper respect. We can also have an "All-Time Best" award for missions that have been out a while now, this would make a means for people to nominate missions for awards and not just limit it to brand new mission entries.

[MrZig 0]

Howbout RTS by KaRRiLLioN?

[sanctuary 19]

Good idea.

Maybe a sort of competition based on imposed themes could be better for a change instead of making a V.I.P. awards-bis, as there are people more specialized in a genre than in another.

Then with this as a guide , every "competitor" should try to create the best mission he can, to suit the general theme

An example of possible themes:

The mission general subject is :

"Army A must take Town defended by Army B"

The map maker is allowed to create every side-story/event that he will judge interesting/necessary to include in the situation of the mission.

The mission general subject is :

"Sabotage/Infiltration"

The map maker is allowed to create every side-story/event that he will judge interesting/necessary to include in the situation of the mission.

etc...etc...

[Albert Schweitzer 10]

MrZig your signature picture is the best I have seen here for 2 years. You rock!

I propose only one category. And the winner earns a VIP status for 2003. But only new missions can participate. Who cares whether it is single player or multiplayer, coop of capture the flag. It must be good. And the intro shouldnt and other cutscenes shouldnt be taken into consideration. Be assured that the number of contributions will be relaitvely low. The lower the better cause it ensure that many will try them and be able to give full-scale judgement. Maybe we can even put the multiplayer mission into our "forum night" idea. one night on the CIA server we play through all missions and give feedback.

[MrZig 0]

I nominate my RTS3Way 0.5b! Bwahahaha.. Oh what's that? I can't nominate my own mission? Damn!

[Asmodeus 0]

I've seen ideas before for getting more quality missions made for OFP. I've thought of a way of helping mission makers get more beta testers and help.

So, my idea is for a system to promote mission making/beta testing by:

Getting a large group of addon makers to agree to let certain people that qualify and agree to a privacy agreement can get exclusive behind the scenes looks at new addons and missions being made by the mods. They can give feedback and directly effect the way that the addons they love are created by giving much needed "general person" point of view feedback!

The way people would qualify could be done a few ways.

People that beta test missions.  For each post of feedback they can give, the mission maker can give them a point if they think it is earned. (a spam post, for example, wouldn't get a point because it didn't help, same goes for "This mission sucked." and unhelpful things like that)

People that make quality missions can earn points (more than beta testers slightly) by vote of representatives from the mods, or by vote of beta testers or by vote of all the mission makers.

I personally think this could help! Sometimes people need initiative to seriously help others and let me tell you that beta testing and/or making a mission from the start to the end is a serious deal, time consuming and most of the time boring.

This is why there are so few finished missions out there, and why mission makers don't get the beta testing they need sometimes to make their missions good and finish it.

There would probably have to be some sort of "board" or whatever that keeps things running smoothly and settles any debates over points given and not given, etc.

If anyone needs clarification on these ideas, let me know and I'll try to elaborate.

Asmo

[Guest]

I think we should give awards for the following

Single Player

Campaign

Co-Op

CTI

Deathmatch

CTF

And we can also have one category "Best Overall Mission" this way all types could be submitted and given proper respect. We can also have an "All-Time Best" award for missions that have been out a while now, this would make a means for people to nominate missions for awards and not just limit it to brand new mission entries.

I would agree with these categories, but have Non-Addon/Addon versions in each. Perhaps something can be teed up with OFPEC to cooperate on this vis a vis mission packs to download??

[m21man 0]

Edit - Man, it feels weird to be typing such a long post.

If it's a competition, then there must be a prize. What is it?

Quote[/b] ]but have Non-Addon/Addon versions in each.

That may be completely impossible in a lot of cases. Default OFP doesn't have enough stuff to have equivalent units for every addon. What would the equivalent be for Suchey's Javelin? BAS's Tonal Isle, AH-60L, MH-6, and KLR-250? I think that people are going to have to have a lot of new addons so that mission makers can use the best addons in their missions. If people are really interested in making non-addon missions, then we could have a "Classic OFP" category where missions could only be made with standard BI addons. This would be a good way to see who is best at using more limited resources to make great missions.

Quote[/b] ]Single Player

How would you judge which SP mission was best? Maybe a category system, where you give points for different aspects of the mission's design?

Quote[/b] ]Atmosphere (1 - 10)

Cutscenes (1 - 10)

Miscellaneous (1 - 10)

Scripting (1 - 10)

Sounds (1 - 10)

Atmosphere would be judged on how the weather fit the mission, if the briefing was good and built up tension, if there were good ambient sound effects, etc. Miscellaneous would be for little details like a good overview picture, an included readme, and efficient usage of addons. The other categories are pretty self-explanatory.

Anyway, I'll definitely submit at least one SP mission.

[cozza 24]

@Placebo- Been reading Avon sig have ya.

Anyway. I'll enter with a signle play mission.

[redface 1]

IMHO the idea of a competition will not boost the production of missions

because the real problem is that when making a mission one always has to start from scratch. The real issue is to get people started. You can't really start from scenarios that other people have made because finished missions tend to get very intricate and complicated to understand how others did it.

We need a sample of mission files containing basic scenarios that you can let units do in practice (an attack, a patrol, a hostage situation, how to halt a group of AI, convincing dynamic civilian backgrounds), basic ingredients (with easy readible code and deliberately unfinished form!!) that others have stumbled across a thousand times and that are hidden in the intricacies of tutorials but that would be some much more useful in a .intro, .abel, .ardennes form ...

A competition focuses on the ultimate stage of finishing off a mission, a stage that people hardly get to because they are busy finding out very basic things.

[m21man 0]

Quote[/b] ]a stage that people hardly get to because they are busy finding out very basic things.

Then I suggest that they start learning how to do more advanced stuff before we start the competition.

Quote[/b] ]IMHO the idea of a competition will not boost the production of missions

It will almost certainly boost production if there is an actual award (Maybe a special title) that is given to the winner.

[T J 0]

Aaaaahhhh Missions

Very hard to define how a winner could be chosen, given the multiplicity of addons and islands out there, and that very fact meaning that people are unlikely to play with them if they have to download x amount of addons.

My proposal, as a test of pure skill of the mission maker, would be a NO-Addon requirement. If he/she can make a classic mission using standard units, then with addons it can only be better right? And it puts all mission makers on an equal footing with the same tools.

IMHO, a great mission works this way.

1) Its fun to play, over and over and over. To that end there should be random elements in it, and the ability for a player to predict AI movements should be limited. Random environmental factors and/or time of day adjustments.

2) it should be realistic. This is a measure of the skill of a mission maker. for example, a group of west soldiers are attacking an east position, but 200m up the road there are east units in safe mode, would be a poor reflection of reality.

Again, the mission storyline should be feasible, and not some fantasy scenario eg. Zombies attacking a town etc. OFP is a combat simulation, not an arcade game.

3) It should all 'work'. Again a test of the mission makers talent. Triggers should always fire when they should. Trying to hunt down single fleeing units to end a mission is a classic example of poor implementation.

Also, a talented mission maker will appreciate the differences in the PC speed of the user base, and scripts and things used will reflect that. The mission should be playable on the recommended specs for OFP RESISTANCE.

4) The mission should be original. Although it might be an idea to suggest a theme for each category decided on, the actual gameplay and scenario's that are acted out should display imagination and original thought on behalf of the maker. Eg, what elements did they add to an ambush style mission to make it more rewarding?

5) The breifing and gameplay should be clear, and the player should at no time be in doubt as to what he is supposed to be doing. While not making the mission too linear, it should flow properly towards its conclusion.

6) For single player missions especially, the use of cutscenes should show skill and ability with the camera. Cutscenes should be useful to the game, and maybe imparting clues as to gameplay, that are not mentioned in the breifing etc. A proper intro as well as outro for each scenario is cool.

7) use of music. This should reflect the game and add atmosphere, NOT distraction. Obviously it goes without stating that any music used should be copyright free.

Making a mission like this, takes time, and time, and time, and then some more. So if the competition is for new missions, allow plenty of time, perhaps 6 weeks, for it to be completed.

And lets make sure everybody knows about it, get the thing advertised on all the sites. There may be undiscovered talent out there just waiting to blow us away!!

TJ

[Winters 1]

We can do an Addon and Non Addon category but it wouldnt be the Non Addon equal of an addon. It can just be a basic "Best SP Mission (add-on free)" & "Best SP Mission (with add-ons)"

Any category woiuld also require submissions to make it needed. If we only get 5 SP missions submitted its kinda pointless to have 2 categories when just 1 combined one would suffice.

The competition in itself may not bring more mission makers to the table but an influx of new missions is always a good thing isnt it?

One problem i faced when i first started to make missions was in finding "plain english" tutorials that i could understand being a complete foreigner to the world of editing and scripting. Although there are many useful and helpful items these are mostly for people who already have an understanding of how the mission editor works. I think there is still a lack of "Basic Training" manuals for editing novices.

[T J 0]

In that case lets mention the UBER Editing manual from Hangfyre.

I learnt all I know starting with that.

[Winters 1]

I never heard of it, and theres another problem   Novices won't know where to look for the tools they need to start out with.

I learned from an old tute that walked you through the most basic of missions and from there i would depbo a lot of missions whenever i saw something i liked to see how they did it. Then it was a case of practice, practice & more practice. I am still learning things today.

But this is drifting OT so i will stop now.

[sanctuary 19]

I am not sure if it is the same manual as TJ talked about.

But for a beginner , the Ãœber editor tutorial is a great reading, full of help of any kind.

English is not my langage , but this big PDF file (300 pages !) is exactly what a mission editing beginner should have.

A good pedagogical approach , with pictures, and at the end , lots of those snippet from OFPEC.

It was not created in Resistance time , but most of what can be learned from it are always valid.

In the Mission Editing FAQ, i gave the URL , but a forum upgrade changed them in a weird way.

In this thread , i gave links for the download, if someone is interested.

Back on topic

I greatly prefer the "missions" contest idea instead of a simple VIP Award vote for the mission makers VIP as i already said, for this reason :

This way , there will be (i hope a lot of)  new missions certainly interesting as it is a competition , with mission makers giving their best in their contestant mission.

A VIP Award-bis vote will not provide this side effect

But, i continue to prefer my own idea for the sub-category :

If there is only 1 mission winner, it will not really be fair.

How to compare , as an exemple, a "take this town" mission with a "sabotage" mission in the interest level ?

They are not played the same way (obvious, i know ;) )  and usually someone that like "lone wolf" way of playing will always prefer the sabotage mission , the one that prefer the grunt role will usually have the take the town as a favorite, etc etc. giving some kind of bias to a possible judge.

Sub-category (no need of 50 different ones of course) inside a SP mission award should be more fair.

[Harnu 0]

If you have six mission categories, do you really want to double that because of addons?  If it's a contest, there shouldn't be too many winners, (Especially in this small community) or else the value of the award seems depreciated?

P.S. Who's making the award/sig/avatar?

[Winters 1]

P.S.  Who's making the award/sig/avatar?          

Are you volunteering?

as far as categories go, it all depends on the total number of missions that are entered.

[Harnu 0]

Sure. I was curious if there was going to be a single person doing it or many submissions like the VIP. I'd like to give it a shot either way.

[Winters 1]

Well i wouldnt mind seeing a prize given away maybe if someone wanted to donate a T-Shirt or Cap as prizes we could get more entries.

*Cough BIS *Cough* Avon Cough*

[sanctuary 19]

Better idea than those materialist ;) prizes

*cough*having the winner missions inserted in next BIS official patch*cough*

[m21man 0]

Quote[/b] ]*cough*having the winner missions inserted in next BIS official patch*cough*

Even better, let the winner be a beta tester for OFP2. You'd really see a lot of submissions if that was the prize.

[MEDICUS 0]

Hmmmmmm, a competition!  

Count me in for a Coop  

BTW:

I think it would be better, if all mission-makers would use the same addons. So it's easyer to compare the missions and you don't have the problem that one "tester" likes one mission more than another becouse he likes the used addons more. (just a suggestion)

I would prefer a pack including the MarineAssaultPack, VitAPCPack, BAS Choppers, ...  

Mfg MEDICUS

[MrZig 0]

Yes, make a list of what addons you can and CAN NOT use for your mission's eligibility.