Students Compete at Video Game Creation

zalas writes "Stanford's computer graphics class holds a video game writing competition each year at the end of the term, and this year's results are finally online. You can download all the finalist entries from the website. The winning entries featured very original game concepts, such as sending a spiked soccer ball through wormhole planets or infesting a growing maze of cheese with mold. Judges at the competition included representatives from Electronic Arts, Microsoft and the creator of Pong, Allan Alcorn. Ironically enough, the winners of the wacky category who received a voucher for an XBOX360 wrote a game that only worked on OSX laptops with the drop-protection motion sensors."

irony?

[Anonymous Coward]

maybe they should check their definition of irony
i use only OSX, and the Xbox360 is at the top of my wish list.

Oh, the shotgun approach to game design!

[eldavojohn]

Fire a rifle at a target, you might hit the bullseye. Fire buck shot at a target, you can't miss the bullseye.

Make 1 game and maybe it's a hit. Make 50 games, there's bound to be a hit.

Re:irony?

[mcb]

I would guess that the irony stems from a Microsoft rep being one of the judges, and voting for an OSX app.

Re:Experimental Gameplay Project

[AviLazar]

If they truly care about and enjoy programming then they should already know everything that is going to be taught for the rest of their enrollment. They should have known most of it before enrolling. If not, then they shouldn't be taking CS.

Without trying to be offensive, that is a completely obtuse statement. To expect someone who enjoys something to know about it, and to know most of it, before enrolling? Then really there is no point to school if you are going in knowing all of the information. You have no basis to say they do not truly care about what they are in school for, nor do you have a basis to say what their previous background was, and frankly their work is nice for 2nd year students. When I was a 2nd year student we weren't this sort of stuff, makes me wish I went to Stanford.

Re:Waste of time

[panthro]

I could never motivate myself to make a product which wastes time for everyone.

You begin by speaking for yourself. Why didn't you stay on this track?

Real innovation comes from making productive programs which not only save time, but make money.

Real innovation can come from all manner of sources, however unlikely your prejudices make them seem. This sounds like a fuddy-duddy "rap isn't real music" argument.

I hope these kids [...] I recommend these kids [...] I don't really understand kids [...] I know most of the kids [...] KIDS!

I would have gotten away with it, if it weren't for those meddling kids!

You are not as smart as the Quake engine author, you can't do it by yourself. Quit the overzealous cocky attitude!

Now why would you say something like that? Any one of these "kids" could very well be as smart as the Quake engine author [wikipedia.org]. Don't go around pushing your can't-do attitude on potentially bright young programmers. Would you say the same thing if they had an ambitious plan to make, say, a really good electronics simulator?

Games are just throw away work afterall.

Despite all your whining, the video game industry is a $11 billion industry in the United States alone, and keep in mind that video games are similarly huge in Japan, Canada and the UK. And the aforementioned Quake engine author appeared number 10 in TIME's 50 most influential people in technology. Not bad for throw away work.