Summer DsDoZ 2004 Judging Sheets:barbarian
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2004 summer DoZ judge - barbarian
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cateogories:
gameplay 75/400
graphics 60/400
innovation 45/400
plot 40/400
music/sound 35/400
theme 30/400
discretion 15/400
weight ranking 100/400
...games appear in order of which got most points...
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team 97909
avarite
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gameplay 65/75
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neato little puzzler. the 3 character thing was a great idea, i thought. there was one bug which i kept running into involving a character switch when different boards were involved. other than that, the system was pretty flawless. it was a little hard to play at times over the tiny size of the players, but that can hardly be helped.
graphics 40/60
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the game relied heavilly on its snazzy 3-player engine but also featured well decorated backrounds. the intro sequence and the ending was good enough too, but the graphics weren't amazing enough to merit more than 75%.
innovation 45/45
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full marks.
plot 30/40
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the plot worked, i guess. the people involved remained in character and the introduction was enough to let you know what was going on.
music/sound 20/35
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i liked the music. :D some sounds for the various abilities of the players would've rocked.
theme 20/30
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good enough association, i guess.
discretion 7/15
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the players remained in character throughout the game, as i've mentioned, so points awarded for that. but it was a little hard. i had to use the "stick to the edge of the board trick" to beat the game... maybe i'm just dumb.
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rank weighting 100/100
comment: very impressive piece. i'd love to see this engine used in a game with multiple missions or campaigns. this one was the clear winner for me because it was a complete, rounded game... it had music on each board, a well introduced plot, ending scene and of course an excellent engine featuring well decorated boards. the only way i think it could've been improved would be more striking and clear player graphics, some more sound included, and more missions. nice work!
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total: 327/400
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team 68874
mines of madness
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gameplay 70/75
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almost a totally bug-free game. i got stuck a few times in a room with a fissure and the choice of going north or south. the idea was excellent and it worked well. the only trouble i had with it was that i couldn't mentally picture a map of the place... that's the trouble i have with all text games though. so i just ended up going round in circles for 1 hour. i've deducted marks for a slightly limited parser, and for the slowness of typing "n ENTER" to go north as opposed to a simple UP key which works in most text games.
graphics 10/60
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good title screen. new font. but not really a graphical sort've game. but since graphics apply to all the games i've judged, this one get's 10 points. nice text descriptions of rooms, though. it would've been nice to reward the player with some graphics at the end of the game or perhaps when you found the crown. =(
innovation 45/45
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text adventure in MZX is pretty innovative. :D
plot 40/40
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full marks again. the plot was suitable and was the sort of thing i'd personally link in with text adventure games. the whole thing just seemed so genuine, i liked that.
music/sound 10/35
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1 mod. the nature of this game limited the music, but it could've benefited from SAM files acknowledging a new addition to your inventory amongst other things.
theme 30/30
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fine.
discretion 15/15
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the narrator's tone in this game was perfect. i enjoyed it because it was a serious text adventure, no retardedness whatsoever. full marks on discretion.
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rank weighting 87.5/100
comment: very impressive piece. however, the only real reason i was able to finish it was raw determination to have completed every DoZ game i've judged. in fairness, i definately would've dropped it after 5-10 minutes otherwise. it comes in second because although the idea of a text adventure is old, a MZX text adventure is something really new, which is what DoZ's are all about in my opinion. great work.
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total: 307/400
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team 81901
the fate of the grunges
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gameplay 60/75
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i really enjoyed this game. the shooting system rocked. i loved the run, reload and strafe abilities, but this game was way too easy health-wise.
graphics 30/60
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cartoony. :D loved the animated player, enemies, bosses. but the levels were decorated pretty modestly, nothing special about the bullets, and the walls and stuff came across as pretty blocktacular.
innovation 25/45
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nice improvements on the standard MZX shooting engine... but in the end, it was just a shooter. 1 weapon, and a bunch of flashy enough enemies.
plot 30/40
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creative enough plot.
music/sound 30/35
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good sound. fitting music and gun SAMs. no reload SAM, though. and the final boss music... jeez.
theme 30/30
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fine.
discretion 0/15
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the ending and the final boss drop it 15.
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rank weighting 75/100
comment: fun game. the most mindlessly fun of the top three. if the team had have had produced more levels and stuff, maybe then it'd rise up. but a one weapon shooter can't really compete with the likes of avarite and mines of madness. nice game though, i had fun playing it.
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total: 280/400
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team 73824
zombieness
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gameplay 40/75
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a shameless bomb 'em up. that's a new cateogory that i just invented there. i was a bit thrown by the mining system at first, and i got to like it after i got used to it. i loved stacking up and then using a super mine detonation. :D
it loses serious points here for the enemies... all 3 types of them, including the final boss. varying colours, chars and types of attack would've provided more variety and a much better challenge in this judge's opinion.
graphics 20/60
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20 for the colour scheme and the editted char set. game over screens and title screens not too impressive.
innovation 20/45
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the mine engine was nice enough. this game could've scored big with a few extra features attached to the basic engine... like more types of mines... trip mines or something would've rocked.
plot 20/40
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save france. love it. :D
music/sound 35/35
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full marks. perfect sound on every board, and a nice mine .SAM.
theme 30/30
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30 for a strong association. you use mines to fight your enemy. it works.
discretion 5/15
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"YOU ARE HURT YOUR HEALTH IS NOW..." funny the first time, but extremely unhelpful.
the ending and final boss cost it points too.
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rank weighting 62.5/100
comment: i had fun playing through the first level. but i was disappointed that all there was to the game was bombing mindless zombies. the end boss wasn't very challenging either, and it didn't take very long to complete.
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total: 232/400
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team 18349
trashman dan
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gameplay 35/75
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hmm. i had to play this in the editor, so i'm only awarding 35 points. the bugtastic but also cool RPG battle combined with the rocking chase scene get's it the points. but the team could've doubled this and earned about 60 or 70 points with more testing.
graphics 45/60
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this was one of the best graphically. a neat, fully animated 4x4 char engine. a nice enough title screen and neat 3d-ish looking levels.
innovation 30/45
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great chase scene engine and a good enough RPG engine. a flawless RPG engine would've got this game full points for innovation, but there were a few major bugs that cropped up often enough when playing. the player char engine was decent too.
not innovative to release a game that you could play through properly though.
plot 25/40
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the fate machine. i would've loved to see this develop but the team didn't take it very far, so, only 25 for plot.
music/sound 15/35
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no sound during the street scenes or the RPG battle. suitable chase scene music and intro music though.
theme 30/30
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a machine controls the fate of men. nice. :D
discretion 0/15
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unfinished and buggy. the team would've done a lot better to spend more time testing.
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rank weighting 50/100
comment: irritating. it was shaping out to be decent, then it goes all buggy-wuggy. the RPG engine kept stopping and not letting me attack. anyway, if you were l33t enough to get through that, i couldn't seem to be able to board the bike thing and make it to the chase scene, you got the brilliant ending. =(
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total: 230/400
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team 84919
omfg gold!
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gameplay 20/75
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this classes as an adventure game, obviously, but there wasn't nearly enough elements and variables involved to make it enjoyable. the sort've "touch robots in the right sequence" as opposed to any actual adventure game system (e.g. decent inventory system) was a huge problem.
also, the "press space" text system irritated me. you had to press space to continue a conversation and there was no fade out or flashing cursor to distinguish between dialogue between characters and the narrator's description of items. so, i ended up pressing space a bunch of times when i touched gold or dynamite and so on. then i got used to not pressing the spacebar only to get stuck in a conversation... bah, you get the picture.
i got stuck on the 2nd board, too, so it was into the editor again.
graphics 20/60
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some mine detail, and 4 char characters, and a demented game over screen. again, nothing brilliant. the single character items were hard to see and didn't really stand out in the board. there wasn't a huge amount of effort put into graphics barring the title screen and game over screen.
innovation 10/45
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nothing new. nothing really functional either.
plot 10/40
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not a great plot at all, especially for an adventure game... they tend to rely on good story-lines.
music/sound 10/35
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wind of warmth. suitable, but not enough to get more than 10 points.
theme 30/30
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theme is mines. you are a miner in a mine. strong enough association i guess.
discretion 5/15
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the dialogue. jeez. i laughed at the bad language the first time, but it was seriously totally unnecessary. also, the "omfg you won" board wasn't very impressive. drop 10 points.
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rank weighting 37.5/100
comment: hardly groundbreaking stuff.
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total: 142/400
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team 76796
troggdar returns
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gameplay 20/75
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hmm. not a huge amount to do. the gambling sequences were poor because of the zero risk factor. they also sucked because you only had to play them for 2 seconds anyway to get 5 coins for a map. i beat this game in under 2 minutes. that's rarely a good thing. at least it played through properly.
graphics 15/60
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default MZX character. but you used a few movie sequences. nothing all that good though.
innovation 15/45
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RPG engine and gambling engines.
plot 5/40
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troggdar returns... why?
music/sound 20/35
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popcorn! ... and eh, CV_BALON... O_o music was present everywhere, and pretty suitable for each board, so 20 points awarded.
theme 15/30
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troggdar returns and it's your fate to fight him. whatever. :P
discretion 0/15
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"this game is starting to suck!"
this was one of those "definately a DoZ game" games. next time, don't stick in some random guy telling you what's going on... try to develop the plot a little better than that. again, why troggdar? why not barbarian? he's cool.
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rank weighting 25/100
comment: didn't come across as a very serious entry.
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total: 115/400
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team 89471
mines
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gameplay 10/75
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standard MZX shooter action. trouble was, there was like 4 enemies and a boss. apparently the DoZer didn't have enough time to add in any more enemies or boards... in 4 boards with 1 set path, there wasn't very much gameplay at all. plus, i couldn't shoot at the boss on the third board.
graphics 6/60
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2 char player animation. the player was pretty freaky looking. also, i couldn't clearly identify just about anything else in the short little game because the graphics were pretty poor. no real colour scheme either.
innovation 5/45
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not much here. 5 points for the 2 char player engine, although even that's pretty standard.
plot 15/40
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kill the oil company eh? that works. although, i prefer games with some sort of plot/character development as opposed to the old fashioned "grey box explaining everything after title-screen" approach.
music/sound 10/35
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1 .s3m. Simple enough stuff.
theme 10/30
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i don't really get it. miners vs. people in charge. i don't see where this freaky looking alien guy on some random facility in space and a bunch of white bullet shooting objects come into it.
discretion 0/15
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blatant 1 line plot jammed in loses the team points here. plus, it seemed like 2 minutes work was put in. hardly "discreet". :P
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rank weighting 12.5/100
comment: some inspiration and a little bit of effort, and this could've been good. this played like a "drop but submit anyway" entry.
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total: 68/400
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team 72102
mine explorer
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gameplay 5/75
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a low five. default MZX monsters combined with no actual challenge.
graphics 2/60
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2 points for some char set changes. also, i laughed for a long time at the "game over" screen.
innovation 0/45
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zero.
plot 0/40
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no plot.
music/sound 1/35
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again, the game over music on the game over screen made me laugh. 1 point awarded.
theme 1/30
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the word "mine" appeared in the first board and the title screen.
discretion 0/15
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zero.
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rank weighting 0/100
comment: Another DoZ, another joke entry. It was a little bit funny, I must say. And I hasten to add that joke entries like this aren't a bad thing. One joke entry per DoZ means that the worst genuine entry doesn't have the shame of coming in last. ;D
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total: 9/400
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