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This is something I've wanted to run for a while and I think now is a great time to try it out. I know this was run in the past by @tatte and @Chanku, one of which I participated in, so I'm kinda following in their footsteps.

Edit: The competition has been cancelled, but there is an open programming event with the allowance of game engines, including zero-code options. See the linked post for more info.

This is a programming challenge where you will design and program a game of your choosing around a theme of our participants choice. The process will follow the following timeline:

• 8th Feb - 21st Feb is the announcement thread. This is the time for you to consider whether you'd like to join, and if you do want to, to start deciding on your game and designing it. Be sure to leave room for the theme!
• 22nd Feb - 28th Feb are signups with theme nominations. You'll need to know which time frame you wish to take during signup.
• 1st Mar - 7th Mar is the theme voting period, open for participants to choose their favourite theme.
• 7th Mar - 31st Mar is Time to Design, where you will put pen to paper and design the game you will build. You'll need to know your main programming language and how your game is to be run by the end of the design period.
• April, May and June are the coding months, labelled Foundation, Alpha and Beta accordingly, where coding will happen.
• Saturday July 1st is Gold Release day where the games are showcased back to the community.
• 3rd - 9th July is the game voting period, open for everyone (even non-participants) to choose their favourites which are then crowned at voting close.
• Games can then all be used during this years Summersend celebrations, so be sure to think of that when picking theme ideas! You can use the time between competition close and Summersend to polish things off ready for the fun, so don't worry too much if you run out of time near the end.

Go Go Time Crunch Version

Inspired by @Chanku, there is also the option of doing a Time Crunch version. This version has a slightly different timeframe:

• 8th Feb - 31st Mar work the same as above.
• April is the one and only coding month, labelled Go Go Code, where coding will happen.
• Monday 1st May is Go Go Gold Release day where your game is showcased back to the community.
• If there is more than one game in this version, a special voting period will be held between 3rd - 9th May for the best Time Crunch game. Otherwise, voting on your game will take place on 3rd - 9th July as per normal.
• You may continue to work on your game, though this is for polishing for Summersend and only the game released during the release day will be considered during any voting.

Rules

The rules are as follows:

• No coding before April when the coding month(s) begin(s).
• There will be three available themes you can utilise, the top three chosen during voting, of which you can nominate two during sign up. You must include one of these themes in your game, and may include any of the other two as you desire.
• The theme you include as your primary theme must be part of a substantial part of the game, such as overall lore, a core NPC or location, or one of the games classes or other player categorization. Secondary themes can be included at your discretion and can take up minor parts of the game.
• Your game must be runnable either over the web, or cross platform on desktop, or as a Discord bot (integration into Zaphyr optionally available, ask Wuufu if you want to take this route).
• You may use any programming language you desire (Zaphyr is in Python and uses the discord.py library).
• All games must include a scoring system and must provide a way of a player capturing their score with a screenshot or picture export. Discord bot games are assumed to be screenshotable providing the high score is shown in a public chat channel on request. High score table optional. (The scoring system is for use in Summersend competitions)
• You must release the open source code alongside the game at the end of the challenge, but the code doesn't need to be open sourced during it. You may hold back any code deemed sensitive, or any assets deemed not freely available. The code does not need to be runnable, you will be judged on the game itself.
• At the beginning of Alpha (1st May) and Beta (1st June) months, if you are on the normal time frame, you may also release an alpha and beta version of your project to gain feedback and hype, though this is entirely up to you.
• Voting will only happen if at least two final submissions are made.
• Wuufu has final say on all rules.

Design Guidelines

As soon as you decide to join you should start designing your game, though there is also dedicated time for this as well. You are advised to keep the game simple and straightforward, with a clear focus on achievable gameplay.

The idea of the design time is to ensure that the game you end up producing is not too overbearing in terms of coding time, to ensure things are kept simple, and to design any game elements in keeping with the lore and theme(s) that you are planning to incorporate. Things that you can do during this time include:

• Prepare the main concepts of your game, what type of game you are making and how the scoring system works into it
• Choose which features you will be including in your game, and which of these are must haves or wants, so you can prioritise
• Choose on programming language, graphics, sound and/or music, database structure, file storage, and saving system
• Draw out screen designs or UI elements, and decide how your program will flow together
• Put together the game's lore and how the theme(s) integrate into your game
• Gather assets and libraries your game will need

In terms of types of games, a few ideas include arcade games, card games (including CCGs), text adventure games, or idle games. You could also check out past games done in the previous programming competition, or get inspiration from card/board games you like or other video games or fandoms for your project. Procedural generation can be used to offload manually creating environments, where that is helpful to do so.

FAQ

Why is the normal mode three months?
During the previous programming competitions, a lot of people struggled to complete something in the one month period. The three month coding time is aimed to provide a good amount of time for casual coders to participate, and build something nice.

What's with the design period?
The dedicated design time allows participants to prepare in advance, and have time to think through a strategy that works for them in the time constraints, before the competition starts. This is especially important for those taking the time crunch mode.

Signups

Signups are not open just yet, but feel free to discuss below whether you are looking to join, post ideas, and ask questions.

This is exciting! I'm looking forward to it, and plan to make every effort to be part of it.

Looks neat! Depending on how I'm doing I might try to do something.

I think that theme may inform design may inform tech stack - feels weird committing to something like the programming language early on. When I've worked on game dev projects before that normally comes after a general idea already exists.

Looks neat! Depending on how I'm doing I might try to do something.

I think that theme may inform design may inform tech stack - feels weird committing to something like the programming language early on. When I've worked on game dev projects before that normally comes after a general idea already exists.

Agreed. I've swapped that around so signups will no longer require you to know the programming language or how it is going to run. You can figure that out during the design period, and you should know that before you start programming.

Dropping in to announce my interest/intention to participate, hoping it motivates others that are interested to speak up too. This is certainly enough time to learn to create, so it's a fantastic opportunity for anyone interested to get into coding.

Since there's still so much time, perhaps someone might consider whipping up a crash course on the easiest route to whip up a relevant program? Me and my brother had tons of fun with really basic Basic ages ago, who knows what the smallest spark could help people to create today?

Since there's still so much time, perhaps someone might consider whipping up a crash course on the easiest route to whip up a relevant program? Me and my brother had tons of fun with really basic Basic ages ago, who knows what the smallest spark could help people to create today?

It's a good idea. What kind of crash course were you thinking? I know there are quite a few online sites out there to help you learn how to code but I am thinking you are meaning something a little more tailored.

Oh, and signups open tomorrow!

Hey everyone! Given the current upheaval and change ongoing in Wintreath right now, I have decided to cancel this competition at this time. It makes sense for people to focus on the future of Wintreath, and on smaller cultural objectives, until we achieve stability.

Given this, it does open a new opportunity. I myself intend to try and put something together by the original deadline of the 1st July, and if anyone wishes to join me at anytime between now and then, then there are four available themes in the signup thread for you to pull from.

It also means we can work outside the competition's constraints, such as the allowance of the use of game engines (here's a great YouTube video on that, and there are a few zero-code game engines you can use) and perhaps even doing joint projects with others. Feel free to ask questions about your project and gain coding help as you build something awesome. And in future, I hope to set up a coding club for fellow programmers to congregate, solve programming challenges, and help each other out.