An unnamed friend and I decided to have a contest with one another to see who could create the best games in a 7 day time period. We are currently three days into the contest (It was broken up into two three day programming periods with one day to implement art) with the second set of three days commencing tomorrow. I plan on using all of the concepts I’ve blogged about so far. Hiring Artists, Making a Great Game, Doing Self Sponsorships, Submitting to the Top Portals, etc…

Goals for the Contest:

1. Find out how much you are capable of developing in a 7 day timespan
2. Find out the true potential for self sponsorship (CTR, Bounce Rate, Best way to attract users, etc..)
3. Test the effect of small games vs. large games
4. To not slack off

Rules of the Contest:

1. You may only program during the days of the contest.
2. After the 6th day of the contest you will have one week to hire artists, and collect the art.
3. You will have one day a week after the last programming day to implement art you’ve acquired.
4. All the games are to be self sponsored.
5. Sources of revenue include Ads, Non-exclusives, and contests.
6. Each walk through and high score click is worth $.01
7. All other clicks are worth $.03
8. Clicks from China are not counted.
9. $500 bonus for getting approved on unnamed site.
10. All art costs are counted 1/2 against your earnings.

After the first three days I have managed to develop 5 games and start on a 6th one.

The Games

1. Jumper
2. Shooter
3. Avoider
4. Dodger
5. DropBlock

No, I have not actually named any of the games yet. I’ve just given them temporary titles based on the concept, titles will be decided on the last day. The last three games are fairly similar to one another, but should have a very different feel once the art is implemented.

Jumper

Game Size: Large
Game Type: Distance
Game Objective: Get to altitude X in the least amount of days possible
Game Features: Upgrades, Pickups, Special Mode, Enemies, Achievements
Game Length: 30 – 60 minutes
Total Dev Time: 6 hours 45 minutes
Art Costs: $430

Shooter

Game Size: Large
Game Type: Shooting
Game Objective: Complete all 25 waves with the least amount of deaths possible
Game Features: 25 Waves, 20 Unique Enemies, Achievements, Upgrades
Game Length: 30 – 60 minutes
Total Dev Time: 5 hours 45 minutes
Art Costs: $180 (probable)

Avoider

Game Size: Small
Game Type: Survival
Game Objective: Don’t get hit by any blocks and collect the coins
Game Features: None
Game Length: 1 – 2 minutes
Total Dev Time: 1 hour
Art Costs: Searching for artist

Dodger

Game Size: Small
Game Type: Survival
Game Objective: Avoid the meteors and space debris
Game Features: None
Game Length: 1 – 2 minutes
Total Dev Time: 1 hour 20 minutes
Art Costs: Searching for artist

DropBlock

Game Size: Small
Game Type: Survival
Game Objective: Avoid falling blocks as they pile up
Game Features: None
Game Length: 1 – 2 minutes
Total Dev Time: 1 hour
Art Costs: Searching for artist

As you can see so far I’ve managed to develop 2 large games and three small games. On the fourth day (Today) I intend on polishing the two larger games by fixing any bugs, and adding more effects. The following two days will be dedicated to creating more small and medium games. Art costs for all the games combined is expected to be somewhere between $1000 and $2000 which means I will be starting the contest at a $500 to $1000 disadvantage.

As for the person I’m competing with, I’ll let him decide if he wants to posts the statistics and analyses on his games. He has focused more on small and medium sized games so we will be able to see how they compare to my approach with some larger games.

I think I’m going to end up hiring 5 or more highly skilled artists in the next week. I’m hoping that they will all be able to stick to this very short deadline I have put in place. These games will not fair well without some kind of aesthetics to enhance the game play experience.

We’ll see how the games perform when they’re released a little under two weeks from now. I will be updating you all with more blog posts on their progress and revenue. Once these games are released the posts involving this contest will become more statistical and attempt to draw conclusions about self sponsoring and development times. Hopefully they will be very interesting reads for all of you! I’m very interested in seeing the results of this contest myself.

Stay tuned!