that people think the genre that they play the most is the most innovative.

if you're 10 years old and have played less than 100 games in your lifetime everything feels innovative, if you've 60 and have played virtually every game ever made rarely do you see anything new.

So if you've played a lot of a certain genre, you'll think it's more innovative, but if you haven't, you'll think it's more innovative?

(which is to say that you are trying to tell me that im in a lose lose situation because of my familiarity with one genre and lack of familiarity with another... doesn't that put you in the same position?)

i can't think of any similar mechanics in glum buster, an untitled story, or any of the other indie platformers that people have mentioned (excepting the platformers that i have not played). so as far as i can see these three are unique in fulfilling the 'innovation in platformers in the last 5 years'

Surely you see the problem here...

Have you checked out Shift, Bo, Continuity, There is Only One Level, Karoshi?

Edit: or how about Achievement Unlocked, Depict1, Shadow Physics (not out, but you can see video)?

Or how about Snapshot?  Or Canabalt?  What about Where is my heart?

And when I said 5 years, I wasn't trying to be specific, I was talking about recent platformers, so yes, I'll include Gish as well.

There is certainly value in the feedback, but it's just not the point of the competition.  Judges are still encouraged to provide it, it's just not stressed as an expectation of the entrant.  Plenty of people will still get lots of great feedback, I hope.  It was just a mistake to ever make the feedback be some sort of consolation prize.

Would Friday the 14th work for everyone?  (next friday)  Say 7:00PM at Pizza Port in Solana Beach?

So I'm not close to the festival at all and maybe it is really really hard to improve the juries in the way I suggested. But what are the actual counter-arguments? All I hear is realpolitik and the validity of it is impossible to assess from the outside (at least in the way you phrased it - you basically say that if I were closer to the festival, I'd get it). I think it's valuable to discuss what the ideal solution would be, even if it turns out to be a solution that's really hard (even nigh impossible) to implement.

Sorry if I offended, I was hesitant at first to dip my toe into what I feared would devolve into a flame war rather than a reasonable discussion.  It's clearly not that.

At any rate, the ideal?  Well I suppose the juries would be composed of well-informed people from a diverse set of professions, backgrounds, and personalities.  The juries should inspire trust in the people that care about these awards - that they actually understand what is important about the games that they are judging.  And they should all be extremely committed to doing the job well.

I agree that from an ethnic and gender perspective, the juries are not at all diverse.  My biggest problem with the new system this year is that it ended up picking predictable games... the system did little to expose diamonds in the rough.  But I also think this year is much better than previous years, mainly because the judges, for the most part, really cared about doing their jobs well.

It goes back one year earlier than you mentioned: Crayon Physics won over World of Goo

I'm pretty sure at least some of the judges take that into account.  I know some did last year, which is partly why Monaco won over SuperMeatBoy.  I'm sure there will be at least one judge this year that grades Minecraft down because of how much exposure it already has.

EDIT: I realize I'm kind of contradicting myself here, I guess what I'm saying is that I think, in your acknowledgement that there is a balance to strike here, you are absolutely right.  I think where the IGF stands along that curve changes from year to year.

The thing I actually find amazing about this year's Grand Prize finalists is how low the production values are in all of them.  It's by far the lowest we've seen since the early years of the IGF.  I mean, desktop dungeons? SpyParty? Nidhogg? Even Minecraft?  Amnesia is the only one with professional looking visuals and audio.  I do love that about this year, it clearly shows what is valued within the indie dev world.

But to your point - the IGF is definitely not about scholarship, it's about picking the best indie game of the year (not necessarily the most popular).  The press has certainly picked up on all of these games, including Nidhogg, but not the really MAINSTREAM press.  I think any of these, aside from Minecraft, could really benefit from the win.  Even though that's not what the competition is really about.

Lest I seem like I am just here to defend the IGF, my biggest criticism this year is that there is not ENOUGH randomness.  While I believe the new jury system has led to a huge improvement over previous years in the quality of the finalists, there are very few games in there that are "diamonds in the rough".  I believe some changes need to be made to the system to expose more of these, even if it's at the expense of the occassional VVVVVV (however unfair that is).

One of the things that I think is brilliantly run by Simon and Brandon is that they don't give strict guidelines for what each award means, but they encourage the jurists on that panel to discuss those guidelines and define the award themselves.  This should keep the IGF healthy by allowing it to adapt to the changes in indie game development from year to year.

As you can see from the comments excepted by Brandon in the nomination announcement (http://igf.com/2011/01/2011_independent_games_festiva_11.html) the judges had fairly deep and theoretical discussion about what each award meant - not every judge agreed but this system allowed for different perspectives.

As for diversity, I think she is still right, though the more pressing concern was getting judges who were committed to really PLAYING the games.  I do hope that this is addressed in the future.

The last part is plainly refuted by the fact that Monaco won, and now the press is really excited about Monaco.  It wasn't a big name.  It wasn't polished.  And the IGF exposed it.  If it hadn't, the game would have been released with little fanfare on XBLIG.

Although it is old, and maybe some information is not valid anymore, I think this post is still very valid:

http://www.auntiepixelante.com/?p=525

What about it is valid?  I actually think most of the points have been addressed? Not including the unfinished games part, of which I am certainly a culprit! Although a culprit that is well within his rights to enter an unfinished game and only release it when I feel it's done...

+ Writing award. There are two kinds of writing, dialogue oriented and prose oriented. ie words written to be spoken. words written to be read. sometimes they overlap. My games were written to be read. I'd have to re-write them for voice acting. Contrast Pulitzers with Writers Guild awards. Indies aren't currently making lots of voice acted games. A story award would overlap audio and graphics, as it's common to tell stories with all three! Stick to a prose award.

- Feedback. Well, it was great while it lasted, but I agree with Andy.

+ Honorable mentions! The main reason I kept submitting DHSGiT to the IGF was, it consistently got great feedback. So I could imagine that it might have 'just missed' in past years. With the honorable mentions, I know that wasn't the case.

I suspect actually, that DHSGIT is just a bit old... judges typically are looking for something fresh, and often they feel if it has been around the block that it had its chance.  This is another one that maybe deserved a nomination in years past that didn't simply because of the randomness of the system.

EDIT: Also keep in mind that the judges change from year to year, there's not necessarily any consistency in scores.

Paul: No, and I'm afraid the responsibility for making sure the game installs correctly (and easily) lies on the entrant.  I did email the authors of games in my group whose games didn't install, but you really can't expect tech support from the judges as well.  If it was user error, that's a shame.  But honestly, 40% of the game in my compulsory group didn't run on first attempt.  That's a huge pain in the ass for judges.  Only one of the games did I end up not playing because I never received the necessary equipment to play it (despite a fairly long email conversation with the creator about sending the equipment).

kk, thanks. but as mentioned earlier, it's a 30 hour long game, so the players often don't get into it in the first 20 minutes (which i think hurts its chances in contests like this). the first 20 minutes are just teaching the player to play the game and introducing them to the world and to the movement system etc., the real game doesn't begin until an hour or two in (like with aquaria). but i'd like your feedback on how to improve those 20 minutes / first impression, yes. will message you.

To be clear, it wasn't one of my compulsory games, so in addition to those 15, I looked at about 30 games between my grand prize and design selections.  I spent much more time with some of the games.  It's not that I thought SD was in any sense a bad game, just that in those categories it hadn't gotten enough endorsements for me to warrant spending additional time with it, but I wanted to check it out because I always loved Immortal Defense (so there was actually bias in your favor in this case).  I quite like the direction you are going with it, and I like the art.  I'll give you more feedback privately.

EDIT: In the case of Recettear, I hadn't played it and had been told that you really need to spend a lot of time with it to "get it".  In this case, it had gotten a lot of endorsements, so I tried to spend a lot of time with it in order to form my opinion.  I did the same with Minecraft since until my judging duties I had really only played it for about 20 minutes or so.

Edit #2: Also keep in mind that it could be a blessing in disguise.  Games that are finalists one year are rarely selected in following years (miekagure is the only one I know of).  So if the game is done next year, it might actually stand a better chance of winning an award.

It doesn't sound like there have been a lot of cries of "unfair!" this year simply because the finalists are a really well rounded, well respected lot.

As for the entry fee, the IGF operates at a loss.  The entry fee is partially there to cover those costs.  It's also there (I think) to try to keep people that don't actually think they can win from entering.  The competition is already buckling under the 400 entries (plus student entries).

It's kind of like a marathon.  You pay to enter the marathon.  The feedback is whether you won or lost.  You don't expect your entry fee to cover a trainer sitting at the finish line telling you how you should have trained differently.  That's just the nature of a competition like this one.

BUT... to have some sympathy for your point: it's quite possible that Immortal Defense deserved to be nominated in its year.  The IGF just used to be a little more random, and that's one thing they have tried to address with the juries this year.  While Saturated Dreamers wasnt part of my compulsury set of games, I did play it for a bit as part of my jury duties.  If you aren't satisfied with the feedback you got, please feel free to msg me and I'll give you my feedback (of the 20 minutes or so I played).

Feedback was not required this year, which I think is a good thing.  This is something I've been saying for years, which is contrary to the masses of complaints from a few loud entrants: it's a competition, not a forum for feedback.  You can get that a lot cheaper than 95 dollars or whatever the entry fee is.  And the amount of *volunteer* work that the judges put in is massive.  It's better that the judges spend time playing the games rather than sending feedback.  The feedback is also unfortunately just an opportunity for people that weren't selected to cry "its not fair!"

That said, I have no idea how much feedback was given on any particular game.  Judges dont have access to that.  I also don't have access to any raw data, or feedback from previous years.

For the record Paul, I liked Immortal Defense quite a bit, I bought it, and I enjoyed the odd story as well as the gameplay.  I also thought it was innovative.

To your original point Paul, it would be disappointing to me too if my game were docked because it was true to a genre that a judge didn't like.  Was it more than one judge?  Or just one?  If it's just one I don't see that it's a systemic problem.

That said, I do think it's ok to dock a game because it hews to the standards of a genre which itself is poorly designed.  For instance, I am perfectly ok with a Farmville-genre game being docked, even if it has an extra innovation or two, simply because I believe that "genre" of game is, at it's base, poorly designed.

OK, so what games would you pick?

Memory's hazy but I seem to remember this rabbit hole shifting into what the definition of writing is, as it could either mean the overarching story or the quality of the text in the boxes/spoken, also considered is proc. gen. where the player congeals a story out of what the game gives them.

I that said, a writing award would be awesome.

Well, my intention for the award would be actual crafted language.  So a game like Sleep is Death wouldn't cut it in my book.

Speaking of a possible writing award, what do you think would have been nominated had this award existed?  I'm sure my hindsight is not 20/20 in this regard, since I didn't judge the games specifically looking for writing, but from what I played, I think I would have picked A Choice of Broadsides, A House in California, and Flotilla as my standouts.