Hello,
I was wondering whether the launches for our applications will count past the 31st, until the winners are announced or will the applications be shut down for public access after the 31st
My application should be complete on 27th-28th (before 30th for sure) and I would also like to get a chance to get some feedback (as well as launch points) from visitors and I (as well as most other people who entered this competition a little late) would greatly appreciate if the application launches would still be counted after the submission deadline.
Thank you.
Contest Deadline Question
Darin Tomack
We'll stop counting launches towards the contest criteria as of the 31st of December. However we'll continue to enable all the applications to run on the network, and for people to submit new applications. For the contest we plan to announce the winners in Febuary, with the exact date TBD (a post on that later).
With the holidays, we have had some application provisioning gotcha's. What this means is that if you submit an application between now and the end of the year, that application won't be enabled to go live until early in January. This is unfortuante for many reasons, and it looks like we have close to ten new applications in this state. Obviously, for applications that are submited before the end of the year but not provisioned, we'll have to adjust the critiera in some way so that they are not penalized because of the provisioning issue.
Todd Biggs
Product Manager, MSN
http://activity.msn.com
Marino Fourotunis
I agree... late submissions need a means of being fairly judged.
What defines a late entry and what is the new criteria
Todd, are you going to apply this new criteria to all entries, only those submitted before the 31st but not made available by then, or apply the new criteria to entries within a period of time which may include 4X4 and Pool
Also, is this a change to the rules If so, will you post the new ranking methods to www.wordsbestapp.com for everyone to see
It's amazing how smilies can correct and improve the tone of electronic communication.
BushGates
We have a hard dedline for the contest entries of December 31st.
With the other comment my intent was to let you and others know that post contest, we'll continue to enable you to launch the applications you build on the network.
I look forward to seeing your app!
Todd
Carl Mercier
So yes, It's another game.
I know many of you like TankWars, but this will be a killer game too :)
Drop the whole competition thing. Your contacts are your friends, aren't they
So why'd you want to fight them !
Instead, this new game will be cooperative play :)
They're a set of Mario-like puzzles (with much better synchronisation than rockhopper, trust me ;)) that you have to solve... TOGETHER! :P
Want the storyline
I'll give you the first mission briefing ;)
Level 1: The Webcam
---
2200 GMT Microsoft Office, Redmond
Good morning agents,
today we have a quite delicate matter to resolve. Last night someone broke into the Messenger building and stole all features of the upcoming Windows Live Messenger 8.
Leah, Ines, Nicole, Paul and Daniel (the Messenger Team) are all completely panicking and unfortunately they are all so shocked that they aren't a lot of help.
That is why your unit, Q1337, has been called in action!
All features are said to be spread among the messenger-world, and it is your task to recover them!
The first feature we have located is the Webcam feature, We don't know the exact coordinates, but we can get you close enough to find it.
Don't waste any more time, Get your team together and find it!
I'll post the msgrp2p once I've submitted it, so you can play it before it's done ;)
Oh and Todd, you and Scott will get your own level (*oh noes* someone stole the activities feature :P)
Chris Hewitt
JinGuoLi
Better synchronization eh
You'll have to post the msgp2p and explain how you did the sync.
In the past month, I've written a linear-interpolation routine that smoothes the choppiness in Rockhopper between each half-second update.
I'd love to finish the code by buffering the past several positions of the opponent and then play them back on the client in keyframes with interpolation between keyframes...
However, I don't have enough time, the Rockhopper code has become a nightmare to update (Viewsource here: Rockhopper), and I've already moved on to other projects (fixing the motorcycle).
Tankwars is FUN and very well written. I normally don't play games however, I caught myself playing Tankwars for quite some time. I'm anxious to see your next bit of work and how you did it. Do you have a website or blog with info about your code I'm setting one up for myself... I just don't have the time to do it all in one night.
I'd like to see the next Messenger update the functionality available to the Activities environment.
Either add some extra scriptable objects to the activities (to better handle network traffic, user input, sound, and graphics) or add an extra security zone to IE where signed or "MSN Activities approved" activex could be run without concern to the users' security settings. Anything to help the performance limitations of javascript and increase the flexibility of using graphics in a "web environment"
asimelahi
sathupadikesavan
I know you also have a similar game, but I didn't look at your source (yet), and you shouldn't look at mine either :P
Well, not untill after the deadline, that is :)
It's a contest, not a group-activity...
About the blog, no, not at the moment. I might do later though, but I'm going on a holiday (to Val Thorens. I have *no* idea where the heck that is, but it's supposed to be good skiing ;)) tomorrow, and am already busy enough getting the application itself done...
Billy Hui
TheBlasphemer, your tankwars game is still owning in the Games section with penguins and hangman behind. Is the app you are making right now for the Applications section or the Games section I hope it's for Games because you need to give other people a chance to win this competition too!
Vijay TS
RayJohnson
TB, I hope you make the deadline
If you don't make the deadline, you'll still be able to submit apps post-contest (post 12/31/05) and the MSN team will provision it to run on the network, subject to all the same T&C's of the contest.
As for bug fixes, we'll review all the apps for the contest at the same time sometime after midnight on the 31st. So any fixes that happen before then (whenever that is), are great.
I'm curious what you're going to have follow Tank Wars...
Todd
Paul Lambert
That'd certainly be a solution to the newly submitted apps :/
after all, the deadline was 31st, so everyone having submitted before that date should have an equal chance :/
It-Works
I'm also still working on a new application, and I'm not entirely sure if I'll make the deadline.
If I don't make the deadline, can I still submit my app to be used by others (without it being part of the contest)
And if I *do* make the deadline, are you still allowed to make bugfixes after the deadline
soccerdude1000
Thanks Todd. Just to clarify, by saying:
However we'll continue to enable all the applications to run on the network, and for people to submit new applications.
Do you mean 'submit new applications for the contest So does this imply that the 'hard' deadline is not the 31st and applications can be submitted after this date
Thanks.