Sonic Hacking Contest 2019

omg i'm hyperventilating. come on redhotsonic give us that trailerrrr hnnngghhh fuckkkkkk. There's A LOT of cool looking stuff this year but that takes my cake, I never would have dared to dream AE was gonna get an update. If Garnet Garden is still in there I'm gonna lose my mind, it's aesthetically one of my favorite Sonic levels period and I've always wanted it finished.

 

The Official Sonic Hacking Contest 2019 Trailer is now LIVE!

 

I'm loving the hacks/mods for this. They are really fun to play and it's a very enjoyable experience just to play all the great hacks.

 

I love the contest, but we're in the third day and practically all I seen until now was streamers playing Sonic Adventure 2 character swaps (ehr... that Sans head mod is just... MEH!) and various Sonic Mania Mods of any kinds.

 

It's really great every year, seeing the reactions from all the people who absolutely cannot stand to see anything related to one of your favorite games, things you spent months working on. Did we go a bit overboard this year? Probably. But posts like that are a great way to convince people that it's not worth even showing up at all.

Edit: this is a response to Eduardo Knuckles' post.

 

(Note: Quoted post was edited while I was writing this.)

Quite frankly, I'm not sure if I should be the one to do this, but well, here goes.
Just in case so this doesn't get misinterpreted, I think I should better clarify a few things.

• Spanner was referring to the Contest as the "For Glory" judged segment of the event; not the whole Sonic Hacking Contest. (Note: Original post was edited to clarify this as I was typing this post)

As such, the message he intended to say is more in line with the following:

• If an entry is that which consists of a singular custom model (without anything extra), we will highly encourage the author to consider moving their entry to the expo.
• Alternatively if an author submits multiple entries that consist of a singular model (w/o anything extra) to the contest section, we will suggest to the author to merge their entries as one contest section entry.
  • This makes the entry a collection of assets. The downloads/links can still point to separate mods if e.g. published on GameBanana, though we expect to host everything on-site starting next year.

This excludes tech demos, such as Justin's entries from this year. We make this clear in the contest announcement every year under the Quality Control section.
If you look at the historical announcement posts for the Sonic Hacking Contest from the past few years, you will notice that this in fact is not any different than it has been in the past.

The main problem here is that entries of just single model nature are very hard to judge, and we are not equipped to do it. If you look at it from the surface level, most of the judging team is composed of hackers, not 3D artists (maybe except Zoney). With art being a very subjective field in nature, it is very difficult for us to both appreciate and critique the quality of just a single 3D model. This poses a problem, when all we get is a single custom model without anything extra added on top to deliver a more cohesive experience, there is ultimately nothing for us to comment on.

In cases of entries of that nature, what can I do? What can the other judges do? We are not 3D artists. All I can personally say is "they are original models with a high number of polys and environment maps that look pleasing to the eye, cool", and that's much more than most others likely would. How do I compare this against other models when art in nature is so person-based and subjective? All I, and the rest of us can really yack in evaluations about is content; and when that doesn't exist, what do we really do?

I would like to make this clear, this excludes Tech Demos.

--------------
Semi-Related

I would like to mention, that while whatever gets streamed is completely at the media people's own discretion, many streams are also showing expo entries alongside their contest section counterparts. While we are aware that a lot of streamers tend to prioritise the contest entries first, particularly those who only run streams for 1-2 sessions, the coverage for all non-Contest entries is still fairly solid overall. This is especially the case among those who run streams for longer periods of time.

This post below is literal proof.

It may not be very well known, but to the best of my knowledge, I have submitted the only contest section entry in the whole history of the SHC (since we have official streamers, 2013) that was never streamed by anyone during contest week. Awake almost 24/6 over the week, seeing all the streams and doing my absolute best, nothing came out (though I helped some people with PC entry stuff). If there's anyone who knows firsthand what that feels like and wouldn't want others to experience the same it's gotta be goddamn me. Although very busy recently, I've been doing my best to ensure that wouldn't happen again.

Edit: I'm aware MainMemory's post isn't referencing Spanner's, but I'm just making sure people aren't misinterpreting anything.

------
Also a message from the Contest Staff.

Following some feedback regarding mandatory questions, the Evaluation Form was changed so that only the first three responses (overall thoughts, best thing, worst thing) are required.
Any other question, if you do not have an answer, leave it blank. We want as much feedback as possible so we can fix what is needed for SHC2020. There's still a few days left of the Contest Week, but if you have answers to fill in, do so at https://forms.gle/9jj16gLaxUY2eqbZ8

 

PSA
(Don't you love when this acronym is abused outside of its intended meaning?)

The Contest Week Ends Tomorrow! (Sunday 7th of December)

If you haven't already, please get your votes in ASAP. We have no guarantee how long voting will be available tomorrow before the results show.

 

Poll's are now closed and locked! Hope you voted