I've heard a couple of folks on this group say they are planning to enter the Hippodice game design competition. Have any of you found an English-language description of this year's contest rules, deadlines, regulations, etc? All I can find with Google seem to the results of previous competitions. I found the Hippodice club's site at one point, but it was all in German. I can translate it with one of the web translators (if I can find it again), but am wondering if someone on this group has already done that and could magnanamously make a translation available to the rest of us!
To those who will enter, a few questions: have you entered in the past? How did it go?
I'm considering entering one of my games, possibly even the one I'm currently workshopping, but none have seen nearly enough playtesting to be fully balanced yet. I'm wondering how far along game submissions typically are, and whether I should go ahead with a "lightly tested" game or whether I should wait a year until I've tested it 10 or 15 times.
Does anyone know anything about the kind of games that do well? I've heard that "short" games (~ 1 hr or so) that are playable for either 2 or 4-5 players are most appropriate. It also sounds like even if you don't win or place, they'll send you some detailed feedback, which could be very useful. Do they send that to everyone, or just the people whose games they actually test?
Anyway, those who have participated, do tell us more about the contest! And tell us whatever you know about the competition as well -- is it fierce? It seems like some great games have won in the past, so I imagine there aren't a whole lot of clunkers being submitted. But it's also hard to picture 200 great games being designed every year, yet maybe it's possible...
Thanks for any info you can provide!
-Jeff
