who needs judges?

Contests 4K Game Competition - 2006
#1

well, you know, I guess it’s that time of year when I desperately ask “who will judge the 4K games?” But this year is going to be different. Why should we rely on 3 judges and hope their’s no serious bias? I think 3 is just not enough people. So I decided this year there will be a public vote! No more judges! I’m planning (still coding) these 2 voting systems:

  1. have people rate any game (even from 4K 2005) on undecided categories from 1 (being poor) to 5 (being best). that way authors can see anything they might want to tweak in their game. I’m trying to get this system up before the contest ends.

  2. at the end of the contest, Februrary 28th, I’m going to open up a poll for 72 hours. This poll will simply ask you to list your top 3 favorite games. The first favorite will get +3 points, the second will get +2 points, and the third +1 point. at the end of the poll, on March 4th, I’ll display results! Obviously the game with the most points (the game that was people’s top 3 list the most) wins.

Of course, there always is that issue of cheating… like, how am I supposed to know if someone’s voting twice? There’s no way I can check if someone’s changing their IP to vote again, and there’s no point and setting a cookie saying that person has voted. Obviously the best way to do it is using a user-based system. However, one of the original ideas of Java Unlimited was “not to be another site you have to register to.” So, I kinda was talking to ChrisM about things and he was unsure if I could pull this off, but I have :slight_smile: I have managed to have Java Unlimited synch with JGO’s roster :D. So, if you’re a JGO member, you can vote on the games! No registration needed.

For those who are worried about what I mean when I say “synch,” I don’t mean the JGO roster is on my database. All of the user info (password, email, etc) is on JGO only, but Java Unlimited is able to validate if you’re a JGO member by having you login to JGO FROM Java Unlimited. No registering needed :). I’ve run this by ChrisM, he didn’t seem to have objections to this, but he hasn’t given me the final word yet. I’m sure he won’t mind as long as I prove all I’m doing is checking if your JGO login is correct - not storing anything. For those who are still curious, I can show you the PHP script I wrote to check the JGO login.

So, feedback please! :slight_smile:

#2

Woogley, you read my mind. :slight_smile:

What I think the process showed last year was that we tried to get too clever with the scoring system. It was based on a system that one person had adjusted to meet how he wanted to score a given year’s games, and just didn’t extrude very well into a real world system. In addition, the judges also had a hard time spending enough time with a game to evaluate less concrete features such as addictiveness.

As a bonus, JavaUnlimited would finally be able to show the rankings of the games so that Slashdotters don’t wonder who actually won. :wink:

[quote]For those who are worried about what I mean when I say “synch,” I don’t mean the JGO roster is on my database. All of the user info (password, email, etc) is on JGO only, but Java Unlimited is able to validate if you’re a JGO member by having you login to JGO FROM Java Unlimited.
[/quote]
IMHO, this is the best way to do it. This way you won’t run into delays between new users registering and JU syncing up its database. Strictly speaking, there’s likely to be some security issues (e.g. JU shouldn’t handle the password. Ever.), but I don’t consider my JGO account to be a high security account. Plus, I trust you. As long as both sides can be trusted, the security is good enough. :slight_smile:

#3

The only problem I see is that most people won’t try out all the games, which might exclude some games from having a fair chance.

In reality I think that the result list will be roughly equal to the download statistics, as the most downloaded games and the first listed games are the ones new visitors try out first and are most likely to rate. I bet that if you have two versions of the same game, were one is called Ypsilon and the other one is called AAArgh, the latter one will be the most downloaded. With that said, the download statistics probably reflects the quality to some degree, which means that it’s not necessarily such a bad thing. The clear advantage is of course that many people get to vote (everyone that wants to).

#4

Java Unlimited only handles the password as one GETVAR variable through the form, it is never passed to the database. check this out:


function jgo_check($user,$pass) {
	$errno = 0;
	$errstr = "";
	$sock = @fsockopen("www.java-gaming.org",80,$errno,$errstr,30);
	$u = urlencode($user);
	$p = urlencode($pass);
	$post = "user={$u}&passwrd={$p}&cookielength=-1";
	$s = "POST /forums/index.php?action=login2 HTTP/1.0\r\n" .
	     "From: webmaster@javaunlimited.net\r\n" .
	     "User-Agent: JavaUnlimited/1.0\r\n" .
	     "Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded\r\n" .
	     "Content-Length: ".strlen($post)."\r\n\r\n" .
	     "{$post}";
	@fwrite($sock,$s);
	$result = @fgets($sock);
	@fclose($sock);
	return (strstr($result,"HTTP/1.1 302 Found") != FALSE);
}

I think this voting system will work much better than previous years, Donald, because on the poll you’ll be encouraged to try all the games first. Also, I don’t understand your example Donald? Are you saying people only try games that are alphabetically first? Because according to my statistics most people also sort by author and by download, and most importantly … date. :wink: Perhaps on the Java Unlimited front page I should list the newest 4 or 5 that have been added…

edit: Donald, just look at the download count on my sad little game, Warpstar4K, it got plenty of downloads even though its alphabetically one of the last on the list. Not to mention Xero by jbanes …

edit 2: don’t forget everyone, people are more likely to play your game if you post a (working) screenshot … :wink:

#5

Great work I agree that the more judges, the better!

I think that is a bit the point that Donald is getting at. Nice screenshot => more viewers => higher score (but not necesarily better game).
However if just an average of the 1-5 ratings are used then it should be quite fair as long as each game gets at least a few ratings.
A comments section would be really nice as well, for all the non JGF ppl flocking to the page :smiley: But then it might be the problem w spam vs annoying pwd.

Great site!

#6

[quote=“woogley,post:4,topic:26013”]
That wasn’t my point. My point was that you have access to the password. In a high security system, we’d never trust you with that info. For all we know you could be feeding us fake source code for examination. However, this is mitigated by two factors:

  1. I’m not concerned about ensuring high security for my JGO account.
  2. I trust you with the information, and so does the JGO staff.

Those are good enough for me. :slight_smile:

#7

Display the games sorted in ascending order, by their current number of downloads!
its a well known fact, links @ the top of pages are clicked more than those at the bottom :wink:

#8

Im going to put some nice screenshots and descriptions on my games now :slight_smile:

#9

Warning: mysql_query(): Can't connect to local MySQL server through socket '/var/tmp/mysql.sock' (111) in /home/woogley/public_html/unlimited/include/sql.php on line 17
:o
Maybe something to look into before voting starts. Happened while looking at the games list. Have seen it before…

Agree with Jbanes, both the issues he pointed out before and that it still is good enough for me. I will try to participate in the voting if it all pans out.

#10

[quote]The only problem I see is that most people won’t try out all the games, which might exclude some games from having a fair chance.
[/quote]
This is a very common problem when it comes to voting on these things. Very few people play all the games and the games on the first page and/or the top of the list will be played more when people are ‘trying to play them all so I can vote intelligently’.

And if there’s no screenshot you can bet the game won’t get as many hits. BUT the screenshot should be an ingame shot and NOT a 3d rendering or doom3 screen shot (like ‘bleeting sheep’ or whatever last year…).

I also think comments would be good.

#11

I don’t mean to sound negative, but there’s no way I’m sharing my password like that.

If the vote’s only open for people from the JGO boards, why not just run a poll here?

#12

BUT the screenshot should be an ingame shot and NOT a 3d rendering or doom3 screen shot (like ‘bleeting
sheep’ or whatever last year…).

Mhyea… well, my screenshot is a collage of two screenshots together with some added text. Is that still alright?

why not just run a poll here?

Polls are sorta limited. Like you can either have a vote where you can vote for one title… or one where you can vote for several. Both options arent all that nice.

Hm… eventually someone could write a module for smf, which allows some proper voting?

http://mods.simplemachines.org/index.php?mod=91

The Topic Rating mod could be (ab)used for that.

This mod allows users to rate topics (1 to 5 stars). Admins choose which board(s) users can rate topics on, so if you don’t want them rating your announcements, you can set it so they can’t rate topics on that particular board.

The one with the most stars (and most votes [secondary sorting criteria]) wins.

#13

the polls cant run here because their are individual statistics for each game. even after the board had that many topics voted on etc … it would be a hell of a job synching it with the java unlimited database.

markus, you’re not sharing your password with anyone, it’s being sent to the very same HTTP process as the JGO board itself. do you really think I would cache these passwords…? ???

the only way I guess I can earn your trust would be to give full FTP access to someone trustworthy who would be able to see every script that java unlimited uses. either that, or, I guess markus won’t be voting… :-\

regarding the MySQL error, the server is down at the moment.

#14

[quote=“woogley,post:13,topic:26013”]
No, I’m sharing my password with you (or rather, your code), then you share it with the jgo servers.
This goes against everything that is holy when it comes to password security, and not only am I against it on principle, I think it’s a dangerous hack.

Besides, I’d just vote for my own entires anyway. :wink:

#15

you mind explaining why it’s a dangerous hack? I am curious…

edit: the reason I see it harmless is because it works just like your browser does with sending the POST variables (it’s straight up HTTP in a socket). do you consider your browser a security leak? the only difference is one extra middleman: me. but, like I said, my site isnt caching these passwords

#16

great idea, what thinking myself too if a system like this could be used instead of judges. i don’t have any problem with the password issue but clearly some ppl are unhappy about giving out their password, why not just change your password a few days before the voting and change it back after a while to the old password. besides even if someone does steal your account its not like your losing much, in the unlikely event you can just create another account.

#17

[quote]Mhyea… well, my screenshot is a collage of two screenshots together with some added text. Is that still alright?
[/quote]
In my opinion even that is questionable. Is it a screenshot or an advertisement for the game? Is it an accurate representation of the game or an idealized abstraction? Is there a level field such that every entry will have a comparable advertisement for their game?

Just ‘adding text’ in this competition is a big deal because that (edit) gives the appearance you did more with fewer bytes than you actually did.

#18

This is a prime example of how to NOT use passwords.

It is a hack because the indented purpose of /forums/index.php?action=login2 isn’t to make sure that a user with that password exists, but to log in the user. You’re abusing it, and logging in users from your computer.
This could mean, for example, that we all show up as having logged in from the same ip in some log, which normally raises warning flags.

It’s dangerous because your only reason for doing it is to get “secure” logins so we can’t cheat.
So instead of risking [cheating in a competition with no prizes], you’re risking [leaking the password of everyone who votes in the competition]

I seriously hope ChrisM says no to this idea.

A much better alternative, as I said before, would be to just run the voting on these forms.
If not a poll, it could be something as simple as a thread where people post the names of the games they want to vote for followed by the score they want to give that game. You could then write an app that reads that thread, checks who voted what, and that they only voted for the games once.

#19

I would hardly call it abusing. since your cookies arent changed at all, it doesnt affect your overrall login time on the forum at all. if you’re not logged onto JGO, then run the login script from Java Unlimited, you’re STILL not logged into JGO due to the cookies arent set.

how would your password get leaked? it passes through the JGO form just like your browser passes it!

that would be “abusing” this forum to get individual stats for at least 80 games

#20

I’m not going to argue about this. Knock yourself out.