Sonic the Hedgehog Hacking Contest 2017

Discussion in 'Discussion & Q&A' started by Ayla, Dec 16, 2016.

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  1. Royameadow

    Royameadow Welcome to the modern existence. Member

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    Out of curiosity, now that we can upload music files to the site, which format would be easier on it out of the ones allowed, as far as bandwidth consumption is concerned?
    I've gotten used to having my music in Ogg Vorbis format in recent time for minor compression reasons, not sure if it's faster or easier to stream compared to the MPEG family, so I felt it would be proper to ask just in case, even though I know that both formats are able to be uploaded without much issue (if any).
     
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  2. Spanner

    Spanner The Tool Member

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    Bandwidth is of no concern to the website unlike how it was years ago. Just upload whatever you prefer.
     
  3. Cinossu

    Cinossu A blend of secret herbs and spices Member

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    Cross-posting from SHC front page...

    So it's been a good number of hours since the site went live, and.. what's this? The site is still working without going down?! Already the improvements are showing! It's a miracle, etc. If there's anything that proves this is a complete recode rather than a large scale modification, it's that.

    That said, we've had a few more teething issues, so I thought I'd go through some of them now to clear some things up and the status of their fixes.

    Help! I keep being logged out, especially during the verification process!
    If you're on a public connection that is constantly changing IP or your browser has rotating user agent data, this could be the issue. If you're unable to solidify this, or it's something else, contact us on Discord and we'll see what can be done for you. Keep trying and persevering otherwise, as this is one of the few we do not have too much to go on other than this.

    I uploaded my ROM but it says 404 when clicking Download to test!
    Whoops, this one was a caching issue. An older file where the link was slightly different was in place, but now should be fixed and your download should be accessible to test. If it's still not working, try hard refreshing (Ctrl+F5).

    I get the message "An Unknown Error Occurred" occasionally when uploading Media or my ROM
    It shouldn't be occurring very often, if at all, but usually a second attempt should fix this.

    Why do all my Media entries have a caption of their filename? How do I change this?!
    I guess this is something that isn't quite clear, and I'm not 100% sure how to make it more obvious. Click into your Media to preview it properly, and from here the caption should be editable just as everything else is on the entry page.

    When I tried to Save and Mark As Complete it was telling me I needed a banner image, a download, and at least 3 media items. I already have this, so what gives?
    Whoops. My bad. This was a silly little coding error that has since been fixed. Sufficed to say, I was checking a variable of user data that didn't exist(!)

    How do I delete Media items? I made a mistake!
    You can click down on a Media item and drag it over the Delete Media Item block. Where is this block, you say? It replaces the Add New Media Item block when you begin to drag a Media item!

    So I can upload images and music for Media but, what happened to YouTube links...?
    Again, this is a whoops on my part. This is something I actually completely forgot about as a possibility until this morning. This is something that should be implemented before the end of the day as an option from the Media upload dialogue.
    (13:53 BST EDIT): YouTube videos can now be used as Media! Make sure to hard refresh (Ctrl+F5) to reload all files, and then click Add New Media Item to see the new choice available.

    Hopefully this answers questions people are having about the site at the moment. Have more questions? Join us on Discord and report them in #site_issues (link in the footer)!
     
  4. Spanner

    Spanner The Tool Member

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    We've only had the site up a few days and already we've recieved a good number of submissions to both the Contest and Expo, so keep that up! Just remember that we now have uploading fully working, so if you have a ROM then do upload it to the site, the off-site linking is generally preferred for large files such as Generations mods for example.

    Also regarding deadlines, the submissions deadline of the end of Sunday 29th October (where we must have a playable submission by this date) and updates deadline of the end of Sunday 5th November (where you get a week to finish things off and fix any bugs found) apply to Contest submissions ONLY. If you are submitting to the Hack Expo, you only get one deadline, which is the end of Sunday 12th November, as we do not judge those entries. If you can't make the submissions deadline for the Contest, your entry will be moved to the Expo, meaning you get extra time to get your entry done, and you get exposure for your entry, with the expense being your entry won't be judged. You've had since last December to make an entry though, so I would hope most people won't have to miss out on getting judged!

    Please also note, as it's happened a few times, you cannot have the same entry submitted to both the Contest and Expo. It's one or the other. If you want your entry to be judged and be in the running for trophies, it's the Contest. If you don't want to be judged, go for the Expo.

    Stay tuned for further updates regarding the contest and this website which is ever changing, new features are being added regularly. If you have any questions, use the forum threads or Discord which are all linked at the bottom of this page. If you aren't a full member of SSRG or Sonic Retro but want to submit, instructions for getting validated are in a previous news post. We've already had a few people ask to get verified, so don't hesitate to ask!
     
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  5. LordXernom

    LordXernom Well-Known Member Member

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    I've chosen off-site link, because when I upload via site and downloaded it, the entire ROM was broken (I think it's because it could add more info or something different - I saw changed title of my hack on Kega). I hope this isn't major issue that I used off-link in this case. I wish all goodluck, who entry Hacking Contest or Expo! ;)
     
  6. Spanner

    Spanner The Tool Member

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    Upload should be fixed now.
     
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  7. LordXernom

    LordXernom Well-Known Member Member

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    Yes, it works! Thank you very much!
     
  8. MarkeyJester

    MarkeyJester ♡ ! Member

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    Excellent, the new site looks pretty swift and glamorous!

    I can't wait to submit what I have in store~
     
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  9. AURORA☆FIELDS

    AURORA☆FIELDS so uh yes Exiled

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    Me either!
     
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  10. Spanner

    Spanner The Tool Member

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    We've had a good amount of submissions to the Hacking Contest already as well as the seperate, unjudged Hack Expo but do remember that in order to actually be judged for the Hacking Contest, we need a fully playable ROM to be submitted by the end of Sunday 29th October. If you don't do this, your entry will be moved to the Hack Expo, which has a longer deadline of the end of Sunday 12th November, but your entry won't be judged.

    Remember that if you submit for the Contest, you will get an extra week to polish your entry and fix any bugs, the deadline for that is the end of Sunday 5th November. Judging will commence after that date.

    If your entry does not meet the Quality Control Criteria, it will be either moved to the Expo depending on what you do have or rejected from the entire thing. Sorry, but we've got standards to keep this year!

    We want as many people to submit as possible, but remember, if you are not a full member of Sonic Retro or SSRG, you have to contact a judge for validation. This can be done in the following ways:
    • Send an email to shc[@]sonicresearch[.]org with your SHC username, as well as your forum account(s).
    • Send a Direct Message to the @shcontest Twitter account with your SHC username and your forum account(s). Our DMs are open.
    • Private Message a Judge on SSRG or Sonic Retro with your SHC username. Obviously you need an account that can PM with this method, but if you can't, the above two options will work, especially email.


    As we have the Quality Control Criteria in place this year we may decide to get rid of the full member requirement next year. But for now, if you aren't a full member of either site and want to get involved, please ask!

    Anyway, let's keep up the good work here, if you have questions or any issues you can contact us using the forum threads, email account or Discord server which is linked at the bottom of the page. A good example that we've already had to deal with is someone making another account because they put the wrong email address in. If you contacted us about it, we would have been able to change the existing email address for you. No need for another account whatsoever.
     
  11. Royameadow

    Royameadow Welcome to the modern existence. Member

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    There seems to be a few issues happening with the SHC site on my end that I hope will either be clarified about or attended to; I'm not sure if anybody else is also getting these troubles, so in the event that any of you are suffering from the mentioned, please do bring it up as necessary.

    ~ Switching on or off VPN Mode in current builds of Opera will trigger either a "Forbidden" error and require the member of the site to log back in.
    I have had to do this five times over the past few days due to either my modem reconnecting to my network or having to intentionally turn off VPN Mode due to Sonic Retro not allowing the usage of them at this current time; it's not that much of a hassle, but it's definitely something that caught me off guard, never have I been on a site that forcibly logs out my account due to this, it's a first for me.
    ~ Media Uploads require you to save the entry before uploading another piece of media, or else it will tell the user that "an error has occurred"; this is strictly happening with YouTube links.
    While I got the pattern down on this and it's not much of a trouble because of that, I must say that even the old Hapisan/Sonic Research variant of the website did not have this issue, I hope that this will be fixed over time and not likely to occur in the version of the site for the sixteenth contest next year.
    ~ Is there a Text Limit on Media Descriptions that I am missing, or is the site supposed to cut off descriptions at a specific number of characters or even have part of the description shown in a larger Font Size after saving it?
    I am currently experiencing this as I type, it's even gotten to the point where the media thumbnails are misaligned, this is indeed a serious issue that I hope will be handled immediately, I don't think this is supposed to happen and I don't enjoy having to retype or rearrange words in a scenario such as this, it truly can become a hectic time; to understand what I am talking about, there is a screenshot in the Spoiler Box below showing how it turned out after saving my entry to the Expo block.

    SHC XV, Misaligned Thumbnails and Broken Media Descriptions.PNG
     
    Last edited: Oct 25, 2017
  12. SuperEgg

    SuperEgg I'm a guy that knows that you know that I know Member

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    Hey kids, friendly reminder!!!!

    YOUR HACKS ARE DUE BY THE END OF SUNDAY!!! GET YOUR STUFF SUBMITTED BEFORE THEN TO ENSURE YOUR HACK WILL MAKE IT INTO THE HACKING CONTEST!!

    This is the one time that I will tell you guys not to procrastinate.
     
  13. Ashuro

    Ashuro Anti-Cosmic Metal Of Death Member

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    Then... 10th try and still impossible to upload this. o_____o

    Sans titre.png
     
  14. Spanner

    Spanner The Tool Member

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    Do an off-site upload for now, we can look into it later.
     
  15. Spanner

    Spanner The Tool Member

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    Tonight at Midnight EST is the first deadline for the Contest. What does this mean, exactly? I've been hearing some confusion about this, so let us clarify a few points:

    No new submissions will be possible for the Contest.
    This one is a no-brainer; "Add New Entry" will not be possible for Contest entries anymore. Expo entries will of course still be open until Sunday 12th November.

    Entries in the Contest that do not have a playable/fully runnable build will be moved to the Expo.
    This is something that we will be checking on explicitly come midnight and tomorrow. You might not have your completed description or all media entries as of yet, but you must have a playable build of your entry. Remember, the last week given is to give your entry that last minute neatening up and fixing bugs, not to complete your entry altogether. If your entry is found to not meet this point then it will be automatically moved over to the Expo instead.

    You do not need to have your entry Marked as Complete at this deadline.
    I've seen some confusion here, so let's clarify this point explicitly. The Marked as Complete is for the final deadlines only, not this stage of them. Even if you have already marked an entry as complete, you can still make changes to it up until the final deadline dates. This applies to both the Contest and the Expo.

    When you have uploaded a ROM or changed the offsite link, make sure to save.
    This is very important. You must save after uploading or changing the offsite link, otherwise it will not be updated with your entry and the previous download or link will be there instead!

    Please note that unlike previous years, there will be no list of submissions in the Contest posted until after the Update Deadline has expired. This is because we will be doing Quality Control Criteria checks during the week, so some submissions that do not meet that criteria may be moved to the Expo or removed altogether.

    I hope this clarifies some points about the deadline tonight. When in doubt, don't be afraid to come on to the Discord and message us in the #site_issues channel, or PM us on the various forums about!
     
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  16. SuperEgg

    SuperEgg I'm a guy that knows that you know that I know Member

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    Alright boys and girls, we're close to hitting that time!!!

    You've got till Midnight EST to submit your hacks for the Contest!!! Hurry up and have a playable entry before then, because there is no guarantee the website will let you submit after that time!!!

    This is not the time to procrastinate, so get on it!
     
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  17. Spanner

    Spanner The Tool Member

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    As promised, the deadline expired at midnight EST, we are no longer taking submissions for this year's Hacking Contest.

    Those that did enter have until the end of Sunday 5th November to polish their entry and fix any bugs. However, we will be checking all submitted entries during this week to make sure that they have a playable build already and that it passes the Quality Control Criteria. If we decide that your entry is not for the Contest this year, you will be emailed about it. This is why unlike previous years, there will not be a list of entries posted until the Updates Deadline.

    For those that still want to show off something, there is always the Hack Expo, which gives you all the exposure of the Contest, just without the entry being judged. We still are taking submissions for that up to the end of Sunday 12th November, which as of this post is two weeks away.
     
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  18. Spanner

    Spanner The Tool Member

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    If you have a submission to the Hacking Contest, we need a final build submitted by the end of today (Sunday) by Midnight EST. This MUST be uploaded to the site. Any off-site links of ROMs will be manually uploaded to the site at the deadline if they have not been already.

    For those who feel that they do not have enough time to finish, you can forfeit your entry from being judged by having it moved to the Hack Expo, which gives you up until the end of Sunday 12th November to finish up (and we are still taking submissions for that by the way). But if you want that done, you need to let us know by the end of today.

    The list of Contest submissions will be posted tomorrow, provided that the final quality control checks are complete. If it is not posted on Monday, you know why.
     
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  19. Spanner

    Spanner The Tool Member

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    Triple post, I know. I'm sure this announcement will get people posting again!

    First, watch this trailer video, made by redhotsonic:

    Next, let's have a look at this year's Hacking Contest entries. Not as many compared to last year but remember we have the unjudged Hack Expo too which the list for that will be revealed next Monday.

    1. A Generic Sonic 1 ROMhack by CHRdutch
    2. A Rushed Sonic Hack by Unlimited Trees
    3. Achi (AKA another trend in gaming that is slightly annoying and ultimately pointless) by Natsumi
    4. Classic Pantufa the Cat DX by VAdaPEGA
    5. Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine - DX Edition by RadioShadow
    6. Heroes Mod Loader & Tweakbox by sewer56lol
    7. Metal Sonic Rebooted by Lone Devil
    8. Mr. Cat's 16 Day Challenge by Mr. Cat
    9. SADX Lantern Engine by SonicFreak94
    10. Sonic & Ashuro by Ashuro
    11. Sonic 1 - Comet Edition v2.1 by BCasais
    12. Sonic 1 Back to South Island by PineappleArse
    13. Sonic 1 Dragon Edition by DragonWolfLeo
    14. Sonic 1: Colors Edition by campbellsonic
    15. Sonic 2 for PC & New 3DS by Clownacy
    16. Sonic 2: Zen Island by Yoshister
    17. Sonic 3 Chaos Adventure by Jdpense
    18. Sonic Chaos Quest Ultimate by Narcologer
    19. Sonic Double Dash by SteamPoweredPixel
    20. Sonic Egg Factory ReMastered by FoxConED
    21. Sonic Halloween by CamManS5
    22. Sonic Legacy by GammaV
    23. Sonic Redux (Character Demo) by InvisibleUp
    24. Tails Adventure X-L by lordxernom
     
  20. BigBaldBeast

    BigBaldBeast Newcomer Trialist

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    Hey, that's good to see numberous developpers participate to the contest, even if it's a little less than the last year, but that's good when you know the difficulty to made one game hack.

    After all it's pretty hard to be ourself the dev of our game when you know there were a team of 6 and 15 peoples respectively for Sonic 1 and Sonic 2, even, when you see the quality of certains of these rom hacks, it's impressive.

    Congrats guys, I will do my best here, and maybe participate in this contest, maybe the next year or more late.

    (Glad to know you by the way, and thanks to the staff to permit me to post here as a trialist. ;))
     
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