The 2013 Sonic the Hedgehog Hacking Contest

COME ON MUTHA FUCKAZ!!! YOU GOT 24 MINUTES TO SUBMIT YO UPDATED SHIT. CHIP CHOP, I DON'T GOT ALL DAY, I HAVE BITCHES TO FUCK AND HACKS TO PLAY. YES AT THE SAME TIME.

Yes, I am really counting down how much time is left before this is over. Can't wait to finally judge.

 

Aaaaand, it's over. All editing is disabled, all entries are static and final, and no more changes or description, title, gallery, ROM/link or status can be made.

Good luck to all that have finalised their entries!

 

The finished list for this year's contest:
 

1. An Ordinary Sonic ROM Hack by Cinossu
   
2. Egg Fleet in SADX by pablodrago
3. Metal Sonic Hyperdrive by MKDarkon
4. Sally Acorn in Sonic the Hedeghog 2 by E-122-Psi
5. Sonic 1 CD Remake by Bobesh8
6. Sonic 1: The Harder Levels by The Harder Levels Project
7. Sonic 2 Adventure Edition by MainMemory
8. Sonic 2 Recreation - Part One by redhotsonic
9. Sonic Adventure 2: Battle Network by Morph
10. Sonic Adventure Generations by Dude
11. Sonic Generations - Unleashed Project by Dario FF, Chimera and TwilightZoney
12. Sonic Green Snake by Green Snake
13. Sonic MBV by Selbi
14. Sonic the Hedgehog 2 - Time Attack by redhotsonic
15. Sonic the Hedgehog: Never Stop Running by Cinossu
16. Sonic vs Camera by Green Snake
17. Sonic Winter Adventures by vladikcomper
18. The S Factor: Sonia and Silver by Aquaslash and Pals
19. Sonic Generations - Adabat Adventure Pack PC by Arcieo
20. Sonic 2 Build A Burger by SuperEgg
21. Sonic Classic Heroes - Rise of the Chaotix by Flamewing
22. Sonic Random Hax - LZ Demo by Electroball
23. Sonic 1 Color Contrast by TheInvisibleSun
24. Classic Sonic in "Sonic 4 - Episode 2" by Dario FF
25. Mecha Harvest by GT Koopa
26. Mr. Needlemouse by MKAmeX*
27. Sonic 1: Sonic CD Edition by Animemaster*
28. Sonic 2: S3 Edition by Alriightyman*
29. Sonic 3: D.A. Garden Edition by D.A. Garden*
30. Sonic 06 Melpontro Power Pack by Melpontro*

* - Partial Private Entry

If anyone in the Partial Private list wants a video review by MegaGWolf and SomecallmeJohnny please let me know.

 

I'm gonna quote your original post, not your edit. Don't like what follows, sue me.

If you're going to go around disassembling people's hacks to get access to shit that was kept away for a reason, then as far as I'm concerned you're not fit to be a judge. I know exactly who you are referring to, and at no point has it been stated in the rules that changes have to be minimal, or that the damn thing has to be playable. If that is how it has to be, then it should be stated as such in the rules. It's not for you to say whether it was necessary, for all you know he may have had a problem with something game breaking and didn't want the deadline to pass, knowing he could fix it and submit the finished article by the update deadline.

This kind of bullshit has actually put me off entering future contests, which is a shame coz I've been working on something in private which I hoped might get a contest release in time for next years. There's no way I'm going to submit something just for someone like you to disassemble it and go through it to get access to shit that I don't want you to have access to. You should judge all hacks when the final deadline date, the update one, has passed. Otherwise, get rid of the update deadline altogether. I'm pretty disappointed that the people running this contest have let this go by, as it is a complete breach of trust. How can people trust you with their private hacks knowing you might disassemble them just to see their secret shit.

 

Holy douchebaggery Batman!

 

As the person managing this contest I have had a serious discussion with SuperEgg and he will be issuing an apology very shortly. I'm not happy about this either, I don't hack into entries and neither do any other judges. I will not allow anyone to damage this contest, shit like this is just going to put people off from entering.

 

Sigh, were to begin?

Well, I would first like to apologize for my behavior on the forums. I shouldn't have made this public, nor should have I stated it. I am sorry for being an asshole to said user and I will make a personal apology later on. My actions shouldn't have been done, or at the least matter, made public for all to see. My personal feelings and other attitudes shouldn't have clouded my judgement and I should know better. Obviously not my brightest moment.

Now, as far as disassembling hacks, I never do that, until a few days back just to see this one hack. I was more or less curious to see how said hack played, and I wasn't one to wait. So no, I wasn't looking around for some kind of secret shit. No, I wasn't peering into it to steal shit. None of that. I just wanted to play the hack. That is all. I'm sorry if I violated anybody's trust, but I promise you, I'm not looking to do anything ridiculous or extreme, I just want to play the hack.

But, at the same time, don't paint at me like I'm like those little faggots that posts playthroughs of hacks that aren't even being released, or worse leak shit out to the general public. I know my actions were uncalled for, but that is an extreme that I would never cross, no matter how badly my judgement was clouded.

And as far as the contest rules go, StephenUK, you are correct. The rules do not state that, and this was more or less a personal peeve of mine. But to clarify, as I said. I wasn't judging, I was forming opinions. We both know that the judges have a limited time frame to look at hacks and form opinions. As the saying goes, "The Sooner, the better." This rings true here. With only a week to look at 29(30 for the judges who didn't submit a hack) hacks and form opinions to properly judge, it's a bitch, so every second counts. From what I've played, most hacks really haven't had a major enough changes for it to lose or gain points in my book, so looking at them before the final deadline has been more or less no different than looking at them now. Alas, once again, there is no rules about having a playable build for the judges by the initial deadline. 

Lastly, I apologize if this has offset you from deciding to join in future contests. Of course, from what you've said, it seems this only cements the point that the contest needs to be reformatted anyways. Nevertheless, I am not going to step down from judging or from the contest in general. If you feel uncomfortable with me judging your hack, feel free to notify me, but that isn't going to stop my job. I'm busy working with people outside this community in ways to make this contest one of the best ones in years, and if this blip is enough for anybody to feel uncomfortable, I will not blame anybody for not wanting me on the judges panel next year. Unless I hear some huge backlash from an asston of people, I'm here to stay for this year.

So with that said, once again, I apologize to all those I have offended, and I will not pursue such tactics again just to play a hack, or even consider it.

- SuperEgg

 

Hey everyone! I would've posted this yesterday, but work was stupid-busy. Real life gets in the way again. D: Entry editing finished yesterday. Unless you have a very, very good reason, this is it. All over. No changes. Nada.

There appears to also be some confusion about public viewing of entries not being enabled yet; my understanding of the schedule was that public viewing would occur at the same time as Contest Week, of which Spanner will talk more about in a news post after this. If this is in error, well, I'll amend this post and all public and partial-private entries will become viewable at the flick of a switch.

That said, one thing I have noticed on the forums is people posting their entries publicly already. While we obviously can't stop you, we'd all prefer if you wouldn't do this next time and left it for the actual public viewing on the site. This site becomes somewhat useless for public voting and viewing if you're all just going to post them elsewhere, after all.

Aaaand that's all for today. Another day of work for me.

 

The apology is very welcome, I wasn't expecting you to issue one at all to be honest so it's appreciated. I took it a little personally as well coz I had done work on the hack in question as well, so when the project leader (who wishes to remain anonymous) told me what had gone on I was pretty pissed off.

I never suggested that you would do anything like steal work or leak it or any of that stuff, as I know that's not your style. When I mentioned things like that, I was generalising over the fact that the other people running the contest had looked over your comment as if it was normal. If this was considered normal practice in the future, maybe with different judges, the outcome may not have been so minor.

Although I will agree that the majority of hacks will only have minor updates in that final week, there is always the chance that there is a major update due and it may make the difference between a trophy or a broken hack. Years ago when I submitted my hack, although I won a trophy (2nd or 3rd place, I forget which), it wasn't the version I wanted to submit. I submitted one that was a little buggy but playable in time for the deadline, but I was working on a major update which I was hoping to submit within the week. This update was to replace the S2 level layout manager with the S3K one, also using the S3K drawing routines, S3K rings manager and completely new layouts to use the massive amount of extra layout space that was available to me. It would have been like submitting a completely different hack, but unfortunately a few major bugs prevented me from submitting it. This is the kind of thing I was referring to, unless you know exactly what the update is going to be, you can't say for certain if it is going to be big or critical.

If you do not wish to stand down as a judge, then I have no argument there. You appear to accept that your actions were crossing the line and as long as this isn't repeated, I'm happy for you to stay as a judge this year and in the future if you wish. I will also reconsider my decision to avoid next years contest, although I think the rules need clarifying to make it clearer to people entering. As you probably already know, despite our occasional run ins, I have no problem with you on a personal level. My argument mainly stemmed from the fact you didn't seem to give a shit about what you had done (judging by the initial post, not the edit) and if that were the case then my stance now would have been a lot different to what I have just stated.

Again, thanks for the apology and I look forward to seeing this years results.

 

One thing to note; while previously it was required to send an entry in to reserve your place and get that week of editing, one of the purposes of saving your spot and the "incomplete" entry stuff on the site was so situations like this need never occur. An incomplete entry would be left (and still is left) as it is until the time came to wipe the SQL table clean. Without a ROM, sure it's still marked as incomplete, but if it's going to have one by the end of the editing week anyway there is no need to upload one.

That said, I don't condone what SuperEgg did in the first place, just making a note to all in the future about the whole point of using a site with incomplete entries to reserve a space rather than sending in a ROM.

 

I feel like I should come in and say something. First, let's get this out in the open. This said person is me, and my "S2R" hack. I am not best pleased with what happened, as you can imagine, but I should explain why I gave you judges a "teaser" ROM.

First of all, it's true. I did not want you judges to play my hack until I updated it before the deadline. You lot say you won't judge it until the final version, but how do I know you won't do that subconsciously? Hear me out. Imagine I did give you a fully working ROM and you played, say, the first two levels. You might like this and this, and dislike that and that, and spot something that isn't meant to happen, whatever. You're not going to judge. But when you come to play the updated final one, you've got to do them two levels again. You may think, "We've done this already" and will probably try to get past it quicker than you did before; missing out on something I just updated. Therefore, you've subconsciously judged on the old one. Not only this, but technically, it has been judged already before being updated when you said it wouldn't. Proof? Here's the quote:

So already, you’ve broken your own rules. That's the reason why I did not want you to play the game until I updated it.

"So, why didn't I just make a blank entry and not submit a ROM?" Well, I'm a bit of a worrier. When Cinossu posted the rules here, SonicRetro and on the SHC site itself, he stated "you can even put a blank entry in, as long as you do it before the closing deadline". I wasn't too sure what he meant by "blank entry". Did he mean just the form, or a blank ROM? I could of asked in this topic, but I have already asked a few questions, and didn't want to keep "pestering". So to be on the safe side, I put S2R in with just the SEGA and title. That way, knowing I had put a ROM image to my entry, I knew I secured my reservation to the contest. After all, having something is better than nothing, right?

That's my story. Spanner did ask me by PM why this had happened, but I said it wasn't against any rules, and he agreed. I assured him, it will be updated before the deadline. IF it was against the rules, then of course, I would of uploaded the real deal, but it wasn't. I thought that was that. But as soon as I found out SuperEgg disassembled my hack, I thought "asshole". Not only could he not wait one week, but he lost all my respect towards him. This put me off the contest a little, and I bet its put many others off too. I was really considering pulling out and not bothering as I hadn't updated yet. But seeming as I'm going to release this publicly anyway, I thought might as well stay in. The other day, I really wanted to react as I was fucked off, but being told to cool it, I didn't and tried to forget about it. I saw that you edited your post and removed what you said, but thanks to Spanner's quoting the post directly above (again?), the damage said was still there (and still is from time of typing).

Even though it was disassembled, I don't truly believe you put it all back together and played it as I did a lot more than just changing pointers (in fact, I took some art out IIRC). Or if you did get it in a playable state, I bet it wasn't to it's full potential. And therefore, you cannot judge my hack in this state. It's been updated now, and except for one major bug I accidently left in there due to one branch error, you can now play it to your heart's content.

Now this is out in the open and after reading your apology, I do accept it, although my respect for you has been damaged. I don’t care if you don’t care, but thought I’d be honest. For now, I think we should put this matter behind us, get on with the contest, and I look forward to seeing some good hacks and the results.

 

So, about that Contest Week...

 

It'll be taking place from next Monday (12th August) to Sunday 18th August. You'll get a chance to download the public entries, discuss them and vote for the Community Trophies. You will need either a Sonic Retro or SSRG account to vote, if you have both, then only use one as we don't want any vote rigging to take place by people using both accounts to vote for the same thing. Everything will be on the SHC website.

 

The regular events taking place every day will be live streaming from MegaGWolf (from 7pm BST/2pm EST to 9pm BST/4pm EST) and SomecallmeJohnny (1am BST/9pm EST to 3am BST/11pm EST) along with a daily contest podcast from 9pm BST/4pm EST to 11pm BST/6pm EST. The results from the contest will be announced on Sunday from 8pm BST (3pm EST) to 11pm BST (6pm EST). The results and the podcast will be streamed on a radio server which will be linked when the week has started. These will also be recorded so if you miss them, you can listen to them later.

 

An IRC channel has also been setup at irc.badnik.net #hackingcontest so feel free to come in during the week. 

 

We'll also be having other events during the week which I hope to finalise at the weekend including a few hacking workshops - if you have an idea and would like to do it please send me a PM so it can be organised, looking for anything here!

 

Finally, you'll get the chance to take part in daily hacking contests where the end result will be to produce a level in Sonic 1 by the end of the week. This will be open to everyone and not just Retro and SSRG members.

 

Again, I hope to have a full schedule posted during this weekend but every day there will be a post on the site explaining that day's events and the daily contest that will take place.

 

As of about 2 minutes after this has been posted, the main fun of the SHC begins; Entries that are set to be visible to all become visible to all, Downloads meant to be available become available, and you get to have your say on what people have up with by both Commenting on said entries and voting for them on the available Community Trophies!

You will notice some new sections available at the top of the site. Voting will take you to a page showing all community trophies and the current status of their results in real-time; please read what is said at the top and do not use these as an indicator on what you should vote for, vote for what you want to see win the trophy. Streams will take you to a page with all available streams running during this Contest Week; both MegaGWolf's and SomeCallMeJohnny's Twitch.tv streams, as well as a radio stream section (the latter will be up later today).

The login system is also now open to all member groups bar Misfit/Exile, meaning everyone gets their say. Please do note we will be moderating everything to a great degree, as well as able to track and ban all those who abuse the system in place. It may also end up with your ban on the respective forum you have logged in from in the first place.

Spanner will post later on today with more information about the Contest Week itself and events running throughout, but for now everyone get stuck in and enjoy!

 

Entry 14 wouldn't happen to be the "Sonic 2: Time Attack" that can be download over at Sonic Retro, would it? If so, I recorded a "full" playthrough of it, and am looking forward to seeing the hack's entry page over at the contest website.

Note: If anyone's curious as to why I put full in quotation marks it's because there is an issue that I noticed with it; however the entry page may have reasons for said problem, so I'll wait until it's available :read: .

 

S2TA's entry to the contest is slightly different to Retro's download. Hardly any difference though. This contest entry contains 2 bug fixes, and more secure SRAM. I will post an update to S2TA's topic later on today here and on Retro.

 

Today's schedule is posted but here's a challenge for someone to do. Do you have the frogs of steel needed to make this? 

 

Thanks, RHS

I left a comment on the entry page about my issue.

 

Spanner, I asked you in IRC but since it's an interesting question I might as well ask it here too. About the layout modification daily contest, should it be a pure layout edit with no custom tiles, or is it possible to do crazy shit such as creating a new loop? I use the loop as example because (like the S tube) it requires other files to be edited as well in order to work, but my question applies to all kinds of custom tiles.

 

No custom tiles. Just use what is there.
Also, reuploaded the disassembly because I forgot to do the thing SonED2 needs for GHZ editing.

Just a heads up that any Twitter people can follow @shcontest for the latest updates, event reminders and much more. If you're going to discuss the contest week, please use the hashtag #shcontest.

 

The site appears to be down. I keep getting a message that says "Something went wrong; don't worry, we still have everything backed up and it'll be all back again soon!"