To kickstart some new levels for Yo-Frankie I have decided to run a six week competition to create new levels for the game. These can then be included in a future release of YoFrankie, which will include updates for the next blender release and bugfixes.

Goal: Create a great new level for YoFrankie based on the following criteria…

• Level design (the level should be fun to run around, explore, and play in)
• Game play (playing the level from start to finish should be engaging)
• Good graphics quality (nice textures/materials/scenery)

Bonus Points for…

• Efficiency - Creative use of existing Yo Frankie assets (textures/materials/models/sounds).
• Replay value - Come up with a way that makes your level fun to play again and again!
• Puzzles - Its possible to create puzzles with no programming (pushing blocks about, spring boxes, moving platforms)
• 2 player features (when the level is extra fun to play with or against a friend)

No Bonus Points for…

• Slow level logic/python scripts
• Level running slower then existing YoFrakie levels (level_1_home)

Starting Date: January 16th, 2009
Deadline: February 28th, 2009

First Prize 250 Euro
Second Prize 150 Euro
Third Prize 100 Euro
(Payment via PayPal)

Notes

• You may focus mostly on one area, awesome graphics, great puzzles, fun 2 player, challenging platforms to glide between etc.
• This project should be something a non technical artist can finish. You can make a level without adding any logic bricks or scripts, the players have their own logic, so you can get by with knowing 3-4 property names to assign to different level objects - see the wiki for details.
• Your level doesn’t need to use GLSL materials (old texface materials are ok too).
• This level will eventually be included with other levels, start by adding your level to the “levels” directory, and reuse existing groups where possible.
• Even if you don’t win, your level can still be included in the next release of YoFrankie.
• This is not an official Blender Foundation competition, see my contact details below.
• To get updated YoFrankie files from Subversion see projects.blender.org/projects/yofrankie

Judging
I’ll run a community vote on blender artists, however I’ll decide on the final outcome if it seems biased in some way or if people are not able to test levels.

Rules

• Collaboration is fine, but I’ll only accept an entry from a single person.
• Final level must be under 100mb compressed.
• No modifications to the player logic (jump height, glide distance etc) - bug fixes are an exception.
• Your level must be under the same creative commons license as all existing YoFrankie levels.
• No node based materials (just use material-textures for more efficient shaders)
• You can enter more then one level
• Level cannot have been entered into a previous competition

I’ll answer questions on the thread, but you can mail me personally too.
Contact:  Campbell Barton - ideasman42@gmail.com

Behold.. Yo Frankie! Online! Both the binaries and the whole production tree are available in .zip format and also browsable via web.

So go to the Download Yo Frankie! page and start playing the game, playing with the source files, or open the blend files in Blender 2.48a and do both!

A big new is that Yo Frankie! is now part of Blender Projects, this means that you can make and share your own levels, characters, whatever! and also help in the development and maintenance of the game, so we can all play Yo Frankie! in future Blender versions.

That’s all folks!
Thanks for everything,
The Apricot Open Game Crew

The Blender Gamekit book update project is now in its last stage. We’re reviewing the designed pages, finishing the cd for the book, and hopefully within one or two weeks it goes to print! (But you know, planning doesn’t match human limitations always!)

You now can start pre-ordering copies even. Up to december 15 with a nice 20% discount!
Click here to visit the Blender e-shop.

Needless to say: revenues will help Blender Foundation projects (and me & Brecht coding 2.5!

-Ton-

The long wait is almost over, today the dvds were delivered to the Blender Institute. Tomorrow we’ll pack them all for our sponsors/customers, monday it gets picked up by the Global Mail service.
Delivery is usually 2-4 days for countries close, 1 week for rest of Europe, 2 weeks for USA and rest of world.

In case you’ve moved to another place after ordering, make sure the e-shop knows! (Mail shop at blender.org order number and new address).

-Ton-

Just a short note! DVD is done, we’re still doing some tests, and we need Campbell for final blessings, but tomorrow it will be ready to go to the DVD reproduction factory!

Printing takes 2 weeks, shipping will happen during weekend of 1-2 november, customers will then get the copy within 1 (europe) or 2 (rest of world) weeks. Exciting

• Blender 2.48a update: A serious bug in the GE requires a new build of the players/runtimes, which we want to include this on the DVD. Meaning our planning shifts with a week… sorry.

• Nov 7 update: DVD factory started printing! We expect the dvds in end of the week, and ship saturday 14th.