The Games for Health Competition

This is a wide open competition where the winning entry will be a game, or game-styled application in demo, prototype, or finished form that demonstrates an original idea for a game for health in playable form. The prototype will be judged on both its originality and the quality of its execution as software. Games may be submitted that run on any computing or mobile platform. Games may be about any healthcare topic, and serve as training, education, messaging, or interface frameworks.

Qualified submissions for this contest must meet the following criteria:

* Games may be new or existing projects but may not be commercially released software by a commercial game publisher or produced by any organization with greater then $10M in revenues.

* Submission forms include a section to declare the goal of the game. This is not the player's goal but instead refers to the outcomes that you claim the game can help achieve for its intended audience. Please clearly state all goals in order of importance including intended audience. The core judging criteria rests upon our judges impression about the executable itself and how much confidence they have that it can achieve the goals of the submission based on its evaluatable design.

* Submission must be easily executable for judging. We will make our best attempt to judge projects that are for platforms not commonly available. If you are worried about our ability to judge your project because it is not easily executable for judging (e.g. it uses specialized hardware such as an exercise cycle) then please contact us to arrange a means to properly judge it using alternative strategies. We reserve the right to reject submissions that can not be fairly evaluated due to system requirements.

* Mods of commercial games are valid entries so long as it was produced without violating any end-user license agreements of the modified software. Entries that require third-party games to be installed must provide five legal copies of the underlying game software fully packaged. Please email competition@gamesforhealth.org for details on shipping third-party software to us. These games will not be returned upon completion of the contest.

* Submission must be accessible electronically. Please do NOT send CD/DVDs unless requested. Instead please post your project for download via private FTP or Web download.

* Submission must have clear instructions for installation and initial gameplay. Submissions which lack a clear means of working at these most basic levels may be outright rejected because we're unable to properly evaluate them. While email support contacts will be required for each submission we will not vouch for their willingness to do so -- you can not rely on your customers as easily either so clear documentation and an easy install process is important.

* Projects will be evaluated for technical merit, gameplay & design, and liklihood of achieving the outcome goals stated in the submission. If a project has ANY supporting evidence that it is achieving goals it intended to or otherwise upon design please submit links to this research as it will be considered during judging. Otherwise our judges will use their best opinion as to whether the game/prototype has the potential to work.

* Submissions need not be fully finished projects. All submissions will be evaluated only on their ability as executables to clearly demonstrate all critical facets of gameplay and based on that provide a suitable evaluation as to the potential of a final version to achieve the goals the submission states for the executable. While this may still provide an advantage to finished projects it should allow well defined demos and prototypes to strongly compete.

* Submissions may be updated once finalists are announced. Finalists will be given a small 48 hour period to submit new versions of their software for the final round of judging. No other updates other then to fix errors, bugs, or install needs will be accepted once a project is initially submitted.

Posted by Ben at 08:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Organization Storyboard/Treatment Competition
The Organization Storyboard/Treatment Competition involves creating and submitting an original game design document and storyboard that identifies a particular problem a health oriented organization deals internally (e.g. training new staff to counsel family members), or externally (e.g. raise awareness on bone marrow donation) and produces a game design document that would outline a game and how it would be used to specifically aid that organization in handling that problem.

This competition is open to any organization or individual but we encourage teams to be comprised specifically of a representative from the organization that game would specifically be used by. We also encourage health organizations to submit. To aide them with game development help we've supplied a list of resources where they can find potential game-development talent to help them develop a submission.

The document should be 3-5 pages in length and include 3-4 relevant visuals. Documents will then be judged by our panel with finalists being announced in early April and the first prize winner being announced in May of 2007. The winning design will receive a $5,000 prize payable to the designated recipient of the submitting team.

Critical to the all submission in this category are the following criteria:

* Work must be original and focus on a qualified health organization entity. We strongly recommend that submissions come in from partnerships including the organization for whom the game would support but that is not a requirement.

* Work must define a problem the game is intended to solve. This includes a strong presentation about a unique need, problem, or mission of the subject organization with specific insight into the challenges the game seeks to address for that organization. For example, if an organization has an exceedingly hard time recruiting new volunteers explain why that is so, what insights can the organization share about strategies they've implemented or not implemented, etc.

* Work must then detail a game or game-based application that attempts to answer some aspect of the problem as defined in your design document. A critical judging factor is the ability for the document to properly define the goal for the game and then sync a creative game-based solution to the goal/outcomes as defined. Poorly defined goals, problems/challenges not well described, or games which speak to the generality of what is first or which seem dubious toward producing the outcome as desired will score lower.

* Submission must include at least three visual design aides. These need not be master works of art. They must however provide some strong capability for judges to understand how the game will work and how the user will interact with the software. Wireframe diagrams, mock ups that cut and paste elements together from other games, basic screen diagrams are all more then sufficient. The quality is in how well they communicate how the game will work and demonstrate strong design ideas, not the overall quality of the artwork itself. Documents may provide more then three diagrams - the more that add to the document and play a meaningful role, the better.

* Documents must include a technical and budget feasibility section. You must define some basic level of how the game will be constructed (what critical technologies will it use, what platform(s) will it run on, how much will it cost to develop? These need not be extreme technical dissertations. They will be evaluated for how well they demonstrate you have a realistic cost and technology assessment as part of your submission. Cost is NOT a large factor in the competition. Accuracy of costs is. A game which is $5 million to produced and is accurately described will be judged as well as a game that costs $250,000 and is accurately described.

* VERY IMPORTANT to this competition is the need to explain HOW the organization partner for the game will implement it once complete. Your submission must include a use and distribution plan that details how the game will reach its target user, what support will be needed, and how that plan furthers the overall goals of the game and the organization. Again - while not a requirement that the subject organization be directly involved, it is hard to imagine submissions scoring high here without inside cooperation for the submission.

* We encourage all submissions to include a section that details game-play influences and ideas from other games that have informed your design. A strong document will consider how it fits in with the many genres, and styles of play commercial games have achieved over the past 30 years.

* We encourage all treatments to include a single page mock up of an advertisement, flyer, or the box art that might be used for your idea were it to be built. This is a great way to demonstrate how the game would work - see our examples here:

* Documents should be no more then 10-12 pages including basic diagrams.

Posted by Ben at 08:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The Student Storyboard/Treatment Competition involves creating and submitting an original game design document and storyboard that defines and solves a particular problem in health and healthcare that would be of particular interest (in subject matter, or in how it plays) to other young students.

The document should be 3-5 pages in length and include 3-4 relevant visuals. Documents will then be judged by our panel with finalists being announced in early April and the first prize winner being announced in May of 2007. The winning design will receive a $5,000 prize payable to the designated recipient of the submitting team.

Critical to the all submission in this category are the following criteria:

* Work must be original and produced by a full-time student in a qualified two-year, or four-year institution, or high-school during either Fall 2006 or spring 2007.

* Work must define a problem the game is intended to solve. This includes not only stating the problem but providing some underlying logic to the problem, and demonstrate some strong knowledge of the challenges faced by the particular area the game is meant to contribute to. For example, we know that a huge problem with weight gain is that it happens casually over time for many people. How does this happen? What are the particulars of the problem, is there any basic support research or observation for this, etc.

* Work must then detail a game or game-based application that attempts to answer some aspect of the problem as defined in your design document. A critical judging factor is the ability for the document to properly define a problem, and then sync a creative game-based solution to the problem as defined. Poorly defined problems, or games which speak to the generality of the problem as defined or which seem dubious toward solving the problem will score lower.

* Submission must include at least three visual design aides. These need not be master works of art. They must however provide some strong capability for judges to understand how the game will work and how the user will interact with the software. Wireframe diagrams, mock ups that cut and paste elements together from other games, basic screen diagrams are all more then sufficient. The quality is in how well they communicate how the game will work and demonstrate strong design ideas, not the overall quality of the artwork itself. Documents may provide more then three diagrams - the more that add to the document and play a meaningful role, the better.

* Documents must include a technical and budget feasibility section. You must define some basic level of how the game will be constructed (what critical technologies will it use, what platform(s) will it run on, how much will it cost to develop? These need not be extreme technical dissertations. They will be evaluated for how well they demonstrate you have a realistic cost and technology assessment as part of your submission. Cost is NOT a large factor in the competition. Accuracy of costs is. A game which is $5 million to produced and is accurately described will be judged as well as a game that costs $250,000 and is accurately described.

* We encourage all submissions to include a section that details game-play influences and ideas from other games that have informed your design. A strong document will consider how it fits in with the many genres, and styles of play commercial games have achieved over the past 30 years.

* We encourage all treatments to include a single page mock up of an advertisement, flyer, or the box art that might be used for your idea were it to be built. This is a great way to demonstrate how the game would work - see our examples here:

* Documents should be no more then 10-12 pages including basic diagrams.

Posted by Ben at 12:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

As part of our rollout for the Games for Health Competition we're hosting a series of conference calls that will allow participants to ask questions and get advice from project co-founder Ben Sawyer.

The dates and times of the calls will be:

October X: 12pm-3pm EDT
October XX: 12pm-3pm EDT

Posted by Ben at 11:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)