[ehfeinberg]

Originally Posted by EricH

"Cool factor" should never be the driving factor for a design choice. "Correct" answers for this would include anything related to functionality.

Coolness is a perfectly good design factor depending on your teams priorities. If your team wants to build something they want to build, and work on inspiring people with something that they are interested in, then coolness is a big factor in the design. However, if you just want to go out there and win, coolness isn't such a large factor in the design process.

Take this year for example, my team decided to pursue a top rung climber even though it is a big stretch for my team. We decided to go after this idea and not just be a run-of-the-mill shooter because we were excited about it. We might not succeed, and it might not be the best way to win, but hey, we will have a lot of fun building it on the way.

Although I agree that coolness shouldn't be the main design factor, different teams have different priorities, and thus hold the coolness factor to different levels of importance.