First off, thank you to everyone that has posted their concepts, comments, concerns, conundrums, counsel, complaints, consists, considerations, and other things that start with "c". They are most appreciated, and every one of them has been read, reviewed, and passed along to the appropriate game designers. If you have more ideas, we still want to hear them – keep 'em coming!
Also, I want to ask for a little help in answering a question that has me stumped. Several of the posts have suggested having a game design that will allow real time display of scores to the audiences as the game progresses. It is suggested this will pull the audience into the game a little more, and get them more involved. But coming up with a reliable, accurate way to do this that does not interrupt the flow of the game may be problematic.
Consider this: sports that keep running scores during the course of the game stop the game after each score to confirm that the points are valid and appropriate. Only after the score/goal is verified are the points posted and the game proceeds. For example, in basketball, football, fencing, lacrosse, and soccer the game is stopped when a goal is scored. The points are posted and the game clock restarted only after the score is confirmed. Tennis, baseball, golf, gymnastics, and archery don’t have to worry about a clock. Things like skiing, racing, and swimming worry only about the clock and don’t worry about an accurate real-time display of points.
I have been trying to think of a counter-example where this is not true, to form an existence proof that the idea of accurate real-time running scores during a timed match is something that is achievable. So here is the question: can anyone think of a sport or game or event that has a fixed amount of game time (i.e. there is a game clock) and a running score, where the game is NOT stopped after each score? The only ones that I could come up with that were even close were boxing and full-contact karate; points are accumulated during the course of the fight, but not displayed to the audience or participants until the bout is over, so this is still an imperfect example. Can anyone come up with a better one?
-dave lavery
FIRST Executive Advisory Board
p.s. I recognize that one way around this is to not require that the score displayed during the play of the game be 100% accurate, and all scores are subject to verification by the judges after the round ends. But that can end up causing more problems than it solves when displayed scores are revised by the judges and the audience is confused, etc.
p.p.s I really liked Lauren’s idea of "sharpened stakes in pits with cobras to feed food blocks for quadruple the points." LMAO!
