Conclusion
I wouldn't say that the event was a total failure, but obviously there were some holes that affected the experience.
First, here's a list that went right:
- For many people, this became a learning experience, as they had to make something in a limited amount of time, and it also pushed themselves to make things they never did before, for instance I was really surprised by asid61's render of all three bots
- The event was also an opportunity to connect with people from different teams.
Now things that went wrong:
- The "game manual"... well... it had a lot of missing elements. So much that you don't even need robots to win. There were also a lot of things unclear about the game
- Naming conventions: My group had a parts number, but with file paths, the folder name had to be the same for all members, and that was an issue for a bit
- The game didn't have a low goal option
- Software conflicts wasn't a problem as much, but there was one group where they had the same software, but different versions, and that could've been fixed very easily.
Despite these things, I still plan to do another one of these during the summer, and I have a few ideas in mind that could make this better:
- Not designing the challenge alone
- Make it a multi-day event, so that there's more time to elaborate on some parts, and so that in case someone can't make it on one day, there's always the following day.
- Make a better game
. Perhaps even start now in designing a game
Thank you to everyone for participating, and let's hope to make the next one better!