fundamental flaw with GDC?

[antoineft]

Before I start this post, I just want to say that I know the GDC (Game Design Committee) has an incredibly difficult task each year in trying to please so many of the brightest minds on the planet. They should be applauded for the amazing job that they do. What I’m about to propose was already slightly started in this thread http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...&highlight=GDC however I would like to take it a step further.

As I understand it, the GDC is purposely composed entirely of individuals who are not directly involved with any specific team. This is kind of like getting a group of the best car designers in the world together to design a great car, but then making sure they never drive it! Anyone else see a slight flaw here? Wouldn’t it be beneficial to have people involved right from the start who are looking at the game from a builders/players perspective?


The Proposition: FIRST appoints a GAME APPROVAL COMMITTEE (GAC) sounds cool to say eh
- A select group of 5-10 experienced FIRST mentors who may or may not be currently on a team would get full disclosure about the upcoming game
- This committee would be involved early on and would be able to modify the final product or possibly even help in development
- Each member would be approved by they GDC
- These individuals would sign a non-disclosure agreement about any details related to the game
- The GAC is banned from pre-designing their own teams robot, of course they will have ideas, but they are not to draw or CAD up anything. They can be trusted with this on the basis of Gracious Professionalism
- Even with the above point, these mentors will provide an advantage to their team even if they don’t speak about it until after kick-off… my take on this is so what? I would gladly give this advantage to 5-10 teams in FIRST so that the other 1,700 teams have a richer experience! I mean the beta teams this year had the new controller months ahead of the rest of us and did anyone notice a problem there? I didn’t.


Who is on the GAC?
I’m not really the one to make the call on this one, but here’s some thoughts I had:
1) The GDC chooses, much like the beta teams were chosen to test the cRIO this past year
2) I like this one --> Each team in the finals on Einstein from the previous year (6 teams total) as an added reward would send one of their team mentors. Can you imagine how that would have played out this year? it would mean that the game would have been approved and tweaked by Karthik Kanagasabapathy (team 1114), Paul Copioli (team 217), and JVN (team 148)… wow, I can only imagine!


I’m a big fan of the game this year, but I think there were some real issues with some of the rules that detracted from the overall game experience, and after talking with people at some of the regionals, I know I’m not alone in these thoughts. And I’m pretty sure having a GAC in place as proposed would have made the necessary changes before kick-off.

As with any year though, FIRST never really has a bad year, its one of the most amazing experiences you’ll ever have and we’re always coming back for more!

Anybody willing to back this idea?