Pay-to-Play on-line Virtual Competitions

[Mark McLeod]

In FIRST's current survey they asked the question:

43. If FIRST were to develop pay-to-play on line virtual competitions would members of your team be interested in participating?

Only team Captains answer FIRST for the student viewpoint, so I pose the question to the rest of you.

Would an FRC version of Xbox Live or World of Warcraft on-line community appeal to you?

Would it appeal to teenagers not on a robotics team and draw them in?

[Nick Lawrence]

That would be awesome.

It would be a huge benefit during early weeks of the season to learn to play the new game.

-Nick

[Jared Russell]

It would require a VERY good physics engine and design/construction editor to entice me.

[Mark McLeod]

There'd have to be careful thought about how to make it self-supporting and attractive year-round, rather than just during our design and build season.

It would be interesting to be able to take robots from multiple years and invent new games they can play together (Calvin Ball).

Maybe the Game Design Committee could use it to prototype future game elements and experiment with game concepts to see how they might play out.

[techtiger1]

This is intriguing. I think FIRST should talk to Microsoft to see if they can borrow the all powerful Bungie Co. for some help. =).

[JesseK]

For me it depends on the platform and implementation. If it requires that I go out and buy a gaming system, then I wouldn't be interested at all.

On the flip side, I would definitely be interested in it if I could develop plugins or mods for it and it were a PC-based platform.

[Tanner]

I think it would be fun to participate in if it was easily accesible.

As far as non-members of the team participating, I think it would be hard for them to find it without first introduction from a robotics team.

It could be a nice thing to show people what everything is about.

If it were to be created, I'd like to try it first before paying for the service (I've never done any such services like this so, I'm not sure what is "standard" stuff). Wouldn't like to pay for it and then find I can't do x while online or find out I'm playing Overdrive with real race cars.

Would be also nice if it could be played on a local network for free, to easily make regionals and other club associated activities a bit more fun.

If would use it if I could use it across multiple platforms, but I don't think that'd be in the first edition. I wouldn't want to buy a certain controller (i.e. XBox 360 or joystick) just to play it.

-Tanner

[JamesCH95]

It would be very difficult to capture the multitude of unique robot designs, it strikes me that it may wind up being quite routine if autonomous moves always worked, there were never mechanical failures, and everyone started with a fresh battery.

It could be pulled off, and I would definitely be interested in it, but it would require a masochistic level of attention to each model detail, and some very creative "random errors and failures" algorithms, to be engaging and interesting.

[Chris is me]

I would probably not pay. Why not play a different game with a bigger target audience without having to play?

Maybe like, $10 a year for multiplayer Breakaway, if the game works well, allows for strategizing, etc.

On that note, anyone up for online Breakaway via 5th gear? (pm me)

[RoboMom]

Is this different than 5th gear?

[huberje]

There is a game I used to play for the Xbox called Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts. I mention this because in the game, you were able to create complete vehicles from scratch using pre-made blocks of various shapes. Besides a few building limitations and the physics engine, it was awesome.

I don't know much about computers or game-designing, but it would be interesting to see if it's possible to have the online FIRST game be able to import robots from a special version of Inventor.

Pay to Play? Maybe not. It would depend on how it looks.

[Koko Ed]

It would be really cool if you could design and implement game designs kind of like they used to do when people designed levels of Doom for Deathmatches back in the day.

[Wildcat]

so in simple terms it would be something line playing the 5th gear match simulator, only over the internet with others?

[O'Sancheski]

i thinks it would be great to have on xbox live... it would draw teenagers in and even mentors... over 3 million people have xbox live and i think it would be a great opprotunity... someone in first should contact bungie or activision since they are the most popular gave diveoplers

[Bjenks548]

I have to ask... what is 5th gear? and i think this is an awsome idea but im not paying a ton of money for it