I'm on a mission to get reviews of all the non-comp IF games of 2005.
Well, okay, if not not all, then as many as possible. Well, okay, there
are a few exceptions. I don't care to review all the year's AIF games
or all the new ports of Colossal Cave Adventure. But this is still a
big project, and I'm looking for some help.

Fortunately, I have a plan. The plan is at:

http://www.springthing.net/noncomp/noncomp2005.htm

It is a highly complex plan, but in a nutshell it involves recruiting a
group of people, called the Crack Team of People Who Said They'd Help
Out. The Crack Team then proceeds to review the year's non-comp games.

Already there are a small handful of people in the Crack Team. You can
join too! The details are at:

http://www.springthing.net/noncomp/noncomp2005.htm

To talk to me about this venture, email me as soon as you've looked at
the web page. Tell me what games you might be interested in reviewing.
In the meantime, I will be looking at all the games on the list and
thus may soon be able to do a decent job of matching up games with
reviewers who may be interested in them. My email is:

______________________dot_com
_____at_gregboettcher
greg

Note #1. The Non-Comp Review Project does not intend to compete with
such places as SPAG and IF-Review. That's why we accept previously
published reviews. However, the converse isn't true; SPAG and IF-Review
generally don't accept previously published reviews, so make plans
accordingly if you want maximum fame and prestige. (I'm not sure how
other places work, like brasslantern.org.) Alternately, you could post
your NCRP review right here on rgif anytime you want, before or after
the NCRP comes out.

Note #2. Want to write a review and have it appear in SPAG before the
NCRP comes out? SPAG's last non-comp-related issue of 2005 is coming
out very soon; the deadline for submitting reviews is September 25
(next weekend)! Ideally, if you want your review to appear in both
places, write to me beforehand to make sure that the game you're
reviewing isn't also being reviewed by another NCRP project person.

Note #3. I'm not meaning to take any glory away from the IF Comp
either. I really scrambled to get this all put together before the IF
Comp voting period begins, and I'll make no mention of it again until
well after the voting period ends. Make sure to play the comp games,
too, in addition to any non-comp stuff you might do.

That's it! I hope to hear from a few people. Thanks!

Thanks, and a great idea,

Also, some of the previous reviews are quite long. I don't think most
reviewers would say no if I asked to print an abridged version of their
review, but you never know. I think short-ish reviews (750 words or
less) are very helpful when they are to appear in a collection of 40+
reviews.

As an example, take Jimmy Maher's review of Wumpus 2000. It's a great
review, and it's tempting to just ask him for permission to use it
right now. However, if my review project inspires anybody to write an
all-new review of the game, I'd rather print the new review. So I'll
hold off on asking for Jimmy's permission until later.

The other thing is, some previous reviews are too long for my
collection. I don't anticipate any problems with getting permission to
use abridged versions of them, but you never know.

But I will certainly start seeking to reprint past reviews if
necessary. It'll work better than than me writing reviews of 20+ games
as I did last year!

"Greg Boettcher" wrote in news:1127093490.009797.223290
@g47g2000cwa.googlegroups.com:

[snip]

Basically it serves almost the exact same purpose of the "IFReviews
Organization", announced here several months ago, which has already a
home at www.ifreviews.org, with the purpose of gathering under a single
'roof' as many if games reviews as possible, independent of the
year/idiom/system in which they were created/played.

The major change that i read about your project is that you will link to
other sites and users reviews, while in my project i will have the
reviewers enter the review themselves at the site. And allow other
reviewers to rate their reviews. So at ifreviews.org you will find the
rates that the reviewer gave a particular game but also the rates that
other reviewers gave to a particular review. It might sound confusing
but it's quite simple actually.

The actual content of the site is still (due to several personal issues)
in beta-testing. While there havent been much changes on the actually
online version, several changes have been made (on a local server), in
particular to the internal structure of the data, which will only be
updated to the server when all is checked.

I guess another if reviews project is always a good thing for the if
community and as such I wish you all the best this new project.

Kind Regards,
RootShell

As Mike said, my project was around last year, too. I announced it in
the newsgroups last January.

http://www.springthing.net/noncomp/noncomp2004.htm

That's roughly what this year's project will look like when it's
completed.

Here's what I can promise:
-- I'll twist the arm of those who are giving me reviews for my
project. Some may even submit their reviews to your site before they
appear on my site.
-- I'll submit the 20 or so reviews I wrote last year to your site.
I'll also write to the others who worked on that project and ask them
to send their reviews to you.
-- I'll link to your site from all of the review pages on my site.

However, you may have to give me until next week to follow through on
these things. My hands are tied with the numerous things I'm working on
right at the moment.

I dont feel disapointed by the announce of your project, on the
contrary, I really think it's a great idea! And I really wish you all
the best (make no mistake about it) with it, and to prove what im
saying I decided to post this message here instead of emailing it to
you in private.

I really would like to make sure that everyone understands that im not
in any way against your project, nor do i have a reason to be.

All I stated was that I was in the proccess of trying to achive
something similar, and nothing more than that.

It's important for IF that people get involved in projects like our's!

There's no need to promise anything  to me (well except that you will
try to deliver some of your ifreviews to this project :] ), I do
believe that your intentions were/are/will be good.

As for my personal project, it began with a post that was placed here
some time ago (almost a year i guess) by another IF gamer about he's
difficulty of finding reviews for particular games that did not enter
the anual competitions. That's when I decided to use some of my free
database/hosting space to provide that service free of charge to the IF
Community.

I trully expect the participation of the IF community to surprise us
both, since this is a area that still has a lot of potencial to grow.

Like in other actual "consumer" areas, the "consumer" likes to be very
well informed prior to "purchase" something, here the "consumer" is the
IF gamer and the "purchase" is the game he will play.

Well I guess that everyone already got the idea, so I will stop :)

Once again, best of luck with your project.

Kind Regards,
RootShell