Planet Minecraft

[Cyprezz]

The first PMC project contest was a huge success in every way. Besides receiving over 600 entries, it was FUN and inspiring to see how individuals and teams started with the same custom island and transformed it into every type of resort you can imagine.

PMC is long overdue for another project contest. Ideally, we'd like to have project contests bi-monthly. We have a few ideas but they're not set in solid stone, more like cobble stone. We're all creative individuals, so why not open up the concept phase to everyone. Which one is chosen will remain a secret to only those required to prepare the contest. I imagine we'll eventually have so many great ideas that I COULD start mini-contests that run simultaneously with the main event but don't necessarily include physical prizes...

What makes a good project contest idea?
Here are a few things that I think we should take into consideration when presenting our project contest ideas:

1) Allow freedom of interpretation and creativity.
If the topic is too specific our individual creativity will not have a chance to produce interesting and diverse results. When considering this point, think about looking at 600+ entries. That many entries of Nyan Cat would get old quick and no one likes moldy pop tarts. What we're brainstorming is an interesting common element that grounds our creativity and ideally inspires us.

2) Wide range appeal but not main stream media
The topic should be reasonably appealing to everyone regardless of demographic including country, age, gender and/or clique. At the same time, I don't feel commercial main stream topics are good topics for project contests. No movies, games, TV shows, products, etc. When considering this point, think beyond yourself and ask whether the other gender, your parents or another culture would be interested in the topic as well.

3) Potential for a Minecraft back story / Custom map.
A back story isn't a requirement but I do feel it's a good creative test. If we have a fun reason/motive for why we're all building around the topic, then it's more likely to inspire us. If we can't come up with some sort of back story then it's less likely to inspire creativity.

Beyond those three points, I think I'd be getting into specifics that would just get in the way of coming up with ideas.

Lastly, there will be a lot of ideas. If you don't like someones idea or if you feel they didn't consider the above, refrain from bashing it. Either ignore, come up with your own or provide constructive criticism: criticism or advice that is useful and intended to help or improve something, often with an offer of possible solutions.

As always, have fun!

[ZaphodX]

<333333

*Eats the hearts*
Oh soz, thought it wuz ice-cream.

How about evil lairs.

[ZaphodX]

I find it hard to think of something which would tick all the boxes and be a great idea for a project. I'm going to throw in the idea we had discussed before though:

An evil villains lair:
Interpret however you want, it's specific enough to mean there's a decent element of uniformity in the similarity of the projects, but still allows for a vast difference in the direction and theme people take it.

I find it hard to think of something which would tick all the boxes and be a great idea for a project. I'm going to throw in the idea we had discussed before though:

An evil villains lair:
Interpret however you want, it's specific enough to mean there's a decent element of uniformity in the similarity of the projects, but still allows for a vast difference in the direction and theme people take it.

Oh whoops, I didn't know that idea was already suggested. Clearly it's a pretty good idea then.

[Charlizard]

I find it hard to think of something which would tick all the boxes and be a great idea for a project. I'm going to throw in the idea we had discussed before though:

An evil villains lair:
Interpret however you want, it's specific enough to mean there's a decent element of uniformity in the similarity of the projects, but still allows for a vast difference in the direction and theme people take it.

This could be done with a superhero's 'base', too.

Just compiling a list of my ideas.

Lover's Getaway
»Steve is quite lonely, and managed to meet a girl Steve-ette at the resort he was staying at. He fell in love when he first heard her squealing on the roller coaster and asked out to dinner.
»Build Steve and Steve-ette's romantic dinner/get-away for two.
»I doubt that will appeal to a lot of the PMC'ers but it does allow for creativity and a whole bunch of ideas.

Pirate Lair
»Steve decided that life is just too boring as a landlubber, so he joined a band of Pirates to take over the seven seas!
»Build Steves Pirate Lair, maybe include secret coves, treasure, ships, fortress's!
»I think this idea allows for a ton of creativity and nearly endless possibilities.

Fantasy Realm
»Steve discovered a mystical portal that teleported him into a strange new realm
»Use your imagination to build this fantasy adventure, include mystical beasts, new type of fantasy architecture
»I think if the community uses this idea right it could be amazing, using different type of building such as elven and so on. You could also build custom mystical tress. This would essentially has no boundaries, as you're creating the realm from scratch and I'm sure you'll get builds that look completely different

The Chasm
»Steve is actually a very clumsy person, and while wandering around his world he managed to finda newly opened chasm in the ground, which he also managed to fall into... and it leads to a huge cavern.
»You could ask everyone to design the world that's inside this huge cavern. It would be interesting to see the type of things people do when they're asked to build underground. I think it could allow for a bunch of creativity but it might be hard to work with.

Shrunken Steve
»Steve had been having trouble sleeping, and when Lunesta didn't work, he made his own sleep potion. After drinking it, he fell asleep in his garden, but when he woke up, everything was so much larger. The potion had caused him to shrink!
»This could be a very interesting topic because players could build large organic structures such as animals and flowers, trees and so on. Not sure how it would play out but it could be quite interesting

Meh. I haz no ideas then.

Organize the months?
For example, one month could be everything pixels, then the next like Cathedral or Medieval, then Futuristic, then Redstone, etc..
That way you get a wide variety per year.
Or you could do 2 weeks/1 week I guess.

I think you forgot to read all of Cyprezz' post.

[Lycandar]

Might as well throw down some of the ideas that have been mentioned before too

Dungeon Crawler
Definetely feels that there could be some crossover with an evil villains lair but i think that this would be more focussed on making traps and monster encounters while still being impressive to look at, the more imaginative the traps the better. For this it would be best to think about traps that can potentially be avoided by a careful player rather than ones that are completely unfair.

Space
Specific enough without being constrictive

Towers
Interesting idea, would be cool to see how people use the new height increase

An Evil villians lair (adding a point on)
Great potential for a continuation of the Super heroes vs Villains skin contest giving more depth to the created characters backstory.

Ships
I think this was mentioned, but i do think these have been done to death on this site already

Castles/Fortresses
Ties in with alot of the mentioned ideas so there's defintely some overlap but still an interesting topic

Here's some i'm just going to throw out for the hell of it:

Haunted House
No idea how well this would work but i just like the concept of it

Aquarium
Same as before, though i think there might be alot less focus on structures which could work against it.

Winterwonderland
Broad Topic but i don't know how many ideas people would have in it.

Themeparks/Waterparks
I like the idea but maybe it's too close to the first contest.

How about airships/ aircraft?
Massive rage for imagination and creativity.
And everyone loves a good airship!