As of a few months ago, I started a new SMP server for me and my friends to play on.
The tricky thing is, getting them to actually keep playing the game for longer than a week or 2 💀

We all know the memes of starting a server once every 3 months, just to play it for 2 weeks maximum, and our friend group is not an exception to that rule. Usually, we start with a big group and end up with just 2 or 3 people actively playing after a week or so.

To try to keep people engaged, I thought I'd introduce a themed building contest every week, with small in-game prizes for people who participate and bigger prizes for the winner (including a custom trophy that fits with the theme). This turned out to be a big success! People who otherwise wouldn't know what to do or would give up on a build halfway through would actually get inspired to make a build for the contest and send it in on time!

We are now on our 4th iteration and in each iteration the contest has improved.
- Going from 1 week for building to 2 weeks to give people with less free time some more time to build.
- Adding a "Bonus Round" that allows people to send in anything they like so that people who have an idea for a build that doesn't fit the theme are also encouraged to keep building.
- Adding optional diversifiers to spark new ideas for building
- Adding more fitting rewards as players start to obtain rare items by themselves already.
- Letting everyone vote on the new theme and allowing them to send in theme suggestions on Discord.

The fact that we are still playing the game after a few months is already a huge win to me. It's so much fun to finally get more into mid/late game with a lot of my friends who would normally only play during the early game, to then never return to the server and it's amazing to see what they come up with and build for each new contest!

I'd like to try to keep improving on this concept by adding more engaging contests and events to encourage people to play more.
I'm noticing now that people have a hard time committing to bigger projects. Perhaps we should have separate events for shorter and longer projects?

Let me know if you guys have any ideas on how to improve on this or perhaps you have some cool ideas for themes or diversifiers!



Thanks for reading :)