Pixel Madness 2013

A competition where one side has a great disadvantage compared to the other, and this isn't accounted for in the rules, is hardly a competition at all. I'm sorry you don't understand this.

Again, there is no way to know who has an advantage or disadvantage without having seen the results of a round unable to see completion. :) The rules were few and open to interpretation, which in my mind implies perhaps it wasn't that serious a 'competition' to begin with. I'm sorry that you feel I don't understand, but thank you for taking the effort to attempt explaining.

Anyway, I hope that everything gets worked out soon and that this doesn't discourage competitions or events in the future. If anything this is all something we can learn from.

Meh, I'm not understanding him either.

I highly doubt edits and frankensprites will make it very far since the tournament rounds has themes.  If something is chosen that isn't found in the RTP, those people will have a pretty difficult time stitching something together.  If they try to pass off someone else's work as their own then they would be disqualified for plagiarism.

what do you think frankenspriting IS?

hint: it's passing off someone else's work as your own

I was referring to taking pieces of the RTP and making something new from it since those are open for editing.  For plagiarism I was referring to taking something someone else actually created.

The issue I have (and I have to thank Touch for providing a rebound board in IRC for me to work this out) is that the standards for a good frankensprite and the standards for a good scratch sprite are different. I need to be able to tell them apart in a competition so I know what lens to use when looking at them. There are different things to look for, and if I'm looking at something as if it's a scratch sprite while it's a frankensprite, I can easily overlook some common editing mistakes that might affect its score.


If you're confident in your ability editing sprites, you shouldn't be afraid to have it judged on those merits. I don't want these labelled just so I can vote them all a 1 without looking at them, you know.

Worth pointing out that that was just the qualifying round and at least 4 people (including me) whipped something up the day before in a hurry so the event would not be cancelled. Mine was the Joker sprite (i think it was "J") and it is far from an example of the best i can do. I have only been making sprites for like 2 weeks but i am getting better quickly thanks to advice and criticism on the forum. I entered to be a part of a fun event, i don't want or care about the prize and i don't care how other people make their sprites. Originals like that entry with the bandages and the little sword on its hip (which was FANTASTIC whoever made that) will always stand out from recolors and frankensprites anyway. Harden the frak up princesses :p

Sad to see something small ruin something that is meant to help the community. In the end, the point of the contest is the concept. Whether it is or isn't frankensprited, in the end its how well you pull it off. If someone who completely frankensprited something from the RTP wins over someone who did something from scratch, then all I can say is good job.

also, some sprites from the 2011 Pixel Madness:



Not trying to call anyone out. Just saying that these sprites look at least 75% frankensprited/generated and they were allowed to enter.

My final reasoning is that there is that even if people who don't know the rtp come in and give a certain sprite say like a 5, that means it looked good whether it was frankened or not. If you think you're as good as the RTP, then you should have no worries because they would give you the same rating. And then it would be the people who know what is the RTP or not that would vote on sprites that are original. So if anything, having frankensprites sets a system that weeds out anyone below the level of the RTP.

do you not see how insulting it is to ask a real artist to be happy to have the same rating as someone who can use copy and paste?

edit:

if we had a different contest like a "frankensprite contest" that might be really fun—i might even enter, because everybody would be on equal grounds. likewise, a contest with original stuff would be great. but if you mix and match the two, then you run into a problem. they're different things. imagine a world tournament of checkers, except that half of the player aren't as good as the other half, so they get to move their pieces in both directions while the good players can only move forward.

but the idea that some people spend multiple hours creating something from nothing can only hope to get the same score as someone who does a headswap is the absolutely wrong kind of message that we should be sending.

Hmm...maybe I worded that wrong. I'm not asking that artist be happy with being given the same rating. I'm just saying that mathematically, the vote would cancel each other out.

srry. I could still be incorrect :S The last paragraph of that post was a bit rushed

Then, as a real artist, make sure you're leagues better than someone who can use copy and paste. ;)

Blow them out of the water. Show them how it's done. Impress the hell out of viewers so that they think the copy-and-paste piece sucks.

Agreed, this was the only thing that really bothered me. I know this is all for fun and I don't really want to make this a huge deal, but stuff like this should be said. I am sorry if anyone is upset. I can't speak for everyone but I certainly had no intention of stopping the contest.

Or just label them both so it doesn't take a Chariots of Fire-tier heroic effort to outdo someone who took ten minutes and mashed a couple of Looseleaf characters together?

and spend ten hours to just to be able to beat someone who took all of ten minutes?

you are an artist. you should understand why that is a slap to the face.

okay serious suggestion: lets just have a frankenspriting competition, instead. there aren't enough active pixel artists to have a real pixel tournament. we avoid insulting the people who would otherwise create something original by pairing them with someone who makes headswaps. the challenges could be fun (provide three characters and tell us to make something using pieces from them). it keeps the playing field level, and more people will enter.

In the end I'm not disagreeing with des. I completely understand with what you're saying, and as an artist myself, I know the feeling.

I am just trying to encourage the contest to continue. I apologize if I offended you.

I was gonna go to bed, and in a 'bout of crazy brought on by a lack of sleep, some part of me wondered.

What if it were the other way around?

"They should be disqualified. I thought this was an RTP contest. You said it had to be RTP style and they're using their own."

"They made their stuff by hand. How do we even know they actually made it?"

... There weren't any rules that said the sprites had to be made from scratch...

*stares into the void with a crazed gaze*

That's a very silly scenario with nothing to add to the discussion.

Well i feel like somebody just kicked over my legos . *goes back to practicing*

I'm sorry, des, but I don't feel threatened or offended by it. If it takes 10 hours to make something better than it took a person to do in 10 minutes, then maybe there's a bigger issue at hand.

Frankenspriting can only take a person so far. And I'd like to believe that the people in charge of the contest would be creating challenges that are hard to do through frankenspriting.

Yeah, once themes are posted I don't think it'll be much of a problem. All the same, though, it couldn't hurt to be transparent about the methods used to make the entries.