getting badges onto games

Clarification: I shouldn’t have conflated this question with a mild rant about inappropriate ratings, but I did. The question is: Greg, can I do anything more to increase the chance of your putting badges on my games?

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This is basically a question for Greg, but I’m posting it here because a) it’s interesting and b) I think it’s got more chance of being answered here.

So it seems that games are now getting down-rated for not having badges, as well as badges being too difficult/easy/the wrong colour.

(For example: amazing game! Its awsome I favorited. but 1/5 cause it dont gots no badge )

Okay, that’s a bit extreme – only idiots like francais don’t know that developers can’t add badges to their games, and also that down-rating a game prevents it getting badges. But there’s many more favourable comments on many games like “needs a badge”. I for one would really like my games to get badges on, and I would help all I could to get them.

And I recently noticed that a couple of games by DigYourOwnGrave ‘immediately’ got badges – exactly in line with an achievement system reported in-game and exposed via the Kong API (it also gives awards on the digyourowngrave site, or something).

So, I wonder, does doing this give you a better chance of your game getting Kongregate badges? Okay, so both games now have quite high ratings, but a third game (Which doesn’t seem to have internal achievements reported to the kong system) has a similar rating, and doesn’t have any badges.

I mean, I can see how this might make your (if you==Greg) job easier – the graphics are done, the badge is named, the API interaction conferring the badge is debugged. When working to a deadline I’d imagine that it would be nice to have these as at least a fall-back. So – does it give games which do this preferential treatment – or not?

I can’t say for myself, but I thought that pretty much every game with a fully implimented API gets the badges.

But I really wanted to post about the slightly off-topic ratings thing. Almost every damn game I play, I look at the comments and I see some numbskull post something like:

“5/5, but I can’t get past the final level, it’s impossible. so 1/5”. or: “awsome game, but insert special attack here doesn’t work, so I gave it 1/5”. or: “Even though this game ha s no badges, I have a problem with this thing that is totally impossible to know about unless I’ve played this game for at least 30 hours+!!! 1/5”. (ok so they don’t say that, but clearly they played the game for a longass time given their complaint, and there is no reason to unless they were enjoying it).. a real example of the above was for Kongai

“WTF I have 100 wins and I don’t have ONE CARD WON YET!!! 1/5” And I’m here scratching my head thinking uhh.. don’t play a game so long that you have 100 wins if it’s a 1/5 game nub-sauce.

Well consider this: Most of the games that receive badges are considered for badges based on their average scores. So if you rate something 1/5 because it DOESN’T have badges, then you’re only DECREASING the chances that the game has of receiving badges anytime in the near future.

My advice: Rate games based on their content. If you think a game deserves a badge, then you would be better off giving it a 5/5.

I can’t say for myself, but I thought that pretty much every game with a fully implimented API gets the badges.

That’s nowhere near true. If a game doesn’t get a high rating it won’t get badges¹. Basically my question above is whether games can get badges if they have a somewhat lower rating – if they make it easy.

You’re right about the annoying comments and unfair ratings though – and I have to say that along with the craze of randomly claiming that games are stolen (which Greg has recently attempted to mitigate) they are rather tarnishing Kong’s reputation with many developers.

[1] Hidden treasures week excepted.

ive always though that kongregate needed to administer a test for all users and unless they pass the test with 100% of the questions correct they cannot rate games or post in the forums. (there would be a tutorial before the test of course) various questions would be “how do you become a mod,” “how do games get badges,” “what does the number next to your username mean” etc. this way only people who werent idiots and understood that developers dont awards badges to their own games would be allowed to rate. (of course some idiots would get through just by being dedicated and memorizing every question on the test but props to them for being so stalwart) this would need to be a long test when many common sense questions and repeated questions in different words just to make sure people got the picture.

also, important forum topics like the one greg made on stolen games should have a link posted on the front page of kongregate so people know to look at it. compared to the number of users on kong not many look at the forums but a large number do spam suspicious games.

also, the site www.****inggoogleit.com should be required reading.

Wouldn`t that like, scare off people? I wanna play a game, with a point/level system over a whole load of games, but I have to fill out crap over the next 15 minutes…

The people “who want it now” (not including me) will probably move away. Since kongregate likes to attract people (and developers, that even don`t care about the rating point/level system because they just want to post their game (there are some of those – not all of them…)) – It would totally be against that.

Badge-whining is one of my most hated things here. Every game, every other comment, “needs badges”. UGH. It should be considered spam.

Every game, every other comment, “needs badges”. UGH.

When I see that on one of my games, I’m quite flattered – I read it to mean that the commentor thinks the game is worth wider recognition. Of course, I wouldn’t appreciate people down-rating because it doesn’t already have them, but as far as I know thats pretty rare.

Some people are stupid, live with it.

API is required for a game to get badges. If a game does not send any scores at all to Kongregate, no badges can be given out. If you have an in-game system already giving awards for reaching certain scores, it’s easier to make badges out of it, but this doesn’t mean you’re completely preferred over games that don’t have this thing. As long as you have API and a decent rating, you’re definitely a potential (some games having that still don’t get badges due to various reasons).

pimgd:if they didnt care about the post and level rating then why would having to take a test in order to rate games scare them off?

Greg, can I do anything more to increase the chance of your putting badges on my games?

Making better games?

If its better, the higher the rating, and the quicker that greg will take a look at it.

Better? Hmm… Add RPG elements, achievements and make the game shallow and easy. People lap that shit up.

Making better games?

If its better, the higher the rating, and the quicker that greg will take a look at it.

Well, duh! I already make my games as good as I can. A high rating doesn’t necessarily mean better though – as phooltk says, it often means shallow and easy. And if your game is good enough, in the past it’s had a good chance of being accused of being stolen-after which the ratings plummet (although Greg has recently been trying to prevent this). But doing that’s just boring.

Rating doesn’t always mean better though

The problem is visibility on this website means a higher rating.

I totally said my post wrong.

I’m not saying all games with a high rating are good games. I still confused how Pandemic 2 got good rating, for example.

Whilst, unfortunatly, rating means visibilty and the other way around. If you don`t get something up and high and into the “Hot new games” section, its very likely to kinda stay dead.

Greg, can I do anything more to increase the chance of your putting badges on my games?

Make games that get higher ratings. I do a lot of different things at Kongregate, but I try to make badges relatively impartial and objective because I want to be fair to developers who might not be active in our community, dealing with me through sponsorships, or chatting it up with me over AIM. I want the system to be clear to everyone — make a good game that people like, implement our API cleanly, and your game will get badges.

So it seems that games are now getting down-rated for not having badges, as well as badges being too difficult/easy/the wrong colour.

This is brought up occasionally, but it’s purely anecdotal. Anyone who watches ratings closely can clearly see that most badges/challenges actually lower a game’s rating.

And I recently noticed that a couple of games by DigYourOwnGrave ‘immediately’ got badges – exactly in line with an achievement system reported in-game and exposed via the Kong API (it also gives awards on the digyourowngrave site, or something).

Here are some things that worked in Dig Your Own Grave’s favor:

1. The games are very highly rated.

2. They’re simple and quick to get into, but addictive, and with some good depth.

3. The developer made himself available over MSN, and very quickly made a few API changes that I requested.

So yeah, I know it was kind of weird to have 2 games in a row by the same developer, but if someone else uploads 2 great games that are pretty different and helps fix the API immediately on demand, I wouldn’t have a problem with featuring 5 games in a row by the same person.

The in-game achievements did make my job easier, but partially because I liked how they were done. I felt that they were already pretty well-balanced, and having names/images didn’t hurt either. This isn’t an automatic qualifier, though — as much as I enjoyed Scope: First Blood, I wasn’t a big fan of the in-game achievements, so I opted to ignore them.

I mean, I can see how this might make your (if you==Greg) job easier – the graphics are done, the badge is named, the API interaction conferring the badge is debugged. When working to a deadline I’d imagine that it would be nice to have these as at least a fall-back. So – does it give games which do this preferential treatment – or not?

It did help, yes, and it did make my job easier. But it didn’t make it trivial, because, like I said, I requested a few API changes. And I didn’t realize that it was done this way until after I saw the game’s rating and decided they would be good candidates for badges. So I can’t say that they really helped the games get badges in the first place.

I really, really, really can’t emphasize enough how much user ratings determine which games get badges. Yes, I’ll make exceptions now and then, but really, if your game has a good rating, the odds of getting badges are pretty high.

Look at the top-rated games across the whole site. Look at the first 14 pages — the 210 highest-rated games on Kongregate. 210, that’s a lot, right? The 210 best. Going down the list, here are the ones that currently do not have badges, along with an explanation of why:

Bowmaster Prelude – No API

Fancy Pants Adventure: World 2 demo – badges are in full version instead

Electricman2HS – No API

Arcane – Really long game, I’m working on them!

Epsilon – API is broken

Chaos Faction – API breaks game (in Soviet Russia…)

Endless War 3 – API does not report levels already completed

Momentum Missile Mayhem – Badges are in second version instead, which is largely the same game

Free Rider 2 – No API, but badges would be pretty much impossible

Storm the House 2 – No API

Telepath RPG Chapter 2 – another long game that I’m still working on

Drunken Masters – API does not report checklists already completed

Boomshine – No API

RagDoll Cannon – API does not report levels individually, so password exploit messes things up

Ragdoll Laser Dodge – Okay, no excuse for this one, I should add them at some point

The Missile Game 3D HS – No API

Hero RPG – Another really long game

Unreal Flash 2007 – No API

Clear Vision 2 – API does not connect

Punk-o-matic – No API, not sure what badges could be

Submachine 4: The Lab – API is broken (in entire series)

Inquisitive Dave – Only a stat for completion, but it would take a while to test, and it’s on my list

NOtessimo – Not much I can do here

New User Tutorial – Er, sorry, I have to exercise SOME editorial judgment

Mud and Blood 2 – No API

Xeno Tactic – No API, and it’s really similar to DTD anyway

Super Energy Apocalypse – API is currently broken, but a new version is coming out soon anyway

Shadez – API is broken, does not report waves completed properly

Newgrounds Card Game – No API

Solar Chiefs – No API

Raft Wars – No API

LRU 3: Darkness Reborn – Okay, no excuse here, I still need to test it

Super Smash Flash – No API

Temple Guardian 2 – Says it’s a beta version, which makes me wary

Submachine 1: The Basement – API is broken

Boombot – No API

Merlin’s Revenge 3 – Shockwave, no API supported

Clear Vision – API is broken

Stickman Madness 3: Stronghold – No excuse here either, I need to test it

More Mindless Violence – No API

Submachine 5 – API is broken

Feel the Beat – Okay, no excuse here either

Bowman 2 – No API

Tank 2008 – No API

Detective Grimoire – API is broken

Ragdoll Cannon 1.5 – Again with the password exploit

Momentum Missile Mayhem 3 – Still pretty new, I need to test it out

Aether – No API

Sift Heads 0 – NO API

Bloons: Player Pack 1 – No API

Zwingo – API is broken

Cosmic Crush – API ONLY reports for survival mode, which is pretty lame

Paladin: The Game – Another long one I just need to sit down with for a day or two

Talesworth Arena – Another pretty complex game I just need to bite the bullet for and learn

DUI – Haven’t tried it out yet

Bowja the Ninja 2 – Only a stat for high score, not for game completion

Ragdoll Cannon 2 – More password excitement

Manifold – Badges in “Fold” instead

Drakojan Skies Acolytes – No API (major sad face)

Escape #2: The Closet – No excuse here, I’ll try to get to it soon

Bloons Player Pack 2 – No API

Impossible Quiz 2 – API is broken

Defender – Badges are in “Protector” instead

Genghis Khan – No API

Book of Mages: The Chaotic Period – No API

Torture Me – I’m again exercizing some editorial discretion here

Unreal Flash 1 – No API

Swords and sandals: Crusader – No API

Duck, Think Outside the Flock – I almost had a badge finished for this once, but I got distracted and forgot about it, whoops

Jack the Fugitive – Some in-game bugs I’d like to see resolved first

Escape #3: The Phonebooth – No API

Monster Basement – No API

Darkness Episode 3 – No API

QWERTY Warriors – API does not segment score by difficulty

Jelly Blocks – No API

Mad Virus – No API

ColourPod 2 – No excuse here, it’s on my list

DropSum 1.3 – Also no excuse

Darkness Episode 2 – No API

Note that SandStorm Racing had a higher score than many of these games near the bottom before it was made yesterday’s challenge.

So, let’s tally up the numbers. Of the 210 top-rated games on the site:

- 62.4% already have badges.

- 17.1% do not have our API.

- 9.0% have broken APIs.

- 7.1% I just haven’t gotten to yet.

- 2.4% were passed over because they had badges put in better versions instead (or will in the future).

- 1.4% were passed over because of a personal editorial decision on my part.

So, basically, if you upload your game to Kongregate, it’s among the 210 highest-rated on the site, and you’ve implemented our API correctly, and it’s not just an older version/demo of something else you have out there, there’s an 87.3% chance that it already has badges assigned to it.

Ratings help. A lot.

Extremely in depth. This should either be linked from the help section or put directly in there.

(and do I detect a hint of ventilation)

Wow greg. Nice!

Arcane – Really long game, I’m working on them!

So Arcane will get badges sometime? People have been begging…alot. I would like some too. Anyways…

Mud and Blood 2 – No API

so if it had API you would work on badges?

That’s a long list Greg. Hows about moar rainbows?

so if it had API you would work on badges?

Yes.

Duck, Think Outside the Flock – I almost had a badge finished for this once, but I got distracted and forgot about it, whoops

Awesome game :D

- 7.1% I just haven’t gotten to yet.

LAME-O. Get to it! :D

Wow. Well, I did want an answer, but that’s more than I expected. Thanks Greg.

I hope that that list was something you’d already essentially prepared for your own use, otherwise it looks like I’ve seriously impacted your productivity for today.

I think most people who are interested know that badges often have a negative effect on ratings (and I know you worry about it), but the important point is that they do always increase a game’s plays. But I’ve watched games move, and sometimes they go up considerably after getting badges (I wasn’t sure whether this had happened to either of the two games I mentioned).

And thanks for answering the question comprehensively. It’s not worth putting your own achievements in a game or going to town on the API – unless you think it’ll increase your rating – as it won’t buy you in to a badge, even in an emergency.

Leaves me with a question though. I know ratings factor in. But games also just got badges (me thinks, atleast) because greg likes them. Does that give an extra “mentionable” bonus aswell? (like the game had actually +0.20 more rating)

I hope that that list was something you’d already essentially prepared for your own use, otherwise it looks like I’ve seriously impacted your productivity for today.

Bleh, no comment. At least I can use this list for my own use from now on, though…

But games also just got badges (me thinks, atleast) because greg likes them.

Sometimes I’ll just throw in a badge to a game that I like, but I don’t usually do that with challenges, which is what decides where most badges go nowadays anyway.

So, are you going to try to get more badges on games, that aren’t challanges?