How to Enter

The following instructions will help you in preparing your entry for submission. Please note that you do not need to 'register' or doing anything prior to the steps outlined below.

Step 1 - Create an author.txt file

Using Notepad (or any text editor of your choice) create a file called author.txt. Place it with your game EXE. This file must contain:

1. Game Version number (see below)
2. Put 'Software' or 'Hardware' to signify how this game should be categorised
3. Your full real name (not your forum name)
4. Your postal address, including country of residence
5. Your email address

This file will be REMOVED when we make your game available for download.
We respect your privacy. This file is for competition administration purposes only.

You can optionally include a back-up email address. We will email you if you win a prize, so it makes sense to ensure we can contact you. If you do not respond to our "You've Won" email within 7 days you forfeit your prize, so please ensure your email address works! Configure your junk/spam filters to allow email from 'thegamecreators.com' domain.

Game Version number: We often find that developers send us their game, then frantically email saying "I've made an update / found a bug, can I send a new version?". If the deadline hasn't expired then the answer is of course: Yes! But we will use the author.txt file to determine what is the most recent version you've sent us. So the first time you send us a game you put: Version 1. If you send us another version, put: Version 2. And so on. You can submit your game as many times as you like, just make sure you keep increasing this version number, because we'll use it to work out what the final version of your game was.

Step 2 - ZIP it all up

Using whatever compression program you like create a single ZIP file of your game. Make sure you have included everything - the exe, all media it needs, the author.txt, etc. You cannot use any other compression format other than .ZIP. Once compressed check the zip file is 50MB in size or less (that's 52,428,800 bytes).

Step 3 - Send your game to us

You have 5 options available:

Email Attachment. If your game is small enough for your email system to handle, then you can email it to us. Send us just the zip file please. Email it to: compofiles@thegamecreators.com. We will reply to acknowledge receipt.

File Upload Service. There are lots of services on the web such as YouSendIt.com where you can upload a file using your browser, for delivery to us. This is a good option if you don't have your own web site or FTP experience. Here is how to use YouSendIt.com: Enter our email address as the 'Recipient' (compofiles@thegamecreators.com), select the zip file of your game (click Browse) and then click 'Send It'. Nice and simple. You will receive an email from us when we have your file.

Web Space. If you have your own web site you can upload your game there, then email us a link to download it from.

FTP. You can upload your game to our FTP server. The details are: Server: ftp.thegamecreators.com, Login: anonymous: Password: anything. Put your game into the /incoming/ directory. This is a WRITE ONLY folder, that means you will not be able to see the contents of this folder, nor your game after it has uploaded. This is quite normal (it's called 'security'), but you CAN upload here. If you are an FTP noob then we suggest picking another option. If you wish you can email us once the file has uploaded and we will reply to confirm the success of the upload.

Entrants List

As we process the entrants we will place them onto this page. Check it to ensure your game is listed.

What if I need to send another version?

No problem. Just increment the 'Version' in the author.txt and re-send it to us using any of the methods above.