Organizer is the Hippodice Spieleclub e. V. in Bochum.
Requirements for game ideas
The game has to be submitted as a board game, card game, dice game or other non-digital game. Not allowed are purely digital games (i.e. computer games, smartphone games, etc.).
Only prototypes of new developed games that have not yet been published are allowed to the competition.
The game submission must fulfill the following criteria:
- The game has to remain unpublished until the day of result announcement.
- There must not be a contractual obligation to a specific publisher for the game.
- The game must not be part of an ongoing crowdfunding campaign.
- If one of these conditions is met during the competition, the organizers have to be notified immediately. Unfortunately, the game will be disqualified then.
- The participant must have all necessary rights to the submitted contribution and assure that by submitting all materials (photos, texts and other intellectual property) do not infringe the rights of third parties. He must also grant the organizer the right to take photos of the prototypes.
- The participant has to be 18 years or older. A parent or legal guardian can be a proxy for younger game designers.
Application
You can register your games using the form on hippodice-competition.net. The correctly and completely filled application form has to be sent in till the before mentioned date. Two pdf files have to be uploaded with the form: A short game description and the game rules.
The game description presents the game principle and the essential mechanisms in a compact form. Depending on the complexity of the game, the length of the text alone should range from 0.5 to 1 DIN A4 page (250 to 500 words). In addition, the game description should be illustrated by pictures and graphics.
The full game rules shall be uploaded as a separate PDF file.
Both pdf files need to state the name of the game and name of the game designer. Files can be written in German or English.
No prototypes have to be submitted for the preliminary round. After the first round of evaluation game designers will explicitly be asked to send in prototypes.
Each participant is allowed to send in a maximum of 5 submissions per year.
After the preliminary round has been carried out, the authors will be informed whether their game has qualified for the main round. Feedback regarding the preliminary round results cannot be given.
Fees
Participation in the preliminary is free.
If a prototype qualifies for the main round, a fee of 15 Euro per game is charged, additionally the shipping costs for the prototype return shipment (from Germany to the author’s address). The exact amount will be communicated by email as soon as a game idea has qualified for the main round. If the author does not want a return shipment, these additional shipping costs will be waived.
Disposition of prototypes
The submitted prototype will remain with the competition organizers until the final round.
On game publisher discretion a prototype may be handed over to interested publishers after the final round of the competition. If this is not the case the prototype will be send back to the designer if this was requested and fees for shipping it back have been paid. It cannot be guaranteed that a prototype will remain unscathed during the testing period and the competition organizers will not be liable for any damage to a prototype.
Publication of results
The Hippodice e.V. compiles various publication to make the submitted games known to publishers and the interested general public. Game designers grant the competition organizers the right to use photos and written articles about their prototypes. The designer’s name and the prototype will be mentioned in those publications.
The prototype, game rules and personal information about the designer might be transfered to interested game publishers.
All copyrights remain with the game designer.
Legal responsibility
The competition organizers are not liable for any damages including without limitation, indirect or consequential loss or damage, or any loss or damage arising from participating in the competition.
Participants may only submit items that comply with all applicable German laws, including copyright, trademark law and personal rights. Should a participant violate any of these, he/she/they must compensate for any resulting damage. The author is also liable for claims made by third parties against the organizer.
Decisions within the competition are made solely by the editors, test players, expert jury and the competition organizers. Decisions are final and legal recourse is excluded.
Protection of data privacy
The competiton participant declares that her or she agrees with the digital storage and processing of personal data which was used for registration. The competition organizers can email participants and in exceptional cases directly contact them via phone for purposes regarding the competition (e.g. to ask for feedback, additions, results or missing information).
For the preliminaries the competition editors will have access to the uploaded game files (game description and game rules). For the main competition members of the Hippodice e.V. will have access to the prototypes and game rules.
Sumbissions that make it to the finals will be presented to various game publishers. After the final round prototypes and personal information of the designers may be made available to interested game publishers so that they can contact the game designer. The Hippodice e.V. is only an intermediary in this case and has no influence on any negotiations with game publishers.
Responsible for data privacy (§13 DSGVO): Hippodice Spieleclub e.V., Bochum represented by the managing board (see hippodice-competition.net/impressum-legal-notice). Email: datenschutz@hippodice.de. Processing of personal data is necessary for participating in the competition (see §6 DSGVO).
Participants who reach the finals give permission for the digital storage of their personal data even after the competition. They can revoke this permission at any time via email. Participants have the right to request and edit their stored personal data. Participants have the right to appeal at any data privacy supervisory authority if they think their personal data is used in an unlawful manner (e.g. https://www.ldi.nrw.de).