Announcing the Xcrawl Fiction Writing Contest

[goodmangames]

The Xcrawl Fiction Writing Contest

Greetings Xcrawl fans! In cooperation with OgreCave.com and the OgreCave Audio Report podcastt, Goodman Games and Pandahead Productions are pleased to announce the Xcrawl Fiction Writing Contest. This is your chance to get published, and share your Xcrawl stories with the rest of the world! The first prize winner gets his work published in an upcoming Xcrawl title and receives a cash prize of $200.

Here’s how it works:
• The goal is to create a great work of fiction that conveys the action, excitement, and energy of the Xcrawl RPG.
• Your story can be about anything Xcrawl-related.
• Your story can be of any length up to 10,000 words.
• If your story were a movie, it would have to be rated G, PG, or PG-13.
• The deadline for submissions is January 1, 2008.
• To submit your work, format your story appropriately (see below) and email it to xcrawl@goodman-games.com
• We will notify contestants of the results by March 1, 2008

The prize: The first place winner will receive a contract to have his work of fiction published in a Goodman Games Xcrawl product, and will receive $200 compensation for his work once contracted. The manner of publication will depend on the nature of the story. The date of publication will be subject to normal schedule constraints and may not occur immediately.

The judges: The contest will be judged by Xcrawl creator Brendan LaSalle, Ogre-in-command Allan Sugarbaker, Lieutenant Ogre Mike Sugarbaker, and creative writing professional David Bernardy.

The subject matter: The subject matter can be anything Xcrawl. Your story could be based on an Xcrawl game you’ve played, or it could be derived from background elements of the Xcrawl world. As long as it conveys the action, excitement, and energy of the Xcrawl RPG, it is acceptable!

Formatting guidelines:
• Save your document as a Microsoft Word file (.doc ending).
• Name the file “Yourlastname-Firstpartoftitle.doc”. For example, if I wrote a story about the Coney Island Crawl, I might call my document “Goodman-ConeyCrawl.doc”.
• Format the story as Times New Roman, 12 point, double spaced.
• The first few lines of the file should contain your name, mailing address, email address, and phone number.

The fine print: Contestants agree that their submissions will not be republished elsewhere for the duration of the contest. After a decision has been rendered, the winning entry will be subject to normal publication standards and constraints, and the winner agrees to transfer full rights to his story to Goodman Games in exchange for payment. Entrants that do not win agree not to challenge trademarks of Goodman Games and Pandahead Productions, and with that caveat are free to post their stories for noncommercial entertainment use on the Goodman Games forums after the contest ends. This contest does not transfer any copyrights or trademarks from Goodman Games or Pandahead Productions to any other party.

[Blackdirge]

Interesting. Are writers that have worked on Xcrawl stuff in the past ineligible?

BD

[goodmangames]

Writers that have worked on Xcrawl in the past are still eligible. The submissions will be judged anonymously.

[Blackdirge]

Writers that have worked on Xcrawl in the past are still eligible. The submissions will be judged anonymously.

Cool. I've always thought it would be fun to write a short story in the Xcrawl universe.

BD

[goodmangames]

And for those of you who missed it, the OgreCave interview is now up:

http://ogrecave.com/audio/index.php?id=73

[DJRubik]

Eeeeeexcellent...

[Matthias]

Is the short story's "backstory" required to use the X-Crawl universe as-written, or can a homebrew-campaign variation of the X-Crawl universe be used?

I ran an X-Crawl campaign a few years ago that was heavily modified from the original. The best parts of the game were left in, such as dungeon crawling being a professional sport and the use of D&D rules as the base rules system, but the background of the world itself was unrecognizable.

[goodmangames]

Hi Matthias,

What we'd like are stories that help convey the Xcrawl concept to fans. In general, that's probably best done with the back story already in the book. That said, if your story manages to convey "the spirit of Xcrawl" even with a different background, we could consider it. It's really a judgment crawl as to "just how different" your own background material is. Of course, if you stick with the standard Xcrawl, it's definitely okay. Hope that helps!

[CaBil]

Just wondering, now that it is about two weeks out from the deadline, have you been snowed under with submissions, or has it been more light and steady?

[FlamingManofIron]

Results? Who won?