Judging on part two will begin sometime when I am more awake and feel like reading. You dun want me judging right now, I'd be an ass. In the meantime...
I said I'd take care of this one, remember?
You may reign supreme in here, Purv, and I won't challenge that.
But you brought this challenge into PSL.
And in PSL, I am one of the powers behind the throne.
You will not judge the literary portion of the challenge. I will.
That being said (and resaid), allow me to begin.
We'll start with the
challenger's entry.Bitmap has admitted that he's not that confident in his writing skills, and to be blunt, it kind of shows. Conversation and dialogue seems to be his strong point, and his talent in exposition leaves much to be desired.
For actual writing talent, Bitmap scores a 6 out of 10.He managed to keep the story short and sweet, finishing it out in one post while still surpassing the required word-count. The interposed narrative blurbs from Mokou are a nice touch.
For content, Bitmap scores an 8 out of 10.Robotic Moon Rabbits (from the Moon) help maintain the air of cyberpunk, as well as a computer-filled underground base of operations. The use of lead-bullet rifles mixed with danmaku is a little unusual, but PEW PEW ZAPPY GUNS don't necessarily have to be present for it to be cyberpunk.
For adherence to the prompt, Bitmap scores a 10 out of 10.
Bitmaps total score is 24 out of 30.
Next we have the
defending champion's entry.
Moerin is a long-time veteran of the boards, and could have been assumed to have known where to go with his story to win the audience and judges over, but instead did not attempt to use this advantage. He opens with the death of Satori, a risky gambit that could've turned readers away from his story, and follows along with a rather out-of-character portrayal of the other characters used for his piece. Despite this, he shows a wonderful control of the written language, maintaining flow with ease and painting a vivid picture.
For actual writing talent, Moerin scores an 8.Moerin easily surpasses the minimum word count, but because the story is not yet finished I can't award full points. Also he killed Satori. Jerkface >:|
For content, Moerin scores a 6 out of 10.Third Eyes being explained away as portable computers wired directly into the mind is an interesting touch that helps maintain the air of cyberpunk, and the neon lights described on the buildings comes right out of a campy 80s cyberpunk movie. Unfortunately, with how little of the story we have here, it seems less like cyber-tech and more like a ritzy, albeit grimy and dirty, vision of how the year 2000 would've looked according to Disney if it were on crack. Lucky Moerin, this score is all or nothing.
For adherence to the prompt, Moerin scores 10 out of 10.
Moerin's total score is also 24 out of 30.Well, that's inconvenient.It would appear we have a tie, but alas, that is not the case!
The winner of the second challenge is...
IcedFairy! Just because IcedFairy always wins the writing contests in PSL.
NO, WAIT, THAT'S SILLY.
ahh well, I fully expect Purvis will disregard this anyways.
If not, however, I have a potential tie-breaker we could use, one fitting coming from me. It is up to Purvis if he wants to overwrite my judgments and the tie-breaker or not.
Oh, yeah,
rdj's entry.
This is a clever take on the prompt, choosing instead of the potential cyberpunk aspect and going with NetHack, instead.
But, he also cleverly named it 'not an IM challenge', so he's disqualified for forfeiting the competition. :derp:
