Metaverse Maker Contest 2021 Winners & Honorable Mentions
Added 2021-10-19 00:42:44 +0000 UTCHello everyone!
With the conclusion of the Metaverse Maker Contest, we're excited to bring you the winners and honorable mentions this year!
But first, everyone has done an outstanding job. The level of creativity, imagination and skills you have brought in this year has made it very difficult to pick the winners (and even the honorable mentions), particularly the World: Social and World: Game categories which were very contested this year.
Even among larger number of judges (Medra, Frooxius, Probable Prime, Canadian Git and Jak Wilmot) we had to use the audience vote to break a number of ties, as everyone had their own favorites.
Whether you placed or not, you should be proud of what you've made this year and what you learned by building such amazing content - those skills and experiences are something that will stay with you forever.
During my (Frooxius') own judging, I also took lots of screenshots, since I went through every single entry (as did few other judges). If you'd like to check out my gallery of over 2000 screenshots, you can see it here! https://photos.app.goo.gl/nJe5rDM6rUDwMzuy5
So without further ado, here are the winners and honorable mentions, along with a number of screenshots and videos featuring the creator's commentary and behind the scenes (spoiler alert!).
You can also read the original announcement here: https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/740250/view/2944778418489926498
Awards Ceremony
World: Misc
1st place - Time and Gears (by Team GHJ)
This awe inspiring world is something that should be experienced inside of VR. Combining fantasy and steampunk elements with a great sense of scale made for a very unique experience, as the environment moves and transforms around you as you progress through it.
It made us feel as if we were heading towards a grand fantasy boss battle and the only thing it was missing was some finale when you reach the end. We would love to see more environments like this in Neos, as they utilize virtual reality to create fantastic spaces that would not be possible in real life.
2nd place - Lucaedr's Lookout (by Lucaedr & Zaravi)
If you love stargazing, this world is for you. Beautifully atmospheric and polished, it captures the atmosphere of open night sky. It not only serves as a great hangout place, but also has educational value.
Using the in-world UI, you can visualize recent satellite launches and positions in the sky. We loved this addition for its educational / data visualization aspect and we'd love to see more like this in the future, as VR can be a powerful tool for visualizing data.
3rd place - (Unofficial) Interactive Neos Tutorial (by Constant Slerps)
The Neos community has always been very helpful to newcomers and this world is an example of that. it builds upon systems from last year's MMC to create an interactive tutorial, where a motion captured presenter walks the user through the basics of controls inside of Neos.
Honorable mentions
Le Petit Prince by haja
- This entry recaptures the story of the Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. It might not be visually polished, but its interactive storytelling is quite charming and we'd love to see more of it in the future.
Drawing Four seasons JP by Team: ginjake
- A world full of beautiful art for every season of the year! It features a number of beautiful drawings and a shared folder which lets you use them to decorate your own world.
MIRROR? room by rhenium
- A mirror room with a twist! It's not mirror at all, but your avatar with its motions duplicated! Ever play a baseball with yourself? The only downsite is that the world can become a bit unstable with multiple users.
World: Game
1st place - ABANDONWARE (by VR Pokefurs)
Abandonware is one of the few experiences that made us completely forget that we were inside of Neos. It is an incredibly well polished escape room experience that could very well be a standalone indie game. Everything from level design, PS1-style visuals, lore, audio design and gameplay is exceptional, making for one of the most unique experiences in Neos to date.
We would love to see more experiences like this to be made in the future, as building games and interactive experiences like this is one of the major things we wanted to enable with Neos VR.
2nd place - BULLET BUSTER (by GONT_3 & komashiba)
After last year's Mogu Pani, GONT_3 & komashiba came with another unique arcade experience. This game inside of a game is a classic arcade shooter, full with motion and light effects. Playing a 3D game in VR this way gives it a very unique old school feel as you fight to top the high score.
3rd place - Aerial Guardian (by rhenium)
Aerial Guardian is one of the most ambitious games of this year. Featuring a selection of unique weapons, shopping phase, you'll fight waves of different enemies, either alone of with your friends, as they attack the city in the sky.
The game features a number of different enemies, with different attacks, strengths and weaknesses. Not only that, but it comes with a level editor, which allows you to build your own levels and easily configure the enemy waves.
We would love to see this game optimized more and perhaps add mechanisms to make each weapon a bit more engaging, as they can turn a bit monotonous after a while. Regardless it's a great experience to play with your friends!
Honorable mentions
GunnGame by Team: GunnOS
- a fast paced shooter game that really nailed down the gameplay. It's fun and exciting to play, with a number of different weapons and dash mechanic. With some extra polish and bugfixes it could be one of the entries that people will keep revisiting whenever they're looking for a fun group game.
MMC Hide & Seek 2021 by Shorty, Vigilabo, dmx
- a great game for a larger group of people, with a selection of maps with some secrets. It does what it says on the tin - people are split into two groups - hiders and seekers. Hiders must stay hidden, seekers must find everyone.
[Quest] Infiltrate The Dark Lord's Castle! by ♥️ Froppy ♥️ & toydragon
- this game entry is first of its kind - an ambitious adventure game with cutscenes, secrets, two boss battles and number of unique puzzles. It has a number of glitches and some parts go on for a bit too long, but it's still an incredible achievement and hopefully first of many games of this kind!
World: Social
1st place - Rocky Retreat (by Team VibeZ)
Winning 1st place in the world - social category for the second time is the Team VibeZ with the Rocky Retreat. Not only is this world one of the most visually beautiful places in Neos, but also imbued with interactivity in every corner.
You can feed the fish, make a coffee, tea or eat some tasty treats. If you hold your hand, you'll have butterflies land on your finger - but don't use it to poke the carnivorous plants! In the spirit of green energy, you also have to recycle everything you use, rather than simply deleting them, adding to the world's immersion.
Compared to the last year's entry, this one is also significantly more optimized, making it much easier to hang out with a group of people and enjoy the beauty of this world.
2nd place - The Hole In The Wall (by Kulza)
Made by just a single person, this entry showcased that you don't need an entire team to build something great. This world makes great use of scale inside of VR, creating a hangout place that's unlike any other.
Everything in this place is built around the scale - seats are deformed electric plugs, cups and tables are pieces of legos, lights are christmas lights, the TV is a phone embedded in the wall and music is provided by a giant casette player, with physical buttons and swappable tapes. We definitenly recommend checking this place out!
3rd place - Rave Cave (by Hardlight)
Another beautiful and creative world, filled with creativity in every corner. Combining the cavern aesthethic with glowing crystals, this place features a waterslide, underwater part (with a secret area!), dance floor and social area.
A prominent feature is also the DJ balcony, which has a system for playing music and controlling/syncing a laser show on the dance floor. This has a number of options and features. The world also has interesting lore behind it, with every contributor being featured in a form of a small story.
Honorable mentions
Neon Den by Team: Hedgedogs
- an incredibly polished hangout world. Set in a beautiful futuristic setting, it features a smart multimedia screen, adjustable lighting and colors, cozy pod with optional mirrors and baked lighting, giving it a very polished look.
The Metaverse Hotel by Team: TBA
- probably the most ambitious entry, this world is brimming with content, from a number of places to check out with some interactivity, to a number of games, like paintball, bumpercars and ring punching game. Unfortunatelly its ambition has been one of its weaknesses too as a lot of parts are not quite finished or buggy, but it's still an incredibly impressive place to check out and we hope it'll get some extra polish after the MMC
Umi ga mieru Ryoakan by Team: haruru806
- if you're fond of the traditional Japanese hotels, this place if for you. It is quite cozy and nicely polished, with a number of interactive elements.
Avatar: Avatars
1st place - Gunnbot (by Gunnar)
Created for one of the game submissions, Gunnbot is a nice customizable avatar, allowing you to not only customize the colors, but also swap the head type. It features dash functionality as well, which is quite fun to use on its own.
Once you customize it, you can save your settings on a small memory card. When inserted into another bot (for example in the GunnGame) it'll load up your customizations, but the avatar itself can be used standalone as well.
2nd place - False Goddess (by PurpleJuice)
Returning for the 2nd year, PurpleJuice has come up with another creative avatar this year, with perfect theme for Halloween. This avatar was made completely from scratch in the span of 1 month and features support for both eye tracking and face tracking.
However those are where its unique aspect also shows - the eye and mouth are on the hands! You can see your own facial expressions by simply looking at your palm. Other users can hear your voice coming from the hand as well. The avatar also features another unique function - you can actually see from the eye in the hand!
3rd place - leech avatar (by levia)
This is one of the most unique, even if quite disturbing avatars we've seen. It has a very appropriate presentation, where you pull the leech out of a jar. The avatar has a unique locomotion as well, which allows you to attach to moving objects in the world and even other avatars. To make it even more disturbing, the leach will undulate and slowly engorge itself when attached. We would love to see more non-conventional thinking with avatars like this.
Honorable mentions
AstraVinn by HybridKyth & Ralii
- another avatar made in the timespan of a single month! This world also features the whole progression, from initial sketches to the final model. If you're shopping for a new avatar base, check this one out.
Avatar: Accessories
1st place - Badge Maker (by yakiringo & Rabbuttz)
Ever wanted to put a bunch of pin up buttons on your avatar's clothing? This world make it very easy to make them! Simply drop in a picture in a frame and press a button for a pin up button to pop out.
It also features a box with camera so you can easily take picture of yourself, an image crop tool for any other pictures and tool to make the buttons easily attachable.
2nd place - Shop MrSB (by komashiba)
If you like Shiba-themed accessories this place is for you! This cozy shop has water bottles, backpacks, developer and LogiX tooltips, hats and glasses for your avatar!
3rd place - MultiStaff (by Eventide)
Multi-tools are one of the staples of Neos and everybody's approach to them is different. This one takes form of a magical staff that has a number of different modes, combining some useful tools with fun functions like teleporting or invisibility.
Avatar: Misc
1st place - Figure generator - フィギュア制作機 (by Team orange)
The Figure Generator has taken Neos by storm before MMC was even over. With this utility you can easily create a little figure of yourself. Simply press a button and strike a pose! You can even take one with multiple users at once.
2nd place - Rusty Exosuit (by Rustybot)
The Rusty Exosuit features probably the most unique avatar mechanic we've seen to date. When wearing this avatar, you can hold grip and secondary and high five another user. This will transfer the head and hands over to the user, essentially combining two users into one.
While you float as disembodied voice around the target user, they can use your hands as a blaster or a thruster to move around and shoot other users around the world. By floating away from them you disengage the mode. As a very cute detail, the namebadge will also combine the usernames like "Frooxius and Raith" for example.
3rd place - 立ち絵生成機 Standing image generator (by υμβραν)
This utility makes it easy to capture a cutout of your avatar. It has a few functions to adjust the resolution and camera options. Simply stand on the podium, make adjustments, press a button and a cutout pops out!
Other: TAU
1st place - Traffic system - Showcase (by The Science Team)
The Traffic System is one of the most technically impressive entries of the whole MMC21. With this system you can build and edit nav-meshes in the environment and then add agents to them, that will follow the created paths. It has lots of customization options for the pathing as well as the agents and number of fancy features like collision avoidance.
This entry embodies what game development is about - building your own development tools. The world documents the process, shows off a number of experiments (and issues) and potential applications. It is definitely worth checking out.
2nd place - LKGP Quilt Camera (by υμβραν)
If you've heard of the Looking Glass holographic display then this world might be of interest to you, but it is generally a cool utility to play with. Instead of tranditional image it captures a simple light field. This can be displayed as a hologram both on the device itself, but also in Neos - giving you photos not only with sense of depth, but also some parallex, allowing you to look around them in a limited range.
3rd place - Bitbot Multitool (by Rustybot)
Another creative approach to multi-tools, which has a number of cool features. It features a pen, developer and LogiX tooltip, but the most interesting part is the material gun - it has a storage mechanism, allowing you to put it a number of material orbs to carry around for quick access.
Honorable mentions
Blue Inspector by rhenium
- Inspectors are another popular tool in Neos for customization and this one features a number of cool additions - from numbers of children in the hierarchy display, quick contextual options, to easy resizing and adding of more panels
Create New 3DModel Plus by MotoMaid
- One part that we haven't seen customized much yet is the "Create New" dialog, which made this entry quite unique. It adds a number of procedural shapes to the menu as well as handy animated previews
Other: Misc
1st place - CytraX Studios - The Novahawk (by CytraX)
Vehicles are another popular topic in Neos, so it's no surprise that we saw a number of them this MMC. The Novahawk is the most polished out of them all, featuring not only nice presentaation, but good set of controls for both VR and desktop, as well number of deparments in the vehicle itself. We also appreciated the open nature - for example the world contains the original .blend files that you can easily export if you'd like to make some edits or build upon it.
2nd place - Terraforming simulator (by good_neighbour)
For any lovers of strategy games this is something to check out. In this game your task is to terraform a planet. You have a number of tools at your disposal, from a branching tree of infrastructure to supplying the planet with natural resources. It can be quite challenging to play, but gripping once you get into it. The game has surprising amount of depth into its mechanics. We think it could benefit from more visualizations, like graphs to shows the progression of the different resources over time.
3rd place - Mechanical KeyBoard (by Team MK)
Neos is all about customization and custom keyboards are one of them. This entry took this concept even further. Similarly to how some people build their own mechanical keyboards for real, this one allows you to build out your own inside of Neos! Combining different bases, switches and keycaps, you can make a functional keyboard with unique sounds and behaviors by assembling it together inside of VR.
Honorable mentions
DIY Tool by guheheP
- this world/tool takes a very unique approach to building in Neos - instead of abstract tools, you use a saw and drill to build things together. It's a very fun approach to building inside of VR, one that makes the whole process a lot more physical.
Inside Neos by G59
- a beautiful piece of art created completely in Neos! It depitcs a Neos logo composed from Neos-related terms. Every single drawing is unique too - this world must've taken a lot of time and patience, so definitely check it out!
Meme
1st place - The Sphere Detector (by Bunny team)
With the (murder) timely death by old age of the Sphere Detector node a number of questions arose in the community - what is a sphere? This entry recaptures the glory days of being able to tell apart spheres from non-spheres and proves once more the power of community in Neos VR to build the tools they need for every day function.
2nd place - Finger Universe (by Danyy59)
Have you ever wondered what would the world be like if everything was a finger? Wonder no more, for in this world you'll explore such universe, collecting a full hand to open secret treasures of finger jokes.
3rd place - Cool Genius Stylish Spaghetti LogixTip (by MotoMaid)
This custom LogiX tooltip allows you to literally embody spaghetti code and mentally scar anyone you encounter into organizing their code properly.
Honorable mentions
Albert** - Team: Warp-Gate
- "There is no reset button. You destroyed the universe." - it lies!
