I think people are trying to solve puzzles for the wrong reason. It is suppose to be fun. With that said, I think the puzzles could use some work sometimes in that area. Regardless, the game is fucking free and it is upto the person that spent the money to make it exist how its fate will be. We should be grateful they even decided to post it here even in a puzzle without mentioning what. It is a surprise to people and some of us like that.
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I love puzzles and when I have time I usually try to solve the ones that I see.
One thing that I never understood is that puzzles have official rules on the FAQ, but SG don't give the option to create a puzzle (we need to use a 3rd party tool).
My opinion on this is that SG should provide an infrastructure to create puzzles, something similar to itstoohard. In this mode, you must "link" one of your current private giveaways and then the system will give you a "puzzle" url (maybe something like www.steamgifts.com/puzzle/XXXXX". Those giveaways should be inaccessible from an URL that is not the one of the puzzle, so it'll be impossible to leak the final link, the user must solve the puzzle in order to enter the giveaway.
When a user enters this puzzle SG will tell you if you already own the game or not (without telling you the name). Of course you can always solve the puzzle even if you already got the game. Obviously it'll tell you the time when the giveaway will finish and maybe a countdown, and the contribution value needed.
Then let the creator set some options:
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You don't need a reason to blacklist people afaik. You just need to have the existence of a blacklist verified by the support.
i.e. Support need to know that you have a blacklist and you can only use it in group or private puzzles and it should be / must be linked to in the description. Support don't care who is on the blacklist or for what reason.
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This is a great idea. Guess it might involve some work for CG, but it would be great to have a more robust, and fully integrated, format for puzzles.
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Can i express an opinion without getting called a douchebag or getting blacklisted? (you can blacklist me, who gives a crap)
Ok, from the previous thread i noted a quite entertaining trend: "do you disagree with me? blacklist.". Now, i can see the use of a blacklist and i agree with that, but this means that the creator of the giveaway/puzzle get the freedom of selecting who can enter and who can't based of their personal judgement?
In the previous thread i wrote that if i find a fortix after a difficult puzzle i'd spoil the game too. Does this mean that i've actually done it? No. So, if i say that i would commit a homicide i would be arrested? Ha, weird.
Be honest and admit that the blacklist is a way to "win arguments" (lol) with the threat of being uncapable of entering puzzle giveaways and overriding other people's opinions. And i'm a little curious about moderator's opinion about this topic - it is actually possible to do this without a real reason?
Also (and i remember that i am discussing and there's no need to be rude - use your own mind instead of steamgifts's mass consciousness ;) ) i think that the forum is a place where you can discuss, not a place where you hide puzzles EVERYWHERE. It's ok to open a fake thread with a hidden giveaway - much less when there are dozens of this threads and people expect a hidden giveaway even when the OP is supposed to be serious and wants a real discussion only to get lots of "i can't find the puzzle", "i need clues" and "thanks for skyrim".
Now, feel free to exhibit your worst insults.
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Moderators are okay with blacklists AS LONG as the blacklist is included in the giveaway description from the beginning, and as long as you have the mod approval for including the blacklist in the first place (moderators DO NOT approve of who is/is not on the list, just the fact that the giveaway creator is allowed to use one). Mods do not care for the reasons someone is on the blacklist.
Someone please correct me if I'm wrong.
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The reason you got blacklisted by many people in previous thread including me is not the fact that I disagree with your opinion, I'm disagreeing with lots of opinions in previous topic, yet only 2 people got blacklisted.
The reason for blacklisting is that you were rude, offensive and insulting to people you disagree with. You can disagree in a civilized manner in civilized discussion, or you can play mr_douchebag. The latter gets you on a blacklist - and it does regardless if people agree or disagree with your opinion.
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Oh really? The thread looks quite different to me.
I post this:
And these are the first three replies:
Why bother at all? Why not just Q.Q and ask for a game, straightforward. It's my puzzle, my rules and it's either my way or highway. You don't like fortix? Being ungrateful little prick is the worst thing you can do.
Reply
bull21
Congratulations on being a douchebag.
Reply
MrCastiglia
congrats on entering blacklist! xD
Reply
zelghadis
Please tell me again how i was the offensive one (or link me a post where i actually insulted someone).
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"i can't find the puzzle", "i need clues" and "thanks for skyrim".
Those replies tend to be on the many threads we get about contributor value not increasing or other "I won and didn't get, what do?" / bundle game threads... They are given as a sarcastic reply, because the creator isn't likely to be the first person with that problem and they could find a similar / identical thread if they took the time to use the search function to find some relevant threads. After all, with nearly 1200 pages, at ~50 threads per page (quick count) so 60000 threads, there must be a similar one with the answer in.
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...which is quite annoying in the long run and gives some users the right to do a pointless +1. If someone ask a recurrent question it's much easier to answer or link an old answer and then asking a mod to close the thread, without all these childish replies.
It's fun the first time, the second, the third, but then it becomes annoying and a rule against this like the "calling out" one wouldn't be so bad, especially when a user is doing it multiple times.
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Yes it's annoying, that's partly the point. It winds the thread creator up. They couldn't be bothered to type a few characters into the search bar on the site and do a bit of reading, why should people bother helping them?
I usually provide a 'sensible' answer, but I sympathize with everyone who get annoyed by the threads and posts annoying replies.
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Like I said before - I don't agree - revealing ANYTHING regarding puzzle should be up to puzzle maker. And like I said while talking to you Jade, by forcing this rule "Do not tell people what game this is on the forum" you are forcing Puzzle Makers not only to spoil the eventual troll Puzzle but also Hidden Stages / GiveAways, what makes making them pointless.
Let's assume previous example by me:
Let's say I'm making Puzzle with 2 Stages (2nd Stage hidden), where 1st stage reward is Bad Rats and 2nd stage reward is Metro Last Light hidden within Bad Rats GiveAway. In most of my puzzles and quizes I do either reveal the game title, or hint it in some way inside the puzzle. If then, out of nowhere nowhere I add "Do not tell people what game this is on the forum" to my rules some people will automatically assume I'm making a troll puzzle, but what's even worse - my puzzle regulars will immediatelly know that there's something fishy that I don't want game revealed this time, will be more cautious and find hidden GA easier. So I'm forced to give hint I may not want to. Now let's imagine I decide not to post this rule so I don't give away any hints. And some noob goes to the forum and starts bitching "Do not solve this puzzle - there's only Bad Rats at the end." - and now I have 2 possibilities 1) I tell this person there's something more, again being forced to reveal existance of hidden stage, or 2) Ignore him, and a lot of people seing his post will not even try solving my puzzle and will have no chance of finding about hidden stage.
What I generally mean that puzzles are very unconventional type of topic and giveaway and you CANNOT assume that something IS and something else IS NOT essential information about the puzzle in each ocassion. Thus decision about anything regardiang a puzzle should be totally up to puzzle creator and noone else.
Just my point of view.
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I find it really funny how in the thread when Jade went to talk to puzzle makers, he stated "The more active you are as a creator, the more I will value your opinion."
And yet at least two of the three people with 15+ puzzles (Read: top tier of activity) who posted before Jade's cutoff argue against what he posted here.
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I wasn't invited to the discussion, I posted a couple minutes too late on his thread.
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Wouldn't make a difference. Voice of veteran PUZZLE creator (I hate mistaking puzzles with quizes ;p) was in the end weighted the same as voice of someone who created 1-2 quizes ever, and for such a person "it's no big deal", cause in their simplistic quiz format (I'm not saying there's anything wrong with ITH format, just vthat it's not always relevant to complex puzzles) revealing or not revealing a game usually won't have any impact on Quiz itself.
Concluding discussion 60% of attendants were in favor of Jade's simplistic sollution, while 40% had problem with it. Sadly it was not revellant that people who were against it were people with many ACTUAL puzzles on their account, while many of these 60% were just Quiz makers so it would not change a thing for them.
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We now know the secret to get more respect from Jade! Spam the forum with quizzes!
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Agreed on this point.
But I'd like a middle ground, if the puzzle is only linking to one giveaway (i.e. not a 2 step puzzle) then the game should be listed or at least hidden by cipher / other encryption / hidden in source-code / behind a relatively easy its-too-hard so that people can find out what it is then try the main if they want.
By "not a 2 step puzzle" I mean it's fine to have a cipher of the its-too-hard code, then that linking to an jigsaw puzzle that contains a different cipher to the next step / GA. What I don't mean is like you mention Zelgh - get into a giveaway and then find the actual giveaway from there.
Obviously policing this would be hard - people might not list the name in anyway in 1 step puzzles and lead people to think that there is more to it than meets the eye / a hint that there is 2 step puzzle simply because no game-name is given.
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The problem is Cha0s that this mean I should reveal it's a multi-stage puzzle, while I may not like to, as some of the stages may be hidden, even very obscurely hidden ;p And it's normal that some of the solvers may not notice them, assume it's just 1 stage puzzle and feel free to spoil it then.
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I know, it hints that the multi-step puzzle might be there if no name is given...
But then again, you could do a many-step puzzle through a series of closed giveaways that all get better and better and make the puzzle harder and harder at each step. Then put the name of the first game and small hints in that game's description that there maybe more. Then leave no trace, make the rest of the puzzle insanely difficult - the naming of a low-value game might ward off the ones who don't want to do the puzzle (and so don't deserve the prize game). The small hints in that would then lead on the clever / determined ones into the next giveaway. People will drop off as the difficulty ramps up and only the more shrewd ones will even notice that there is another step. By making the closed games better and better, it encourages those who want to do the puzzle to continue... "Hmm Bad Rats? -> better\_game\_1 hmm...-> better\_game\_2 :) -> Skyrim :D -> Bioshock Infinite o.0 :D :D what's the finale?!! -> finale (whatever you want)"
This leaves you with grand-puzzle-master-champion(s) and they hopefully deserve the game (have a requirement in the last giveaway to comment all the games + something special from the description in the steps so you know it wasn't leaked to them). Possibly leave small fortix giveaways at some later steps that can be reached by making a mistake with the main puzzle and then put the description as 'these aren't the giveaways you are looking for' subtly prompting them to go back and try again.
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Partial solution - make a quiz right before the Metro Last Light giveaway and have the answer be Bad Rats. Even if the leaker doesn't find that quiz, it would still be suspendable.
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I've talked with cg.
Revealing the giveaway prize of a puzzle is treated as a spoiler and is considered to be disrespectful to the puzzle creator. While it's not as serious as other spoilers (giving away answers, or links), it still warrants a suspension, though shorter. I will treat all reports and comments about this kind of puzzle spoiler that way from now on, starting with the one that created this discussion.
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You will be suspended if you don't play an inofficial forums game correctly? Seriously?
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I'm closing this thread as it has lived its purpose. If anyone wonders about what the final decision was, read my last post above this. In the meantime, keep reporting any users that's spoiling your puzzle one way or another.
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Early this morning, there was a support ticket about reporting someone who leaked the game a puzzle was about. Not the giveaway link, not the answers, not even the fact it was a puzzle in the case of hidden puzzles, but the game itself. I will get to the details in a minute, but the answering support member declined to suspend the user as they felt nothing was truly spoiled. However, what we did not foresee was the giveaway creator taking it to the forums and posting a thread asking opinions of that. That's fine. What wasn't fine what the 104 posts of dreck that went into that thread. Absolute hostility, threats of blacklisting by people who don't even have a blacklist, it was not a good thread. That thread is now closed and I would prefer to keep the intense drama out of this one, so please do not link to it.
For a start, the moderator to blame would actually be me, as my opinion was asked of the situation. I was not shown the ticket or knew the user or the thread in question. Maybe if I had seen it, my response would have been different, but as it is, the action is done now, the users have spoken and I am going to clarify our rules on it right now.
Telling people the name of the game is not a reason for suspension, nor is it truly leaking anything, in my opinion. Unless the name of the game is integral to the puzzle somehow, it is not considered to be part of the puzzle, merely the end result. To my knowledge, this has always been the case and we have no plans to change this fact. My unofficial view, that is not representative of SteamGifts policy or of the other moderator's views, is that it is actually common courtesy to say the game upfront. As was said by numerous people in the thread, there are so many puzzles, all of varying difficulties that it can be very difficult to do them all with time limits (especially when those aren't posted). Those who don't have the game can attempt it, those who do can either move on to another puzzle or, if they are a puzzloholic, attempt it anyway for the fun of it. There's more of us than you might think.
Telling people the name of the game has never been a suspendable reason as far as I am aware and we have no plans to change that. However, there are ways around this. If the game is somehow part of the puzzle and they leak it, that counts as puzzle spoiling and is a suspension reason.
Furthermore, while I have said my views above, I am also aware that sometimes you want the giveaway to be a surprise, or you simply wish to troll by promising BioShock Infinite and giving Horrid Henry. I've done that myself, once for fun, once to disguise what was secretly a two-part giveaway where the prize was so ridiculous it subtly encouraged people to search for the "real" one. If someone had posted "hey, thanks for Call of Batman 7: Battle Bastion", that would have ruined the surprise and the second half of the giveaway, wouldn't it? So, to clarify on what we do act on but has remained a largely unwritten rule, if you do not want the name of your giveaway posted, simply post something to the effect of "Do not tell people what game this is on the forum" in the giveaway description or the forum post, and if someone does then post it, we will suspend them. This counts as a rule you do not need to ask support for permission for, but you must remember this when you post as we will not suspend retroactively.
Finally, spoiling that there is a puzzle in the first place, such as an apparently nonsense or offtopic post with a single miniscule link in it that links to the puzzle, is a reason for suspension as part of the puzzle was to appear innocuous. That said, puzzle creators, please do not make antagonistic or diguised begging threads. These are sometimes a little too good at their jobs and are likely to be closed by the moderators and may lead to a suspension if we don't think to check for a private giveaway started at the same time. On top of that, to the average user, it can look very real and can lead to a lot of troubling posts and a lot of trouble for the moderators cleaning up the mess.
Regarding leaks, however, be aware of this. Currently, only a couple of the moderators have the power to delete comments. No other moderator can do this. This means that, while we can suspend a leaker, we cannot do anything about the leak unless they are available. To balance this, we generally offer amnesty to a leaker by unsuspending them if they agree to immediately delete all relevant comments.
I hope this clarifies all of your issues and that you all believe this to be the fairest method of solving everyone's issues. Please do not cause drama in this thread either. This was made with the help of puzzle makers to try and reach a fair and balanced policy that minimises the problems for everyone and retains both the creator's rights and the user's freedoms while limiting the moderators' workload. This is hopefully only a temporary solution until we have a better system in place, but until that is the case, consider this policy to be the policy for however long it needs to be.
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