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Clickmas Countdown Day 5: TDC Xmas Compo 2003 - Winter Sports

News posted 23rd December, 2024 by Joshtek

For Day 5 we have The Daily Click's 2003 Christmas Competition run by Pete Nattress. Most of these games were found on the Internet Archive, with the exception of Super Snowboarder where version 1.1 was from my old downloads folder.

The theme for the 2003 competition was "Winter Sports", and many entrants went with ski games, some reminiscent of the Click demo game Ski Monday.

I'll run through the games in order of placement, with the overall summary from each of the judges for the three winners.

If you want to read what exactly the judges said about the games you can find the opinions HERE for Pete, HERE for Circy, HERE for Shab and HERE for Shab.

1st: Freestyle Santa by Tom Carlier (YuYu)

See entry on Kliktopia
Download the game directly

Circy: "94/100. This is brilliant! The graphics have an amazing chunkiness - obviously rendered somehow, but the whole game oozes class and dignity. The engine is a little difficult to get to grips with, but eventually you'll master it. Easily the best entrant in my opinion, Freestyle Santa clearly deserves to win this competition. Excellent work."

Pete: "75/100. This game is a clear contender for the top place. The controls take a while to get used to; in fact, they are the most annoying thing about it, but it is fun once you get the knack. The 3D rendered graphics are quite nice although I do have a few qualms with the blocky main Santa sprite. Music is suitably Christmassy and sounds fit well. A very nice effort all round!"

Shab: "49/100. Hey it's good, but not great."

2nd: DownTime by Paul Jeffries

See entry on The Daily Click
See entry on Kliktopia
Download the game directly

Pete: "68/100. Another of my favourite entries, Paul Jeffries has really pushed MMF and pulled off a pretty impressive feat with this pseudo-3D game. The presentation is top notch, especially the title screen. I think where the game lets itself down is with the rather blocky graphics and sometimes unapparent gameplay – it is an easy game and you may find yourself just sitting there whilst the sleigh drives itself. Sound and music are also a bit lax. Technically, this is a brilliant game but the struggling gameplay issues are stopping it from reaching my number one spot.

Circy: "67/100. A very impressive technical example of what MMF can do; Paul Jeffries has coded this very well. However, the bobsleigh track looks a little naff, and it's slow, so that’s why the graphics aren't as high as they could be. Horrible music, and the whole game gets a little boring. But sheer technical brilliance overall."

Shab: "61/100. The graphics are a mixed bag, and to me the game itself wasn't all that interesting."

3rd: Santa goes Tossing before Christmas by Lasagnasoft

See entry on The Daily Click
See entry on Kliktopia
Download the game directly

Shab: "69/100. This game is fun, but you won't find yourself playing it for hours."

Circy: "57/100. Interesting mini-game here, rather than a full production. The idea is to throw a snowball as far as you can. This isn't technically a winter sport, as there's this little Olympic event called "The Javelin". Well coded, mind, and probably great fun in short bursts. But not bad stuff overall."

Pete: "56/100. Comment: This is a neatly presented but disappointingly simple button basher. I do love the cartoony graphics though, along with the dangerously ambiguous title. The high score table is nice too, but this game is purely all mouth and no balls, and becomes boring pretty quickly. Music is appropriate but unoriginal and the sound effects leave something to be desired. As for the whole winter sport thing… it’s really not a sport. Low marks for that."