20 Euros is a bit steep for an initial fee, especially when compared to Germany’s Hippodice Club competition (5 Euros, I think?). Then add to that 45 Euros if it gets shortlisted--and they reserve the right to shortlist as many games as they wish, which makes it financially advantages to allow quite a few into the next round.

All of the winners from last year were French, which either reinforces a protectivist stereotype or simply proves that French designers were the only ones who participated.

The contest should be more accessible (read: affordable) if it truly aims to be international.  Otherwise, there’s nothing wrong with a “national” competition focusing on finding home-grown talent.

Wrong, I was one of last year winners and I’m a Canadian. French canadian, it’s true, but not French at all! They also awarded a prize to Sébastien Pauchon from switzerland (in 2006 for Oklahoma and in 2005 for what is now known as Yspahan). A couple of years ago, a guy from Brazil also won.

The fee may seem a bit expensive, but it’s not much for the effort they will invest in your game. If you get shortlisted, then your game will be tested at least 3 times and you will receive a detailed written analysis. Regarding the fee, I would say the exact opposite: if the contest wants to be international it HAS to charge a fee, otherwise they would get way too many bogus proposals. If you submit there, do your job seriously. But if you have a good and well-developed game then don’t hesitate and submit it. This contest is highly regarded by many very good publishers, and going in the final round is probably enough to get their attention.

Thanks fo clarifying, Philippe.  I just saw all of the French names and wondered aloud if an English-language proposal had a chance.(Sebastien is from the French part of Switzerland)

I also did already consider your point about excluding the not-so-serious designers and their undeveloped game ideas by charging a higher fee.  I agree that a fee is important--I only feel that this is a bit steep in comparison to other competitions.  It would be interesting to find out more from Hippodice about the overall quality of their entries since their fee is so much less.

As for the playtesters and jury, I don’t doubt at all their ability to select quality finalists. The French game design scene (and French-speaking, for that matter) has produced the strongest challenge yet to the traditionally strong Germans, and I expect it to continue as the new designers hone their craft.

Maybe I wouldn’t feel this way if there wasn’t such a huge difference with the Hippodice Club’s contest. I just feel that, for that kind of money, I’d rather attend game designers meetings where I can playtest with company representatives or send my ideas directly to a publisher for consideration.

I think that the Boulogne-Billancourt contest is run in part by voluntaries and in part by paid employees of the Ludothèque. I don’t think they receive much in term of private sponsorship (maybe some public funding, I can’t say). Still, I’m quite confident in saying that, between the money they collect from the entries and the money they invest in the contest (as salaries or prizes), there is not much, if any, left.

In other words: the steep fee is probably related more to their financial model than anything else. I dont think that it’s fair to imply that they would adjust the shortlist to balance their finances. I think their goal is really to identify a good subset of games based on a reading of the rulebook. It is a difficult endeavour, and they don’t want to arbitrarily accept or reject a game because they commited to some arbitrary size for their shorlist. In fact, through the years, this shortlist has usually be _shorter_ than their target size.

If so many french titles win, it’s for the same reason germans often win the Hippodice and italians often win the Premio Archimede: local participation is always higher. Still, I wouldn’t suggest any of these contests is intrinsically biased.

I’ve met the Boulogne-Billancourt guys and trust me, they are fair, they love games, and they try to establish a process that really focuses on promising authors. They will bend over backward to show your games to editors and they will give you a great follow-up.

Also, I agree with you that the French scene is releasing increasingly better titles, and I would argue that it is not foreign to the profesionalism of the Boulogne-Billancourt contest, which awarded prizes to such names as Faidutti, Cathala and Erhard among others.

Thanks for the testimony of your own personal experience.  It would be helpful to know more about the experiences of the winners of the various contests. 

I apologize if anything I wrote about the contest organization or organizers was without basis.  I simply couldn’t understand why it was so much more expensive and wanted to find out more.  Thank-you for supplying some of that information.

The journalistic side of me is now even more curious as to the differences in the various competitions.  Can anyone else offer any further information?