And James, I just over-exaggerated. I'm pretty confident in mine and it was one of the more fun ones to write and research.
It was good though!
Sorry I've delayed so much, but this week has been crazy busy and I didn't get time to sit down and work on my proposal until yesterday afternoon. I'll have it up today, but I still need to make a few changes and find pictures. In all honesty, I don't think it's my greatest work and I think I'll be eliminated this round, but I'd rather make an effort than drop out, especially this late in the competition.
Just as a teaser, my proposal is completely different from those posted as it is not based on a real world country or continent. Instead, it is based on a (most likely) fictional location, and expands Animal Kingdom's collection beyond land and sky animals. It also will give the park two new dark rides, one a slightly modified version of a dark ride operating at another Disney park and the other a unique take on the omnimover ride system. I won't say any more for now, other than check back later tonight and it should be up.
And I imagine next year, but there's also a waterpark apprentice.
And AJ, I loved your idea! Journey to the Center of the Earth is something I would love to see at Animal Kingdom. The rest was just really awesome, especially the theming and the sort of mystical aspect of it.
Karly, enjoy your trip to Dollywood. It's one of my favorite parks and I'm sure you'll have a great time.
Josh, TPA seems like it usually runs every summer, so look around May for season five. It's also possible there may be a short winter version (probably around January), but I don't think it has been confirmed yet.
AJ, I'm gonna read your proposal now.
But it was a very good entry, and if you're playing next year I think you're someone to look out for.
I know it got a bit of Criticism, but I liked Alan's Serengeti Skyfari; It cut out a lot of the needless compexity (says the guy who's entry that week couldn't be more complicated) allowing guests a great animal experience, without disturbing the animals in any way.
Out of mine, I'm still the proudest of Chimp & Zee's. I know others of mine have ranked higher, but I still think its the best I've done especially as thats the challenge I expected to fall in (although Unplugged is very close).
For mine: Kodiak Retreat at Walt Disney World! I was so proud of that 2nd place :')
From me: I'm going with South Park: Revenge of the Crab People. My favorite was either this or Forest Flyers, but I'm going with South Park. I pulled a last minute thing with this because I didn't feel like using Pocahontas, Phineas and Ferb, or Over the Hedge as they didn't work well, so I decided to go with South Park and be very random. While it wasn't a hit with judges, the voters liked it. I felt very proud of it.
I wish it was sloths though. Sloths are amazing. Go sloths!
Challenge 1: Karly's 101 Dalmations Escape from Cruella De Vil
Challenge 2: Chad's The Desert at Night
Challenge 3: Andy's SeaWorld Orlando: 40 Years of Fun
Challenge 4: David's The Shack on Whitaker Hill
Challenge 5: David's Poaching at Ape Mountain*
Challenge 6: Didn't read these since I was on vacation
Challenge 7: Dan's The Lost World at Worlds of Fun
Challenge 8: Chad's Unplugged: Acoustic Cuisine*
Challenge 9: Chad's Universe of Energy Pavilion
Challenge 10: I'll wait until ranking are posted
Now, here is my ranking of my own entries, from the one I liked best to the one I liked least.
1. Falconidae (challenge 2)
2. Brother Bear: Kenai's Journey (challenge 1)
3. Kingdom of the Dinosaurs at Knott's Berry Farm (challenge 7)
4. Meltdown (challenge 4)
5. The Lorax 3-D: Return of the Once-Lers (challenge 5)
6. Fiends of the Sea (challenge 3)
7. The Lost City of Atlantis (challenge 10)
8. The Land Pavilion (challenge 9)
9. The Otter Lodge (challenge 6)
10. Raccolto Della Terra (challenge 8)
I definitely think this season has been excellent, although I didn't follow any of the previous seasons too closely and only read the proposals for challenges that sounded interesting.
Challenge 1: AJ
Challenge 2: Bryce
Challenge 3: Michelle
Challenge 4: Joseph
Challenge 5: Bryce
Challenge 6: Dan
Challenge 7: Bryce
Challenge 8: Chad
Challenge 9: Bryce
Challenge 10: Waiting for the judges first
For me:
1. South Park Revenge of the Crab People (Challenge 5)
2. Forest Flyers (Challenge 2)
3. Fantasia Bout Tours (Challenge 1)
4. The Terrifying World of Special Effects (Callenge 4)
5. Born to be Wld (Challenge 3)
6. Lion Paradise (Challenge 6, my elimination round)
And I was scared to go into too much detail about The Forbidden Jungle because the judges said not to do that. I dunno. Chad's was really well done and so was AJ's. We all had our flaws. And the vote is pretty close. Chad could still come ahead...
Capricorn Forest was supposed to have an avary originally, but I ended up caning it because it just didnt feel right...
But the other ideas were very good, and if my legion of fans doesnt arrive tonight (where are you guys???) I've done better than I expected or hoped - my eyes were on the "eliminated too soon" prize, and, well, everyone was worthy of making the final I think.
I had no idea what I was getting into!
The rest of mine, I wasn't too sure where I could put them without it just being a pic for pics sake...
So I guess I'd like to ask, where would all of you have liked to have seen pics?
At this rate there's a resonable chance all 3 of us will be tied winners come next Monday....
Thank you to whoever voted for me though!
First is about how long a proposal should be, and when extra explanation should be included about a part of the proposal. There were several times when a judge stated that something didn't make sense to them in a proposal, and that more explanation would have helped. The competitor often said that they didn't want the proposal to get too long, and that we had said that they should keep descriptions short and basic (or something similar to this). I would say that, when in doubt, write. Adding a paragraph that fully explains a proposal in a short but compete manner is better than letting the reader, be they a judge or a voter, be confused.
The second question involved the use of pictures. No, they are not required, but one thing to consider is the fact that, with a proposal as complex as the one you are working on right now, you are going to have lots of text and a lot of reading for the public to dig through. Adding an appropriate picture, map, logo, etc. can help to break the long sections of reading into something less intimidating. Also, theme parks are very visual things- giving the reader something to look at is just one more way to get their attention and share your vision of your park. I often have said that a great proposal involves "painting with words", but at this level of competition you should use every tool at your disposal to make the most memorable, dazzling, fill-in-the-adjective proposal possible. A picture that augments your written proposal can't help but help you. Be sure to follow the rules concerning how many you can use, but don't hesitate to use them if they can help you in any way.
I hope this helps you understand what I think about when writing and reading proposals. Please feel free to post questions if any of this is not clear. I do know that my fellow judges join me in wanting you all to do your best work ever. We are all looking forward to your proposals!
I have a proposal in to Tim to shorten the season down to 5 weeks (including a non-elimination week) and possibly do two of them over the summer and one over winter break.....the major change would be a 50% elimination each week instead of just the bottom one. According to the positions from the current season, we would have had the same people in the final four. Although this would make it very difficult to get practiced up enough to compete against people who have been playing every season....
Thoughts? Comments?
I think getting "practised up" is an important feature, I think I only started hitting my stride come Chimp & Zees.
I think also maybe allowing a single multimedia link would be great... Anytime i think of unplugged the song "classical Gas" jumps straight into my head.
But overall if it ain't broke, don't fix it. The only possible "broke" bit is the voting results pulling up ties.
I thought that the 3 judge system worked pretty well and would also propose getting rid of the site vote entirely....except for maybe the last round or two.
As for elimination process, my idea would be that the following occurs in this order:
1. Before the challenge, the judges decide on a minimum point value needed to continue (obviously, this goes up as the game progresses). After scoring is completed, anyone who falls below this value is automatically eliminated. If more contestants fall below this score than required eliminations, the bottom x contestants are eliminated.
2. If additional eliminations are required, the bottom two contestants from each judges rankings (that were not eliminated in step 1) are put in the vote. This means the vote could have anywhere from 2 to 6 contestants. The lowest x number of contestants after 24 hours are eliminated to satisfy the competition requirements.
3. If tampering is suspected in the poll, the judges may end it at any time and/or choose to eliminate an alternate competitor.
4. In the event of a tie, the competitor with the lowest cumulative score is eliminated.
5. For the final round, no site vote takes place. Instead, the judges each cast one vote, and each eliminated competitor may cast a vote (by e-mailing a judge). The number of votes recieved determines the winner.
One other thing that might be good to add would be a drop rule, such as "If you drop from the contest after eliminations have begun, you will not be permitted to vote for a winner and the judges may, at their discretion, bar you from competing in future TPA competitions." It's mainly to keep the signups to serious competitors and not people who are going to quit partway through.
These are just ideas for improvements. I do think that everything has worked very well and not much needs changing, but at the same time there are things that would be improved by making changes.
Interesting additions.....we will definately take those ideas into consideration....
.....I was also thinking that 50% elimination in the first week of eliminations was a little harsh....
Unfortunately, the judges don't score the submissions per se. We are using a ranking system instead of a scoring system. It makes it a little easier to say "Is Jeff's submission better than Jim's" instead of a more complex scoring system......not that it wasn't theorized early on, but we decided to drop that for a more simple system.....
.....I would also be a little more gentle about people dropping out. People like Andy had a completely legit reason for gracefully bowing out.
Maybe the first challenge is a team game (3-4 teams?), the "Project manager" for the team is a previous champion. Opening entry is a park, with each contestant having to build a "land" for that. The "Project manager" is additionally tasked with the overall vision and making sure the lands work with each other and the overall park vision.
The winning "Team" gets a pass into the next round. Out of the non winning teams, each team has a separate vote for either someone to be saved or elminated.
This does strike me as soemthing that might be awfully fiddly and complicated to pull off though. Not entirely sure if it would work in practice.
Maybe it would work as a warm up? That way people who are having difficulty with the format have the opportunity to get up to scratch with "Coaching" from a former champ...
As for scoring submissions, I thought each judge gave each proposal a score out of ten and then they were summed to create the final rankings. If that's not the case, my idea might not work as well, so maybe the bottom one or two would be automatically eliminated and a vote determines any additional eliminations.
As for challenges, I'm not a huge fan of the team challenge idea (too complicated), and I will admit that I found the earlier challenges this season good, but the later ones too restrictive and somewhat boring. I think the more open-ended the challenges are, the more fun they are to do. Although it would be hard, and probably somewhat difficult to judge, I think what would be fun would be having a build-up game where none of the challenges take place at a real park, and instead everything has to fit together in the contestant's fictional park. Part of the final would be incorporating all your previous proposals for the season into the final park without it seeming too awkward, and it would also require contestants to plan ahead so they don't end up with something that doesn't quite fit in at the end. Perhaps this would be better for a mini-season rather than a full season, but I think it sounds like fun.
Another twist (although this would be more of a spin-off game) would be to have each competitor submit a challenge, and then they act as a guest judge for that challenge and compete in all others. This would probably work better as a cumulative points total than as an elimination game, however, and would have to be limited to around 10 players.
Whatever ends up happening, I'm sure it will be fun. I should probably think less about the next season and more about the final of this one, at least until I decide on an idea and get started writing.
AJ: Around 8 challenges worked great the first year, and I would love to keep it around that. During the first season, signups were low. The demand was immense after the first season, and thus Water Park Apprentice was born, greatly increasing the amount of challenges.
As for your number 5, I actually tried this for I believe 3 seasons. Unfortunately it just doesn't work. Having all the eliminated contestants involved in voting for the finale never seems to be accomplished, as the first year I never received a vote from one competitor. As the seasons went on, and the contestants increased, the responses became more sparse. I did away with this (last season I believe) because it just didn't make sense anymore if people were going to neglect this request.
Andy: I would love to go back to an old school version, where the possibilities were endless. I thought the creativity was much greater and was expanded. I originally was going to go in this direction this season, but had a positive response of the more extensive themes that I have given seasons. I have toyed around with about 3 more themed seasons, but these might be alienated to the mini-seasons of winter break. I run these games to get reader enjoyment, and I will take this into consideration for the next seasons.
As a sidenote and for possible further commentary, the themes that have been in development are movies/tv/music, roller coaster mini season, and a hometown theme park mini season.
Dominick: TPA 2 was set around the basis of changing things that I wanted to see developed in the theme parks. It was a personal competition, revolving around what was current at the time.
Chad: We have been in discussion about the possibility of coaches and teams before. I've wanted to experiment for a while now, and this would be a complete revamp of the format. This might be needed to keep things interesting. I did find the the pairs challenge from a former season did not work out to most contestant's advantage. It caused for some conflict and disputes.
AJ: This is another idea that has been on my mind. I've kind of wanted to work this idea of having every challenge relate to each other in some way. I think it would make for a challenging and interesting season.
Thanks again everyone.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Will we be allowed more than 5 pictures for this challenge?
