Introduction

One of the major cornerstones of SCD over the years has been its challenge systems. Each and every generation of SCD since Gen5 (the TSS-era) has had its own collection of challenges - tasks which the staff of SCD issue to the members to complete to earn awards, and therefore show recognition of their abilities in the Sonic games. Gen8 is no exception to this, as SCD has yet another collection of challenges for you to take on. However, we've mixed things around this year, to form a challenge system which offers a new balance of tasks so players of all skill levels can take a shot at them, and also a new reward system to allow you to better show off your accomplishments and, ultimately, to stimulate competition for the title of Challenge Master!


Challenge System History

Gen5
The first challenge system introduced on SCD was the Emerald Challenges. The system, which was primarily designed by SCD administrator SpinDashMaster, offered 24 tasks split across three difficulty levels. The difficulty levels were represented by the different levels of emeralds in Sonic games: the Chaos Emeralds representing the easy difficulty tasks, generally requiring a simple activity to be completed within an act; the Super Emeralds representing the medium difficulty tasks, generally asking for the player to use more complex techniques and skills over Chaos Emerald tasks in a single act or completing multiple acts under a condition; the Master Emeralds representing the finger-breaking difficulty tasks, which demanded the player in most cases to complete the entire game under strict conditions or using difficult techniques. Alongside this, the colours of the emeralds represented the skills which the challenge was testing. For instance, green tested the player's speed in the game (time trialling skills), while yellow/orange tested observance (collecting items like rings). Each task was released on a weekly basis, and in order to tackle harder tasks, you had to first earn the emeralds of the particular colour you wanted from the lower difficulties (e.g. to be able to take on the Blue Super Emerald Challenge, you had to earn the Blue Chaos Emerald first). The system as a whole was a major success for SCD, and was the primary pull factor for the site. However, towards the beginning of Gen6, unfortunate circumstances arose within SCD's administration, which led to the challenges being removed from the site, leaving a gaping hole in the site's content that needed to be filled urgently.

Gen6
As a result of the loss of the Emerald Challenges, SCD was in need of a new replacement challenge system. At the time, SCD staff members Tha CGS, MickX and NelspikeTX were working on a small project of their own, which was originally intended to be part of the Emerald Challenges. This project was the Sol Emerald Challenge system. The Sol Emeralds used the same method of assigning the skills being tested by the challenge as the main Emerald Challenges, through the colour of the emeralds, and also followed the weekly release schedule. Many of the challenges involved playing Sonic 3 & Knuckles, as this was the favoured game among the creators, although a few Sonic 1/2 challenges were involved. The system was immediately put into place as the replacement challenge system, and was a hit with the members straight off the bat. However, due to the original concept behind the system, only seven challenges were made for it, so in the long run, SCD required another system to help support it.
This requirement was soon met by the creation of the Badnik Challenges. Created by SCD member MM*Gazah, this challenge system was cored completely around the original Sonic The Hedgehog title on the Genesis, and involved the player destroying a certain number of badniks in an act or zone, alongside completing an additional task. The rewards came in the form of the badnik which featured primarily in that challenge. This system was almost completely unique to both of the other systems used by SCD, and so offered a lot of potential. However, bad management of the system by the staff led to it not receiving much attention from the members, in comparison to the Sol Emerald Challenges. A second set of challenges themed around Sonic The Hedgehog 2 was proposed for creation and release, but the idea was soon canned after SCD Gen7 began.

Gen7
Where Gen7 of SCD had to be launched early due to security issues with the previous Generation, and SCD's upgrade to using vBulletin instead of Invision Power Boards, there wasn't time to plan out the system to be brought in to replace the Sol Emerald Challenges, so they were brought back into service during the first few months. Though, it was seen that the system wasn't drawing in the attention they once were, since they were becoming rather old to the members. So work on the new system had to begin quickly. At first, the idea of using a Master Emerald split into shards was proposed, where each member of staff would be assigned a shard to make a challenge and graphic of their own for, but this idea in the end did not make it past the early design stages due to lack of support.
Once again, MickX came up with another new system idea, this time involving the Emblems as seen in more recent Sonic games. The main premise to this new system was that the challenges could consist of any tasks which the challenge creator could think of (several members of staff contributed challenges and award ideas for this system, as MickX left the SCD staff shortly after the system went into development), since it would not be restricted to testing certain skills like the emeralds were. With this, the challenges also had three levels of goals to complete, ranging from a normal 'easy difficulty' emblem to a platinum 'hard difficulty' emblem. It also used another unique concept with the award images, where a small graphic representing the challenge theme would be set into the center of the emblem (for instance, Sonic's death sprite for a challenge involving 'Game Over', or a ring for ring collection tasks). This new system offered a lot of scope for challenges with having almost no restrictions, however this also proved an undoing of the system, as some of the challenges issued were seen by the members as too overly-complex through requiring too many things to be done. As such, only a small number of the challenges saw much attention, and so the system did not fully live up to the expectations of the staff.


The New Challenge System - SCD Achievements

For the new challenge system for Gen8, we have taken into account the strengths and weaknesses of the Emblem Challenges, used what worked for that system and mixed it together to form what we call the SCD Achievements. This system, much like the last, uses Emblems as the base for the award images, but uses a completely different formula for the challenges themselves, coring off of the Achievement system used on the X-Box 360. In order to explain exactly how the system works, it would be best to explain how the Achievement system on the X-Box 360 works.

Every game on the X-Box 360 has a set of goals and tasks to complete, called Achievements. Each game has a different number of achievements to complete, all with varying levels of difficulty and appropriate score values known as GamerScore. Many of the achievements in games can be unlocked via general gameplay, while some require the player to do 'out of the ordinary' gameplays or play online against other players in order to unlock the achievement. Upon completing a particular achievement, a message appears at the bottom of the screen, listing the achievement that has been completed, and the value of said achievement. This achievement then appears in a list of completed achievements for that game in the user's profile, complete with an image to represent the achievement. Although the number of achievements may vary from game to game, every main X-Box 360 title has a total of 1,000 GamerScore's worth of achievements (with an optional 250 GamerScore's worth possible to be added via Downloadable Content), and every X-Box Live Arcade title has 200 GamerScore's worth. Overall, the achievement system on the X-Box 360 is popular among the players, with even some die-hards going out to buy games purely for earning achievements.

So with this in mind, our idea for the SCD Achievements challenge system revolves around assigning a selection of tasks and goals for players to accomplish on each Sonic title, with a healthy variance of difficulty to appease to all players, and to prevent the issues that arose with the original Emblem Challenges system. As such, each game will have its own list of challenges and awards independent from the other games. The awards, as explained before, come in the form of color-coded emblems, containing a central graphic representing the task (to be) completed. Although we've said each game's challenge list is independent, you'll notice that some tasks do appear on multiple of the games, such as collecting a certain number of rings in an act or detroying a certain number of badniks. This is all part of our idea to allow you to demonstrate those particular skills in all of the games to emphasise how good you are at those types of tasks, and so rewarding yourself multiple times for it.

Another new concept for this system is the method of displaying your awards. One common issue in the past with displaying awards has been that it's not possible to show off all the awards you have earned, due to problems like signature image limits. So, we came up with something to counteract this. Like with the previous systems, when you complete a challenge, you will be issued the award in the post with your entry, but unlike the previous systems, your awards will also be displayed in your user profile, much like how achievements appear in your X-Box 360 profile. All of your awards will be able to be displayed in your profile, as there is no limit to how many can be there, so other members will recognize everything you have achieved.

The final new concept for this generation's challenge system is a new scoring tally. Each challenge has a score weight assigned to it, based on the difficulty and the length of the challenge, and as you complete the challenges, the scores will be tallied by the staff. Every member who takes part in the challenges will be ranked on a league table, with their position determined by the score they have accumulated from completing challenges. So, as such, members who have completed fewer but more difficult challenges could rank higher than those who have completed many but easier challenges. So, you may want to consider which challenges you aim to complete if you want to rank highly on the table.


How to Participate in the SCD Achievements

Participating in the SCD Achievements is, as a whole, done very much the same as it always has been with past challenge systems. Threads will be posted in the Challenge Arena forum for each game, and you simply reply to the thread with your entry. For most challenges, entries are recorded using the Gens Plus emulator, much like in the past (however, there are some exceptions, which are addressed below). The staff will then watch your entry to evaluate it, and give you the appropriate feedback based on the success or failure of your entry. Success at the challenge will reward you with the challenge's award edited into your entry post and added to your forum user profile. In the case of failure at the challenge, the staff member will edit in why you have failed, so you can use the information to correct the mistake during another attempt.

There are two differences this time round in terms of participation. Firstly, the challenges will be released weekly in blocks of three, with the previous week's challenges being closed as the new ones are introduced. However, once all of our proposed challenges have been released, we will cycle back through the challenges and re-open them, so you'll have another opportunity to complete them if you missed out the first time around. You are free to work towards completing challenegs which aren't open, but you will not be able to post your entry until they are open.
Secondly, we are now introducing a small number of challenges to be completed online, using the OpenKaillera client to record your entries with another player. These challenges will involve using the V.S. mode in Sonic The Hedgehog 2, the Competition Mode in Sonic The Hedgehog 3 & Knuckles, and the Sonic & Tails pairing in the main Sonic 3 & Knuckles gameplay. With these challenges, both participating members will be required to post videos of the entry in order for credit to be given.

Extended explanations on how to participate in the SCD Achievements can be found on the forums by reading the following threads:

Orientation - SCD Achievements Challenge System
SCD Achievements Challenge System Rules
How To - Record '.giz' Video Files
How To - Record '.krec' Video Files

Also, please be sure to read the 'How This Forum Works' thread in each game's forum, so you understand what exactly you can and cannot post in your reply to the challenge threads.


Need Help?

If you have any queries about the system, or any suggestions for challenge ideas, please feel free to post a thread in this forum:

Orientation & Help

If while using the system, you spot any members cheating at the challenges or feel that anyone was unjustly given an award, please make a post in this forum:

Rules, Rulings & Disputes


Final Statement

We hope you enjoy using the new SCD Achievements challenge system, and look forward to your participation! Happy gaming!

-The SCD Gaming Coliseum Team