New Features on IFDB
This is a summary of recent additions and changes to the site. The list isn't comprehensive - we report only the more visible and significant changes, so you might notice some minor changes from time to time that aren't reported here.
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2 August 2024
Mobile improvements: Pages for individual games work much better on mobile browsers now. In addition, we've added the ability to collapse the "Welcome to IFDB!" section, so you can see more IFDB news on the home page. (If you sign in and collapse the section, we'll remember that you prefer the section collapsed.)
18 February 2024
The 2023 IFDB Awards have been concluded: The 2023 IFDB Awards ran from February 1st to February 17th. Winners can be found here. Congratulations to all winners, and thanks to everyone who participated!
11 February 2024
2023 IFDB Awards Closing Soon: Voting ends for the IFDB Awards at roughly midnight EST on February 17th. Make sure you get your votes in early! The rules for the competition can be found here, and a list of all categories can be found here.
1 February 2024
The 2023 IFDB Awards are open!: The 2023 IFDB Awards are open from Feb 1 to Feb 17! The rules for the competition can be found here, and a list of all categories can be found here.
List of Categories in the 2023 IFDB Awards: Overall Categories
Outstanding Game of the Year 2023
Author’s Choice for Best Game of 2023
Outstanding Game over 2 hours in 2023
Outstanding Short Game of 2023
Outstanding Underappreciated Game of 2023
Most Sequel-worthy game of 2023
Outstanding Worldbuilding of 2023
Outstanding Use of Interactivity in 2023
Outstanding Retro Game of 2023
Language CategoriesOutstanding German Game of 2023
Outstanding Spanish Game of 2023
Outstanding French Game of 2023
Genre CategoriesOutstanding Children’s Game of 2023
Outstanding Fantasy Game of 2023
Outstanding Educational Game of 2023
Outstanding Historical Game of 2023
Outstanding Horror Game of 2023
Outstanding Humor Game of 2023
Outstanding Mystery Game of 2023
Outstanding Romance Game of 2023
Outstanding Science Fiction Game of 2023
Outstanding Slice of Life Game of 2023
Outstanding Surreal Game of 2023
System CategoriesOutstanding Inform 7 Game of 2023
Outstanding Twine Game of 2023
Outstanding Choicescript Game of 2023
Outstanding Inform 6 Game of 2023
Outstanding PunyInform Game of 2023
Outstanding Game in a Custom System of 2023
Outstanding Moiki Game of 2023
Outstanding Ren’py Game of 2023
Outstanding Adventuron Game of 2023
Outstanding Unity Game of 2023
Outstanding Bitsy Game of 2023
Outstanding Texture Game of 2023
Outstanding Gruescript Game of 2023
Outstanding ADRIFT Game of 2023
Outstanding Decker Game of 2023
Outstanding Game in an Uncommon System of 2023
Rules for 2023 IFDB Awards: The IFDB Awards is an annual competition designed to award excellence in creating interactive fiction.It is held from February 1st to the first weekend after February 15th each year on the Interactive Fiction Database, and take the form of polls.
Votes are public but anonymized. Every IFDB member is eligible to vote, except for one special poll, the Author’s Choice Poll. Eligibility to vote in the Author’s Choice competition is determined by having a game linked to your IFDB profile (this can be found by editing a game page and use the ‘Link to Author’s Profile’ feature. Authors added incorrectly to a game will not be permitted to vote (for instance, if someone associates a random game they didn’t make to their account). Rules for discussion and voting-Voting must be in good faith and be based on personal experience with the games involved.
-Campaigning or organizing voting is not allowed if it breaks the above rule.
-Discussion of games on merit is allowed and encouraged.
-There is no hard limit on how many votes a person can cast in each poll for different games. A player voting for so many games that it makes voting difficult for others (such as voting for every game from the whole year) may have their votes removed, but only after warning.
-Author cannot vote for their own games. Such votes will be removed so that the running tallies are correct. Authors can post about their own games (for instance on intfiction) as long as doesn’t encourage people to break the rules (such as telling people to vote for your game even if they haven’t played it). Code of conduct -Voters must abide by the IFDB Code of Conduct. Harassment of other voters (including on other platforms) and creating multiple accounts for one person are prohibited. Moderation -Votes that are cast incorrectly (for instance, voting for a Twine game in a Choicescript poll) or fraudulently (for instance, using sockpuppet accounts) may be removed. Eligibility
-For most polls, games are eligible if they are listed on IFDB and have a publication date during 2023.
-For system-specific polls, games additionally must have the appropriate system or genre listed on their IFDB page under the specified field.
-Each poll will have a link to an IFDB search listing suggested games. Outside of system-based polls, users can vote for any game they feel fits the criteria.
-Any IFDB user can edit game pages to confirm eligibility. However, malicious editing (such as adding every genre to a game or adding incorrect systems to a game) will be reverted or removed.
-Any game author can opt out of the competition. Adding a note to the game page during the competition may be helpful to let others know not to vote for it, but opting out should be officially done by messaging the organizer (me, for now).
Results
-Results will be clearly visible throughout the poll. However, there will be a grace period of up to 3 days at the end to allow checking of votes before the official announcements, which will be made on Intfiction and IFDB.
-Polls with very low traffic will not have a winner awarded. This is left up to organizer discretion, but low traffic may include less than 5 votes for the winning game or less than ten votes total cast. Future of Awards One of the main purposes of these new awards is to be community-owned and regular. They need to keep working even if I don’t keep working. The awards begin on February 1st of each year. If Feb 1st passes without the current organizer having created the polls, anyone can create the polls themselves. The community can propose new changes to awards or new organizers via public discussion. A public yes/no poll on intfiction with more than 50% voting yes can be used to add new organizers. Current organizers can also add in other organizers or successors, subject to a public veto.
4 January 2024
Database performance improvements: Over the past few days, we've rolled out a number of database performance improvements. The site should load faster now, especially on the home page, game listings, searches, and user profiles. More details on the performance improvements are available on the intfiction.org forum.
6 September 2023
New this week: The team has been hard at work on improvements to IFDB.
- Search by days
- Renamed “Downloads” to “External Links”
- Made it easier to ask the moderation team to delete games
Search by days: published:30d- searches for games published within the last 30 days. published:90d-30d searches for games published within the last 90 days, but more than 30 days ago.
Renamed “Downloads” to “External Links”: IFDB doesn’t store files, so we hope that by renaming this section, it will make it clearer what we do.
Made it easier to ask the moderation team to delete games: Now you can click “Delete This Page” on any game. We’ll ask you to give a reason why the game should be deleted, and IFDB will send an email to our team for review. (Our team is all volunteers, so please be patient!)
11 July 2023
Security Updates:
In a recent update to IFDB, we’ve added a Content Security Policy, designed to provide broad defenses against XSS attacks. https://github.com/iftechfoundation/ifdb/pull/242
The change required updates to almost every part of IFDB, and so it wouldn’t be totally shocking if we broke something while rolling it out.
If you see a new issue, we invite you to reply on the intfiction.org forum, or to file a bug in our suggestion tracker at https://github.com/iftechfoundation/ifdb-suggestion-tracker/issues.
18 February 2023
The 2022 IFDB Awards have now concluded: The 2022 IFDB Awards are now closed. Results are available here. Feedback can directed to this forum post. Thanks to all those who participated!
The 2022 IFDB Awards are in!:
Overall Categories
Outstanding Game of the Year - Player’s Choice
- According to Cain, by Jim Nelson
Outstanding Game of the Year 2022 - Author’s Choice
- The Spectators, by Amanda Walker
Outstanding Debut of 2022 - Player’s Choice - an IFDB Poll
- No winner (4-way tie)
Outstanding Debut of 2022 - Author’s Choice
- A Long Way to the Nearest Star, by SV Linwood
Outstanding Game over 2 hours in 2022 - Player’s Choice and Author’s Choice
- According to Cain, by Jim Nelson
Outstanding Short Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice
- Use Your Psychic Powers at Applebee’s, by Geoffrey Golden
Outstanding Short Game of 2022 - Author’s Choice
- Esther’s, by Brad Buchanan and Alleson Buchanan
Outstanding Underappreciated Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice
Tie:
- Quintessence, by Lapin Lunaire Games
- Cannelé & Nomnom - Defective Agency, by Younès R. & Yazaleea
Outstanding Underappreciated Game of 2022 - Author’s Choice
- Quintessence, by Lapin Lunaire Games
Most Sequel-worthy game of 2022 - Player’s Choice
- Lady Thalia and the Rose of Rocroi, by E. Joyce and N. Cormier
Most Sequel-worthy Game of 2022 - Author’s Choice
- Custard & Mustard’s Big Adventure, by Christopher Merriner
Outstanding Feelies of 2022 - Player’s Choice
Tie:
-
The Last Christmas Present, by JG Heithcock
-
New Year’s Eve, 2019, by Autumn Chen
Outstanding Feelies of 2022 - Author’s Choice
- New Year’s Eve, 2019, by Autumn Chen
Trailblazer Award of 2022 - Player’s Choice
- Trigaea, by RynGM
Trailblazer Award of 2022 - Author’s Choice
- A Chinese Room, by Milo van Mesdag
Outstanding Worldbuilding of 2022 - Player’s Choice and Author’s Choice
- The Archivist and the Revolution, by Autumn Chen
Outstanding Use of Interactivity in 2022 - Player’s Choice
- Cannelé & Nomnom - Defective Agency, by Younès R. & Yazaleea
Outstanding Use of Interactivity in 2022 - Author’s Choice
- Fairest, by Amanda Walker
Outstanding Retro Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice
- Alchemist’s Gold, by Garry Francis
Outstanding Retro Game of 2022 - Author’s Choice
- The Mystery of Markham Manor, by Edward P. Toovey
Language Based Polls
Outstanding German Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice and Author’s Choice
- Schief, by Olaf Nowacki
Outstanding Spanish Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice and Author’s Choice
- El Virulé, by paravaariar
Outstanding French Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice
- La Princesse spéculaire, by Nathanaël Marion
Outstanding French Game of 2022 - Author’s Choice
- Une soirée costumée, by Julien Zamor
Genre Polls
Outstanding Fantasy Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice and Author’s Choice
- Fairest, by Amanda Walker
Outstanding Horror Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice and Author’s Choice
- Sweetpea, by Sophia de Augustine
Outstanding Humor Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice
- Wry, by Olaf Nowacki
Outstanding Humor Game of 2022 - Author’s Choice
Tie:
- Gent Stickman vs Evil Meat Hand, by AZ / ParserCommander
- Wry, by Olaf Nowacki
Outstanding Mystery Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice
- Things that Happened in Houghtonbridge, by Dee Cooke
Outstanding Mystery Game of 2022 - Author’s Choice
Tie:
- Things that Happened in Houghtonbridge, by Dee Cooke
- The Thirty Nine Steps, by Graham Walmsley
Outstanding Science Fiction Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice and Author’s Choice
- The Archivist and the Revolution, by Autumn Chen
Outstanding Slice of Life Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice and Author’s Choice
- New Year’s Eve, 2019, by Autumn Chen
Outstanding Surreal Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice
- The Impossible Stairs, by Mathbrush
Outstanding Surreal Game of 2022 - Author’s Choice
- Nose Bleed, by Stanley W. Baxton
System-based polls
Outstanding Inform 7 Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice
- The Spectators, by Amanda Walker
Outstanding Inform 7 Game of 2022 - Author’s Choice
- Of Their Shadows Deep, by Amanda Walker
Outstanding Inform 6 Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice
- Alchemist’s Gold, by Garry Francis
Outstanding Inform 6 Game of 2022 - Author’s Choice
Tie
- Alchemist’s Gold, by Garry Francis
- Into The Sun, by Dark Star
Outstanding Adventuron Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice and Author’s Choice
- Things that Happened in Houghtonbridge, by Dee Cooke
Outstanding Twine Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice
- The Grown-Up Detective Agency, by Brendan Patrick
Outstanding Twine Game of 2022 - Author’s Choice
- Computerfriend, by Kit Riemer
Outstanding Choicescript Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice
TIe:
- The Passenger, by Jime Rolón
- THROW. MARIA. OVERBOARD., by Travis Moy
Outstanding Choicescript Game of 2022 - Author’s Choice
- THROW. MARIA. OVERBOARD., by Travis Moy
Outstanding Adrift Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice
Tie:
- Lost Coastlines, by William Dooling
- The Euripides Enigma, by Larry Horsfield
Outstanding Adrift Game of 2022 - Author’s Choice
- Lost Coastlines, by William Dooling
Outstanding Game in a Custom System in 2022 - Player’s Choice and Author’s Choice
- Uncle Mortimer’s Secret, by Jim MacBrayne
Outstanding Game in an Uncommon System in 2022 - Player’s Choice
- The Impossible Stairs, by Mathbrush
Outstanding Game in an Uncommon System in 2022 - Author’s Choice
- The Archivist and the Revolution, by Autumn Chen
Outstanding PunyInform Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice
- Alchemist’s Gold, by Garry Francis
Outstanding PunyInform Game of 2022 - Author’s Choice
- Carpathian Vampire, by Garry Francis
Outstanding Ink Game of 2022 - Player’s Choice
- Prism, by Eliot M.B. Howard
Outstanding Ink Game of 2022 - Author’s Choice
- Use Your Psychic Powers at Applebee’s, by Geoffrey Golden
31 January 2023
The 2022 IFDB Awards are open!: The 2022 IFDB Awards are open from Feb 1 to Feb 17! The rules for the competition can be found here, and a list of all categories can be found here.
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