Subject: *** INTERNET PC GAMES CHARTS * DOCUMENT ***
Date: 11 Nov 1995 00:44:59 GMT
X-Posted-By: jojo@xs1.xs4all.nl

Posted-By: auto-faq 2.4
Posting-frequency: once per month
Editor: Jurgen Appelo


                     Internet PC Games Charts: Document

                                Version 14

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This document should answer all possible questions about the weekly
international games charts for the comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.* newsgroups. The
document describes the way the charts are compiled and it decribes the way
to participate in this. At the end, a list of frequently asked questions is
presented, together with their answers. But first, let me present you some
messages I got from the entertainment industry. The first is from
Electronic Arts, the second from Apogee Software:

> Thanks for sending us the weekly chart. It is much appreciated by both our
> development staff and marketing department. We use it to gauge the type of
> games that people are interested in. [...] Electronic Arts takes its users
> seriously. We always want comments, be it praise or critisism. Then we know
> if we are doing something good or bad. If a certain type of game is riding
> high we want to know why, and if our games aren't, we want to know why not.
> [...]

> Electronic Arts.

> Just wanted to drop you a line about the Top 100. A while back, you posted
> a list of people who read the chart. I don't know which other companies
> actually do this, but I wanted to say that the list is more than just read
> by me. It's also printed and hung on the wall by the front entrance to the
> offices. Our stuff is highlited, and it's read by just about everyone in
> the office. Whenever a new list is posted, everyone checks it out, and I've
> seen a few customers of ours who have stopped in the office looking at it
> as well. This list is really great fun, and it's a nice tool as well. Keep
> it up!

> Apogee Software

Don't worry, I will not quote all the messages I got from the software
companies. Let me just give you some names: Access, Accolade, Adventions,
AdventureSoft, Apogee, Blizzard, Capstone, DC Software, Digital
Integration, Dragon's Eye, Dynamix, Electronic Arts, Epic MegaGames,
HomeBrew Software, HyperBole, Id Software, Impressions, Interplay,
LookingGlass, LucasArts, Luminaria, Maxis, Merit, MicroProse, Microsoft,
Mindscape, New World, Origin, Papyrus, Parallax, Psygnosis, Raven, Sierra,
Sir-Tech, Sony, Spectrum Holobyte, SSI, Three-Sixty, Westwood and Wizard
Games of Scotland. And these are only the ones I've had contact with. There
may be other important readers out there.

Now that I have shown you that the Internet charts are a serious thing, I
will explain what it's all about.

The Chart

The Internet PC Games Charts are weekly charts for PC games, compiled from
votes that are sent by e-mail. Every game player in the world, having an
e-mail account, is allowed to send his or her votes. The chart is published
every Monday on Usenet in the comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.* newsgroups. You can
also find the charts at http://www.xs4all.nl/~jojo. There are two main
charts published every week: the Commercial Top 100 and the Download Top
40.

The Votes

When you send me your votes, you are allowed to spread a total of 20 points
over several games. Different games may get a different amount of points,
but not more than 5 points may be given to one game. As a result, at least
4 games should get points when all 20 points are used. (It is allowed, of
course, to use less than 20 points.) Try to concentrate on the games you
play now, and not the ones you played a long time ago. The chart is not an
all-time favourites list. It reflects the popularity of games that people
are currently playing. There is a limit to the number of times you can vote
for the same game, which is 26 times. After that you are encouraged to vote
for other games you like. This rule tries to prevent stagnation in the
chart by making life for very old games just a little harder.

The chart is compiled automatically by a program that reads and processes
e-mail messages. When sending your votes, be sure to have the word votes
(or vote) in the subject of your message. Only points should be given in
messages having this subject header. Send comments and questions in
different messages using different subjects.

It is likely that your votes will not change much over the weeks and that
it may be tiresome to send a new message every week. Therefore, everyone's
votes are used for 4 weeks in a row. So, when your list of favourite games
does not change, you only have to send a new message after 4 weeks. You
will be notified when these 4 weeks have gone by, if you haven't sent new
votes yet. New votes can be sent anytime. Your previous votes will
automatically be discarded.

Some games will appear two times in the lists, once in the Commercial Top
100 with the full price version, and once in the Download Top 40 with the
free distributable versions. (Although those two versions may in fact be
exactly the same.) If you have the full retail/registered version of a
game, and you want other people to know that it's good, then vote for it in
the Top 100. If you downloaded a demo or shareware version and you think
other people should do that too, then vote for it in the Top 40. The
commercial games and the download games have different ID numbers. Check
them out.

If you want to vote for games in both charts, then your votes must be in
one message, in whatever order you like. Don't send different messages for
the two seperate charts, as my computer will assume that the first message
must be discarded when you send the second one.

The Form

To help people send their votes for the charts, a voting form has been
designed on the WWW. It makes voting very easy, because you only have to
click on the games you want to vote for, select the number of points, and
don't worry about ID numbers. You can find the form on Dave Stanworth's
Games Domain, at http://wcl-rs.bham.ac.uk/GamesDomain/top100.html. If you
cannot use the voting form, or if you don't want to, then you can send your
votes with a simple email message.

The Syntax

The message holding the votes should have one game on every line. The first
thing to appear on the line is the number of points, second the title of
the game. The line has to be ended with the ID (a 4-digit number) of the
game, which can be found in the chart between brackets []. This ID is quite
important, for it is the number used by the program that compiles the
chart. For new games, that are not yet in the chart, the ID-number can be
replaced with []. If you do not include an ID-number or [] then your vote
for the game on that line will not be parsed and will not be stored in the
database!

Here's an example of a message:

Subject: votes

> 5  Dark Invader  [1435]
> 4  Mysterious Forces 2  [1322]
> 5  Super Fighter  [1502]
> 2  Magic of Zuul 4  []
> 4  The Lost Tycoon  []
--
Jurgen "Jojo" Appelo - jojo@xs4all.nl

Don't send me this example as your 'own' votes. The games in this example
do not exist, so they cannot be your favourite games. I will flame anyone
who sends the example as his/her votes. It's being lazy and it's being
stupid.

Be sure to have the ID-number in square brackets []. A character at the
beginning of the line, like >, is allowed. Try to avoid having lines with
unnecessary information, like disclaimers and remarks. If you have trouble
deleting disclaimers, include -- right before it. My parser will skip
anything after --.

History proves that many people type wrong ID-numbers. Therefore the title
of the game is also needed on the line. If possible copy the title directly
from the charts, so that it is identical to the chart's entry. If you
change the title slightly, then my program may not be able to recognize it,
and I will have to confirm it manually. So, help me a little.

The easiest thing to do is to reply to the message containing the latest
chart. Copy the chart and delete all lines, except the ones containing your
favourite games. Delete the numbers that hold this week's and last week's
position and the number of weeks, and put in your points instead. This way
you don't have to worry about titles, and ID-numbers. And don't forget:
points must be first on the line, not last.

The Restrictions

It is not allowed to give more than 20 points to the games or more than 5
points to one game. Extra points are automatically discarded by the program
(at random).

You may send more than one message a week, but only the latest one will be
used. (This can be useful when people change their mind.)

Try to mention the publisher when giving points to a game that is not
already in the chart. There are some games around that even I have never
heard of. Some people mention the category for each new game, using the
codes that are used in the charts. Some also tell me when it's a shareware
game. I appreciate this very much.

Try not to vote for the same game more than 26 times. Your votes for this
games will still be stored in the database, but they will not be used in
the compilation anymore. This has no influence on the other games you vote
for, of course.

Votes for the Commercial Top 100 and the Download Top 40 must be sent in
one message only, not in two seperate messages.

The Deadline

The deadline for every chart is on Friday night. Messages that come in
after the deadline are used for the next week. New charts are compiled in
the weekend and published on (or before) Monday.

The Sending

The new chart is sent to each person who has mailed me new votes. Although
the votes are automatically used for 4 weeks, only the first next edition
is sent to the voter. This way I can get people to vote more than only once
a month, when they want to receive every edition of the list. This is an
advantage for the actuality of the chart. When I send voters all four
editions for which their votes are used, they will only report new games
they are playing after the fourth week. By sending them only one edition
for one mail with votes, they will report new games sooner.

The Flags

When you have voted for a game more than 26 times (which does not have to
be 26 consecutive weeks), you will receive a warning. It tells you that
your votes for this game will not be used anymore. You may want to continue
voting for your game, because the votes are still stored and used for other
purposes, like the year-end charts. You can then add a #nowarning flag in
the body of your message, to tell my program that you don't want to receive
another warning. Otherwise you will be warned every time you vote for this
game again.

There is another flag for people who've asked if it is possible to vote and
not to receive the list. Well, it is. Just add a #nolist flag in your
message. You will then be excluded from the mailing list. But your votes
will still be used. You will however still receive a call for new votes
when your 4 weeks have expired. If you don't want to receive this call, you
can add #nocall in your message.

Add #nowarning if you don't want to be warned about the 26 weeks.
Add #nolist    if you don't want to receive the Top 100 list.
Add #nocall    if you don't want to be called for new votes.

And please, try to type them correctly, because #nomessage, #nowarn and
other variations will not work.

The Compilation

For compiling the Top 100 chart, the Top 100 from the previous week is
used. The games get points corresponding to their position in this chart.
These points are exponential. This means that the difference between the
points of high positioned games is bigger than the difference between those
in the lower regions of the chart. This assures that games can climb and
drop rapidly in the lower regions, but have to fight a much tougher battle
in the top of the chart.

After allocating these initial points, the points sent by mail in the last
4 weeks are normalized. This means they are multiplied equally, in such a
way that the total of all these points is a constant number, used every
week. This asserts that the number of votes received in a week has no
influence on how much changes there are in the chart. More votes results in
a more accurate chart, but not in a chart with more movement.

After the normalization, the resulting relative points of the voters are
added to the initial points. This results in movement in the chart. When a
game gets few or no points from voters, it will automatically drop in the
new chart. When it gets many points by votes, it will climb.

As you should have noticed, it is not the case that the game that gets the
most points from our voters, will automatically be number one. Only when it
already has a very high position it could be number one in the new chart.
Otherwise it will have to do serious climbing first, which will
automatically be the case when it gets many points. This compilation system
introduces a chart that is robust. Games can only reach the top when they
get many points for several weeks in a row. The more usual 'most points is
highest position' system would cause very strange things to happen, when
the number of voters is limited, like in this case. Another advantage of
the adopted system is that it is more exciting. Voters can carefully watch
the movements of their favourite games, and influence the movements by
balancing their votes. Of course, the influence of a single person on the
chart decreases, when the number of voters increases.

The Bullets

In the Top 100 bullets are earned by games that climb very fast. Each game
earns a bullet if...

it is on number 1 to 5 and has climbed at least 5 places
it is on number 6 to 10 and has climbed at least 6 places
it is on number 11 to 15 and has climbed at least 7 places
it is on number 16 to 20 and has climbed at least 8 places
etc...

New entries are considered as coming from number 101. I have experimented
with a few different policies in the first ten weeks of the list, but this
one is now the one I'll stick with.

The New Contestants

Together with the Top 100 and Top 40 another small list is published every
week. It is called the The New Contestants. This list contains games that
people have voted for, but which did not get enough points to enter either
the Top 100 or the Top 40. It is useful for detecting new games that some
other voters came up with and that you want to support too, to get them in
the charts. As a result of the compilation system most games will enter
this list first, before entering the Top 100 or Top 40. BTW, If you vote
for a new game, then this doesn't mean that the game will automatically
show up in this section in the next list. Games are only put on the list
when several different people are voting for it.

The Publication

I don't have the intention to make money with the publication of the
charts. All the work is done at no charge. Publication of this chart by
others, in magazines and on bulletin boards, is allowed, but only after
written permission. There is nothing I ask for in return, except that the
file is not altered and that I will be asked for permission in advance.

Publication now takes place in several magazines. Most of them are
electronic. Some people who own a BBS also publish the chart for their
users. You can find a full list of all authorised distributors on the WWW
site.

The FAQ

These are the most frequently asked questions:

Why aren't the games sorted by their number of points?

The points mentioned in the chart are an indication only of the support by
votes. When I order the games according to these numbers, the result would
be ridiculous. Only a much larger number of voters can justify the ordering
by these points only. Unfortunately, I don't have such a large number of
respondents yet, so I have to use a more complex system to build a chart
that's fun to watch. For more information I refer to the section The
Compilation.

Can I vote for someone else?

You can only vote for one person. It doesn't matter who this person is. You
may send votes for a friend, but then you cannot vote for yourself, because
only one set of votes is allowed for every email address. Of course, two
people can use one email address to combine their votes in one message
within the restriction of 20 points.

Can I get the chart every week?

You only get the chart every week if you send me your votes every week.
This is the only way to receive the chart weekly, other than getting it
yourself from the comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.announce newsgroup. I do maintain a
mailing list that has game developers and publishers on it, and some
publishers of magazines. They get the chart every week for obvious reasons.

Where can I find the games you mention in the chart?

I only collect information concerning titles, developers, publishers and
categories. I do not maintain a list of FTP sites, BBS's or other places
where you can find some games. For this information you should post a
message to the appropriate newsgroups and ask the readers. Some readers
like to see the filenames of shareware games in the list, so that they can
find them more easily. However, I think there is no reason for me to
support shareware games or any other type of game. It would only influence
their positions in the chart, which is certainly the last thing I want to
do.

Do you have hints, cheats, solutions or other information?

As a game fanatic, I do have some information for several games, but I only
keep it for personal use. My work for the charts implies having information
about developers, publishers and categories, nothing else.

Can I get a list of ID's for games that are not in the chart?

When you can't find your favourite game in the charts, you may leave out
the ID when you vote for it. Games that haven't showed up in the chart have
no ID yet. It is possible that a game you want to vote for has been in the
chart once, but dropped out some time ago. For these you can leave out the
ID too. Therefore you do not need some list of all ID's to be able to vote.
Once in a while I do post a list of all games that have ever been in the
Top 100, with their highest positions and other data. Check out the
csipg.announce newsgroup for this.

Can I vote against games I dislike?

I asked the readers if they would support this idea, and the answer was no.
If people would be able to vote against games with negative points, they
could vote against games only because they hate the publisher, or only
because they don't like the type of game, or only because it's one place
above their favourite game in the chart. We don't want that to happen, so
negative voting will not be supported.

Doesn't this 26 times limit affect the credibility of the list?

No it doesn't. The positions of the games relative to each other have much
less meaning in this Top 100, than in any other 'normal' chart, because of
the weird algorithms used for the compilation. What is important here is
wether a game is climbing or wether it's dropping, and wether it's high in
the chart or not. Only if older games are able to find new voters again and
again, they will stay high on the list. If they have to rely on the same
voters forever, then after some time they will drop because of the 26 weeks
rule. This is a very reasonable thing.

The Discussions

The Top 100 is just some stupid list.

No it is not. In fact, the Internet Top 100 is read by most important game
developers and publishers. They think it's quite an interesting source of
information.

The Top 100 has no statistical value.

That's right. I never claimed it has. BUT, it still is a list that tells
you more than you may think. For example, it told us that Alone in the Dark
2 is not at all such a big success as part 1 was. It tells us that Pinball
Fantasies is by far more popular than Pinball Dreams was. It tells us that
little games like Minesweeper and VGA Planets do better than many expensive
commercial games. And it tells us that Pacific Strike was a joke compared
to the flight-sims from MicroProse and Microsoft. Now try to find such
interesting information in the magazines! You won't! But you're right when
you say that the difference for a game being on number 2 or number 3 has
little or no meaning.

The Top 100 counts the number of messages in the newsgroups.

That was true some time in 1993. I stopped it because it took so much time.
Only votes from voters are used for the compilation now.

The 26 weeks rule makes the Top 100 unfair to older games.

Here's what we can choose from:

   * No 26 weeks rule. Games can stay in the Top 100 as long as people are
     willing to vote for it. Even if it's the same set of voters supporting
     it till they die. Lastability of games gets more attention than hot
     new games begging for attention.
   * A 26 weeks rule (or any other number of weeks). Every week life will
     get harder for the older games. They will only survive as long as they
     are able to appeal to NEW voters. We see that Civilization is able to
     do so, and VGA Planets and Star Control 2. Other games can only rely
     on the same set of voters. They will die out. New games get more
     attention.

I prefer a chart that keeps itself fresh. Emphasis should be on the power
to find new voters. And I really don't understand why people complain about
being restricted to half a year. Take a look at the retail charts. When you
buy a game it is only accounted for ONE time. Not 26 times. You don't
complain about that too, do you? Your favourite games already have the
ability to stay in the Top 100 much longer than in other charts. (At least
I don't just remove them, like the CGW guys do.) What's the point in making
this period endless?

The Publisher

Jojo Productions
Graaf Balderikstraat 16
3032 HC Rotterdam
The Netherlands

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       Jurgen 'jojo' Appelo / Top 100 Chart Master / jojo@xs4all.nl

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