Rules for the Competition

The rules are not quite as simple as the famous "One Rule" from the first competition, but I have tried to keep them relatively straightforward. Those who violate a rule once will either be issued a warning or disqualified at the discretion of the organizer. Those who violate a rule twice are disqualified. If you have any questions regarding the rules, please contact the organizer.

Rules for Judges

1. Judges must base their judgement of each game on at most the first two hours of play. If a judge is still playing a game at the end of a cumulative two hours of playing time and wishes to continue playing it, the judge must rate the game and not change that rating later before continuing play. Authors may write a game of any length they desire, but should keep this rule in mind when determining the length of their entry.
2. Judges may discuss the games during the judging period, but should be careful when doing so in a public forum. Make appropriate allowances to hide spoilers, and don't put spoilers in titles of posts or blog entries. If you post on the Usenet newsgroup rec.games.int-fiction, please preface your subject line with "comp09 Discussion:".
3. You may not give a rating to any game you have beta-tested.
4. You must play and rate at least five games for your ratings to be counted.

Rules for Authors

1. Games must not be based upon works currently under copyright unless permission is obtained from the copyright holder. You may parody established works, but you may not, for example, write a game based on Terry Pratchett's Discworld without permission. This avoids the entire issue of copyright and the ethics involved. For the purposes of the competition, a work is still under copyright for a period of 70 years after the author's death or if it was published after 1923 (just to make things as simple as is possible given the complexities of copyright law).
2. Do not use copyrighted multimedia assets (graphics or sound) without permission from the copyright owner. This is especially important for MIDI files, as many web sites have MIDI versions of copyrighted songs available for download. If you don't know if a song, sound file, or picture is under copyright, don't use it.
3. All entries must be freely playable by judges, no strings attached. While you retain the copyright to any games you enter, by entering you are granting the competition and the Interactive Fiction Archive the non-exclusive right to distribute your game for free, and granting judges the right to play your game for free. No shareware, donorware, commercial products, etc. may be entered.
4. All entries must be previously unreleased at the opening of voting. This includes beta versions. The author must know who has had access to copies of their games before the competition. The game may not have been freely accessible: if you place a version of your game on a web site, the URL cannot be publicly handed out. If an entry has previously been circulated, it will be disqualified. Translations of previously-released works are considered to be released. If you are unsure whether your game fails to meet this rule, please ask me. Note that this rule does not prevent you from having your game tested by a few beta-testers, as long as you know who those beta-testers are.
5. Authors of a competition entry may not discuss any of the entries in a public Internet forum during the voting period, nor may they canvass fora for votes. Once the competition has begun, do not post your thoughts on your entry or anyone else's on a newsgroup or bulletin board until the deadline for voting has passed.
6. Authors may enter at most three games.

Rule for Everyone

1. Anyone who impersonates a contest official in any capacity related to the contest will be immediately disqualified and will be banned permanently from future involvement in the competition.

These rules may be changed as required by the organizer. In addition, the organizer has final say in all disputes regarding potential loopholes in the above rules.