As you can see, I've made some changes to Adam Cadre's original rules, particularly by adding more prizes and eliminating the "20 slots" rule. But the spirit remains the same.

1. The Spring Thing is a competition for interactive fiction, i.e. text adventures. I'm not going to try to give a definition of interactive fiction, but I will say that any game to be considered for this competition must have a text parser, for one thing. If you are writing a game using Inform, TADS, Hugo, ADRIFT, or Alan, and it is not highly unusual for its authoring system, then you probably have nothing to worry about. Otherwise, you might want to email me and describe your game in detail and/or show me what exists of your game before you send in your entry fee.
2. To enter the competition, you must first submit an initial intent to enter, no sooner than noon EDT on September 30, 2004, and no later than noon EST on March 15, 2005, to the organizer at the email address at the bottom of this page. It must include your real name (and pseudonym, if so desired), a brief description of your game, a working title, and the country you live in (so I can give you appropriate payment instructions; see below).
3. There is no limit to how many games will be accepted, as long as the authors of those games follow all the rules. (I think most judges would most like to see fewer than twenty games, and I agree. But for me the administrative headache of enforcing both the "20 slots" rule and the $7 rule [see next rule] was more than I wanted to deal with. And anyway, I predict the $7 entry fee will naturally limit the number or entrants. If I'm wrong, I'll consider reinstating the "20 slots" rule for 2006.)
4. Your intent to enter will not be complete until you have submitted a non-refundable entry fee of $7 US to the prize pool. After your initial email stating your intent to enter, wait for a reply from the organizer, who will tell you where to send your entry fee. This fee will not be refunded, even if you withdraw from the competition or are disqualified.
5. If you are submitting your entry fee electronically (such as by PayPal), then your entry fee must be received by noon EST, March 15, 2005. If you are submitting your entry fee by any other means (such as by mail), then your entry fee must be postmarked no later than March 15, 2005, and received by March 31, 2005. (There will be ABSOLUTELY NO exceptions to this. If I receive your payment envelope in the mail on April 1 or later, your game will be disqualified, and I will either refund your entry fee or contribute it to the prize pool, at my discretion. I am drawing a hard line here, because the rules are already a lot easier for authors than they were before, and there will be no further backsliding. If you are concerned about the slowness of your local postal service, you are advised to pay by PayPal before March 15, or else send your money by mail with lots and lots of time to spare, or else find a sponsor [perhaps on rec.arts.int-fiction, for instance].)
6. You may submit only one intent to enter, and one game.
7. Entrants may submit their games to the organizer no sooner than noon EST, March 1, 2005, and no later than the final deadline: noon EST, March 31, 2005. (This is different from Adam's original rules, which gave entrants only half as much time to submit their games.)
8. All games must be finishable by the organizer. Therefore, you must submit a walkthrough with your completed game, so that the organizer may ensure it is finishable. If you want the organizer to withhold the walkthrough from the judges and/or the public, just say so.
9. You may enter the competition anonymously or under a pseudonym, but your real name will be revealed at the end of the judging period.
10. Games may not be based on works currently under copyright without permission from the copyright holder.
11. No shareware, commercial software, etc. may be entered. All entries must be playable for free, both by judges and by the general public. While you retain the copyright to any games you enter, by entering you grant the competition and the Interactive Fiction Archive the non-exclusive right to distribute your game for free, forever.
12. All entries must be previously unreleased at the time of voting—that is, they must never have been publicly downloadable or otherwise publicly available. Obviously, this does not prevent you from having your game beta-tested, which is very much encouraged.
13. Games may not hang, crash, or generate errors of the [** Programming error **] or [TADS-1234: description of error] variety. If the organizer discovers such errors before March 31, they will be reported to the author so that they may be fixed. If such errors are discovered but not fixed by March 31, the game in question will be disqualified. (Thus, if you submit a game on March 1, you have a month to fix any errors. If you submit it on the 31st and it has errors, tough luck.

    (Note from Greg: I'll go through your game fairly quickly when checking for errors and completeness, following the walkthrough but also deviating from it from time to time. One effect of this is a certain leniency for authors: I'm not going to be poking and prodding every corner of your game in an attempt to make it fail, although if I do find errors, the above rules certainly apply. Another point of leniency: no game will be disqualified because of errors that I miss. Finally, bear in mind that my inspection of your game is no substitute for having your game thoroughly beta-tested by others, which is recommended.)

14. Games must be playable on at least Windows and MacOS.
15. Also bear in mind the rules of judging: judges are encouraged to spend as long on your game as they want, and are encouraged to try to finish it, but are not required to, especially if your game requires more than one or two evenings to complete.
16. If your game is in the competition, then you may not publicly discuss either it or any competitors' games during the judging period. If you need to correct a public misstatement of fact about your game, please contact the organizer, who will relay the message.

1. The judging period will be announced when the games are released. It will likely require judges to play about three games per week.
2. Judges are encouraged to spend as long as they want on each game, and are encouraged to try to finish each one. In the end, however, they are not required to finish before voting (especially if the game takes more than an evening or two to complete). Nor, for that matter, is there any particular minimum time length that must be spent on each game.
3. Judges must vote on at least seven of the games for their votes to be counted (or as many as they can, depending on what they have beta-tested, and perhaps depending on their computer's compatibility). (This is different from Adam's original rules, which required judges to vote on all entries.)
4. Anyone who is not an entrant or the organizer may judge.
5. Judges should score each game on a scale from 1 to 10, 10 being best.
6. Judges are allowed to discuss the games during the judging period, but are requested to clearly mark posts which discuss the games, for the benefit of those who want to avoid spoilers and having their scores influenced.
7. Beta-testers are not allowed to vote on the entries they beta-tested. (This is different from Adam's original rules, which allowed beta-testers to vote on the games they'd tested.)

1. There will be several prizes, including the cash taken from the pool of entry fees, but also including donations. The first-place winner will have first pick of any one prize, the second-place winner will have the next pick, and so on. For more information, including the current list of prizes, see the prize page. You may also donate a prize.
2. Note that cash prizes are handled differently from other prizes, as explained on the prize page.

1. If a rule is breached once, the organizer reserves the right to decide whether to warn the person or kick them out of the competition. If a rule is breached twice, the organizer will very likely kick the person out of the competition.
2. The organizer will have final say on all judgment calls, but may consult others in making decisions. (And, for the record, just as Adam consulted others extensively in formulating the initial version of these rules, the present organizer did the same with these slightly modified rules.)

[Note: On this page I have stolen plenty of phrases from Adam Cadre's original rules, plus one or two phrases from the IF Comp's rules—e.g., as involves copyright—without necessarily using quotes, which would have been awkward. Since this is all in the service of Adam's original idea and the IF community, I hoped nobody would mind. If this does bother anybody, please write to me.]