Category Archives: Challenges

Replacement Prize 2 Results

The voting is over for the Replacement Prizes, and the results are in. I don't yet know for sure exactly how many of these will get done, but at least the first five, probably more. Any time a winner doesn't know what to request, they can refer to this list and pick one, or they can just say "whatever's next on the Replacement Prize list" and we'll be good to go. Thanks to everyone who chimed in!

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Caption Contest 106: Super-dickery

With hearty thanks once again to Glenn3's "Say What? Pictures" for the panel and SuperDickery.com for the title, your challenge this week is to come up with the best replacement dialog for this comics panel:

This one's a challenge, as you have two other filled-in thought balloons to contend with. I imagine the thing to do is to populate the missing one with whatever it is he thinks he's so right about.

The best entry (as judged by yours truly) wins the author's choice of either any item they like or any portrait to be included in HeroMachine 3′s final release, or a custom black and white “Sketch of the Day” style illustration (you pick the subject, I draw it however I like).

All entries must be left as a comment (or comments) to this post. Keep ‘em clean (appropriate for a late-night broadcast TV show), but most importantly, keep ‘em funny!

This week we have a cap of no more than five (5) entries per person, so make 'em your best!

Character Contest 71 Winners!

Many thanks to everyone who entered Character Contest 71. I know it was a tougher theme than usual, so I appreciate your creativity very much.

Without further ado, here are the ones I thought stood out the most, your Finalists!

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Character Contest 71: In the Cards

Your character design challenge this week is to create an awesome illustration using HeroMachine based on a deck of cards. Now, you could go with the standard playing card deck with numbers from deuce to ten, with the Jack, Queen, King, and Ace, in the four suits of Hearts, Clubs, Spades, or Diamonds. Or, you could change directions completely and go with a Tarot Card Deck, along with the various colorful figures and concepts contained therein. One famous example of the former is DC's "Royal Flush Gang", though of course you don't have to do a whole group.

The person with the winning entry as selected by our expert panel (i.e. me) will win their choice of a) a portrait to go in HeroMachine 3, b) an item to go in HeroMachine 3, or c) a custom black and white "Sketch of the Day" style drawing (also by me). The rules otherwise are the same as always:

  • Be sure to check out this thread that explains how to post a link to your image!
  • All entries must be in JPG or PNG form (BMPs are too big), posted to a publicly accessible website (like ImageShack, PhotoBucket, the UGO Forums, whatever);
  • Entries must be made as a comment or comments to this post, containing a link directly to the image and the character name;
  • The image cannot have been used in any previous HeroMachine character design contest;
  • Please name your files as [your name]-[character name].[file extension]. So DiCicatriz, for instance, would save his "Bayou Belle" character image as DiCicatriz-BayouBelle.png.
  • Please make the link go directly to the image (like this) and not to a hosting jump page (like this). If you see "preview" or "rotate" somewhere in the link you're probably doing it wrong.
  • All entries must be in by next Monday, when I'll choose a winner.

Good luck everyone! No more than ten (10) entries per person this week, folks, so make 'em count.

Caption Contest 105 Winners!

Thanks to everyone for the outstanding entries in Caption Contest 105! There were a lot of great ones, so the Finalist list this week is pretty long, including a couple of HM-memes-in-the-making courtesy of Danny Beaty's wrist-blasters and TopHat's evocation of everyone's architecture-smashing "hero", Samson:

  • Worf: Damn these mitts!
  • Wulf: “WHERE THE ROBOT WOMEN AT?!”
  • TopHat: ”I’ve come to preach the word of Samson!”
  • Joel: “Hello? I’m supposed to be on trial for destruction of public property, is this the right court room?”
  • Myro: “Robot God needs booze.”
  • Danny Beaty: I should have used my wrist-mounted blasters!
  • Blue Blazer: Ha! Chalk up one more shifty-eyed door!
  • Gregg: Good afternoon. Might I interest you in some fine replacement doors?
  • McKnight57: Bite my shiny metal adult diaper!!
  • MartianBlue: Everyone stay calm, I’ve just recieved information over the com of a very dangerous looking large, white robot entering this building.
  • Wierdrocks: “NOW it’s a party!”
  • Watson Bradshaw: DRAMATIC ENTRANCE INITIATED!
  • TheNate: Hulk smash, ROM Kavoom!
  • Jester: Hi.
  • Jessica: Jocasta, what the HELL is going on here?!
  • Knighthawk: I put the ROM in romance!
  • Kyle Hilsee: Is Lucy here? Cause’ I’m home.
  • X-stacy: Why are you marrying him? I’ve got five speeds and three attachments!

But as you know, there can be only one. And that one is ... Worf!

I liked that it both provided an explanation for why he was smashing the doors in, and referenced those never-to-be-understood mitts ROM parades around in. Good job, Worf!

Caption Contest 105: ROM Com

With hearty thanks once again to Glenn3's "Say What? Pictures", your challenge this week is to come up with the best replacement dialog for this comics panel:

I think her title is perfect -- "ROM com". Too funny!

The best entry (as judged by yours truly) wins the author's choice of either any item they like or any portrait to be included in HeroMachine 3′s final release, or a custom black and white “Sketch of the Day” style illustration (you pick the subject, I draw it however I like).

All entries must be left as a comment (or comments) to this post. Keep ‘em clean (appropriate for a late-night broadcast TV show), but most importantly, keep ‘em funny!

This week we have a cap of no more than five (5) entries per person, so make 'em your best!

Character Contest 70 Winners!

Many thanks to everyone who entered Character Contest 70! Apparently lions is popular, because there were a lot of entries.

Before getting to our Finalists, though, I've noticed a significant up-tick in the number of links that don't work properly for one reason or another. Some go to a jump page instead of just to the image, others have file names that don't include the artist's id or the name of the character, and some are bad links with bad names at the same time. Here are the folks who had something wrong with their entry or entries -- please look for your name, and if it's there, please try to do better next time as it makes it a lot easier (and faster!) for me to get the judging done.

File names should be in the format yourname-charactername.png (or .jpg). For instance, "Imp-Leo.png" is good. Had Imp just submitted "Leo.jpg", that would be noted below as "no name". Had he submitted "Imp.png" it would be noted as "no character name". Had he linked to the image improperly, it would be listed as "bad link".

You can find instructions on where to get the direct link for your image here.

  • Asder : no name
  • Brambles : no name
  • dazed_and_confused : bad link, no name
  • DeFesh : name
  • extraordinaree : no user name
  • fysaga : no user name, no character file name Photobucket
  • Hairwhip : name
  • headlessgeneral : no name
  • jojo_n_friendz : bad link
  • knight1192a : no direct link (ImageShack)
  • kyle : no name, no character name (always saved as undo-6 or something)
  • Kytana : bad link (ImageShack), no user name
  • leadmetal : no name
  • maniacmick : no name
  • MarquisSamedi : no name
  • McKnight57 : proper PicasaWeb linkage
  • mrmatt220 : bad link, no name, no filename
  • Oquies : no name, no file name, no character name, no names at all
  • Rapthama : no name
  • skullcraze : no user name, no character file name Photobucket
  • Skybandit : bad link
  • Sutter_Kaine : no name
  • thebigm1993 : bad link (ImageShack)
  • TOOL : no user name
  • Trekkie : no name (always has hm3- beta in front of file name, too)
  • Vanja : no user name
  • Zyp(!) : no name

Now on to the more pleasant task of identifying our Finalists! Oh, and note also that most of these are now clickable. The sizes are getting so big that now I'm just making that the default, so I'm doing away with the "click to embiggen" text.

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Open bids on unclaimed contest prizes

A number of people who have won prizes never got back to me on what they wanted as their prize. But their loss might be your gain! In the comments to this post, please suggest replacement prize items that would go into HeroMachine 3. Submissions with links to images showing what you mean are particularly helpful. I'll compile the best submissions into a poll starting next week and everyone will be able to vote on what they'd most like to see.

The currrently unclaimed prizes are:

Caption Contests:

  • 83 Bob Loblaw
  • 84 Larkin
  • 93 Boomcow2
  • 94 Patrick
  • 97 Patrick
  • 99 Gargoyle323

Character Contests:

  • 32 Vigilante
  • 42 Morzan

If you're one of those, let me know ASAP so you can claim your prize.

Whoever I don't hear from by next Friday will have their prize thrown into the general pool.

HM3: Gun blade

I've finally uploaded Tool's prize for winning Caption Contest 96 -- the following gun blade, available now in ItemRight-Pistols. Hope you like it, Tool, and that everyone gets some use out of it!

Character Contest 70: Leo!

This week's Character Design Challenge is roaring in like a lion! Literally. Because it's time for Zodiac Contest LEO!

Yes, your challenge for this week is to design the coolest character image possible with the theme of "Leo". You might design something around a lion (duh), or something based on the astrological profile of those born under the sign, or something completely different. It's up to you so long as it in some way ties into the theme!

The person with the winning entry as selected by our expert panel (i.e. me) will win their choice of a) a portrait to go in HeroMachine 3, b) an item to go in HeroMachine 3, or c) a custom black and white "Sketch of the Day" style drawing (also by me). The rules otherwise are the same as always:

  • All entries must be in JPG or PNG form (BMPs are too big), posted to a publicly accessible website (like ImageShack, PhotoBucket, the UGO Forums, whatever);
  • Entries must be made as a comment or comments to this post, containing a link directly to the image and the character name;
  • The image cannot have been used in any previous HeroMachine character design contest;
  • Please name your files as [your name]-[character name].[file extension]. So DiCicatriz, for instance, would save his "Bayou Belle" character image as DiCicatriz-BayouBelle.png.
  • Please make the link go directly to the image (like this) and not to a hosting jump page (like this). If you see "preview" or "rotate" somewhere in the link you're probably doing it wrong.
  • All entries must be in by next Monday, when I'll choose a winner.

Good luck everyone!

Edited to Add: No more than five (5) entries per person this week, folks, so make 'em count.