Gauntlet Contest 4 (Monster) results

My opinions: I do not think Slam deserved first place, sure it had great gameplay yet deco was kind of a disappointment and didn't really fit the overall theme, the other levels had great bossfights like Slam but also had great deco that fit the theme unlike Slam

Also, I don't really like Ghoul's gameplay, kinda annoying, so I don't think it should've placed that high but that's just my opinion I guess

at least this gauntlet wasn't that much of a let down unlike others (*cough* crystal gauntlet *cough*)


welp time to prepare for hellgate menace lol (that lvl's pretty hard imo)

probably because 99% of the people who made the gc4 entries interpreted “monster” as “undead” so yknow

Am i the only one in love with OMG Aliens, i love it ;D

Me, Jovc and Rustam checked all the levels individually, rated them from 1 to 10 and made an average of our scores. RobTop only looked at the Top 10 rated levels that we picked. I can assure you that Slimy was already gone by then.

first off, thanks for replying yet again, good to see at least one member of the semi-formal administrative team in Geometry Dash actually replies to people.

I understand that in the Doom Gauntlet, there were only 5 suitable levels by Robtop's standards. Although I don't technically agree with the reasoning and some of the logic and thought processes (or lack thereof) behind the decisions made, I can understand that these are concerns that must be met as the game's player base swells and has an influx of younger demographics. It would be brash and very short-sighted of me, and others, to suggest that a PEGI-3 game shouldn't cater to some extent to those who are actually in the younger range of that restriction because several people put a lot of effort into a thing.

However, one thing I heavily and openly criticise Robtop for is consistency. I understand with his standards and regulations, but I completely disagree with his flippant usage / ignorance of the standards whenever he wants. For example, his stance on PEGI-3 content in levels in prominent spotlight in the game, which led Underworld being barred from the Doom Gauntlet, allowed Kotoruption by Alex1304, with the word "fucking" very prominently aired in the song mid-way through the level, as a weekly demon. It is arguable and justifiable that no 3 year-old would ever technically reach that point in the level, but by that logic no 3 year-old would ever technically reach the scarier or more non-child-friendly elements of Underworld's art.

Another example is the lag standards, which barred entire entries to the gauntlets previously, yet somehow Buried Angel by F3lixsram was included in the gauntlet (pre-ultra-LDM, mind you), and somehow Hellgate Menace, which even lags my computer slightly on full and is unplayable even on LDM on my Huawei Honor. I get that this might be an individual gripe more than a summation of a substantial problem, but not thinking of the worst possible scenario in lag management (aka playing on a literal root vegetable) when adding a level to a gauntlet is kind of an oversight so high I suspected Robtop of being a giraffe several times (props to anyone who knows where this joke came from).

And in this instance, the Gauntlet Contest 4 description clearly states "Top 5" in the Prizes segment. Whether this was an oversight or mere circumstance, changing the terms of the basic fundamental contest baselines this late into judging, without informing anyone, positive or no, was really insanely dumb, whether it was positive or not. When you state there will only be 5 winners, there should only be 5 winners. Regardless of whether you think all the levels were good, whether you want to be """inclusive or not""" in the biggest quotation marks possible, whether you think that monster gauntlet entries are inexplicably somehow thematically similar to death gauntlet entries, you shouldn't change terms that people are banking on. You either tell people that this contest is an exception to the "3 people honorable mention, 5 people actually win" rule at the very start, or just stick by your original rule till the end regardless. This breeds massive distrust between embittered members of the community and robtop, because hey, we could have actually joined and won a place in the death gauntlet but we didn't because we thought there was only 5 places and it would be a waste trying.

Look, it's great that you're reaching out to members of the community. It's great that you're trying to justify Robtop's actions and decisions, and my sympathies go out to you and every member of this fiasco for constantly dealing with bullshit from all sides. You guys are the middlemen and we can't blame you for much at this point (unless you actually decide to host another independent contest with your own rules - which would actually be nice, btw, ngl). But Robtop's actions are very hard to justify, and certain sections of the creating community - mainly the relatively unknown ones whose words have very little carrying power and merit - have pretty much given up trying to point out any discrepancies and double standards he takes because they know nothing's going to change. If you look at the comment section of your own videos, there is no dissenting opinion anymore like previous gauntlets. There is no debate, and we need this debate to help improve future gauntlet contests, to further refine the rules and the standards. All I could see scrolling down were just endless waves of relatively famous people congratulating each other.

I don't know what the point of this post was, but I guess a takeaway could be that you shouldn't justify what you already blatantly admit is unfair, or what you yourself wouldn't even do given the chance. I do appreciate you really sparking discussion with these replies though (although it's pretty funny that out of all the replies you picked you picked the two of us from the exact same school), so thanks for speaking up and trying to help us as a middle-man. 

Only replying to this, since everything else you wrote out I'm in near-complete agreement with (pretty stoked about those potential creator contests though, that sounds p dope)

Fair enough, with 2/3 of the objects most of the levels in the results would be decidedly worse lol. However, I'm arguing from Robtop's perspective, where he wants levels that have a comparatively lower object count and hence, lower processing power on decidedly less powerful monitors for a more friendly game. I pretty much am the antithesis of a "simple builder" (pretty much building only in pc-destroying, ldm-needing terms), but if you want to make levels with a budget / limitation on object count, at least make the usage efficient and not superfluous. I indeed do not like the gauntlet winners very much because of their usage of objects, whether it be thematic consistency, colouring issues, block design that doesn't stand out or doesn't exist, and consistency issues in general, but I can still definitely see how people can like them and agree that they can be placed, and that doesn't in any way detract from your judging in particular, because I agree that these are still some of the better entries into the contest.

lol monster gauntlet and death gauntlet are out, that was quick, I remember it took forever for Crystal Gauntlet to be added