Home Computer Club
http://hcc.borec.cz

total since 07.01.1997 HCC since 27.05.1999

Klikněte pro českou verzi! Last update of THIS page: April 12, 2005 Tournament pages are updated almost daily! Aley at ICQ: 82357182

7. HCC's Megaman Cup (2003) 6. HCC's Megaman Cup (2002) 5. HCC's Megaman Cup (2000-2001) 4. HCC's Megaman Cup (1999) 3. HCC's Megaman Cup (1995-1996) 2. HCC's Megaman Cup (1994) 1. HCC's Megaman Cup (1992-1993) Statistics

Welcome at www pages of Home Computer Club (HCC). HCC is computer club, which has been founded in 1993. Originally, it associated owners of computers ZX Spectrum, Sam Coupé, Amiga, Atari XE, Atari ST and PC AT. Now in the age of internet, of course, the club is less important and all club members own classic PC AT.

HCC also (very sporadically) publish its own "not only computer" magazine XAN.

HCC's MEGAMAN CUP

Computer game tournamets "Megaman Cup" held since 1992, often shortly called "HCC Cup", are successors of former unofficial computer games world championships, held in late 1980's. Megaman Cup is based on traditional rules, which are kept almost unchanged since the beginning. The tournament consists of ten games, 5 logic and 5 action ones, which are played on several different computer platforms.

• tournaments held since 1992, started on ZX Spectrum and Sam Coupé
• later expanded to other platforms to make the action more attractive
• currently based mainly on MAME and PC, but there's still some 8bit spirit in the tournament
• 10 games are played, with famous 5+5 system (5 logic + 5 action games)
• games are selected by players' requests, but with regard to wide wariety of game genres
• winner of each game gets 10 points, the others get proportional points to it (0-9)
• players have only a limited number of attempts, to avoid "who plays it more often, he gets more points"
• delay between tournaments is approximately 2 years
• usually 5 games are left from previous tournament (voted by players), and 5 games are new (nominated by players)
• the winner of HCC's Megaman Cup gets "megaman" title, until next tournament

Rules (The Short Summary)

Anybody can compete in HCC Cup, not only members of HCC. Each tournament consists of 10 games, which are played independently to each other. Players don't have to play all games, but it is appreciated.

Winner of each game gets 10 points. Other players get a fraction of it, based on their score. All values are rounded to zero, so nobody except the winner can take full 10 points. This way, maximum number of points in each HCC Cup is 100, but nobody had managed to score it yet (of course).

Players automatically get one half of the points scored in games, which are played in two consecutive tournaments. This apply to game score, not HCC x/10 points, and is not counted to players who don't play. (So you can't simply sit down and get points just because you played sometime in the past.)

Each tournament lasts usually a few months, but the duration may vary in each particular tournament, and depends on how much time most players need to play all games they want to play. This is a bit vague, but we don't want to be too pedantic here, since we simply don't want to lost players.

Players can either play "off-line" with judges, or they can play "on-line" (without judges). We prefer live action, but internet players are also present, and we are ready for them. Internet players don't have any real live judges, so they need form electronical judging. We use input recording (as known from MAME) to record the games. This way anybody can later watch the recorded game.

The rules are officially a "gentlemen's agreement". This is only the summary of it. See pages of the 5th & 6th cup to see rules which applies to the most recent HCC Cup.

Games played by the gamesome players

Game set for each tournament is based on "5+5" basis. It means 5 logic + 5 action. This may possibly change in future, since it is not always easy to find 5 good logic games. Hopefully Mame will help us to survive with this traditional look.

All competitors vote for 5 games from each tournament to promote to the next one. New games are selected from the set of nominated games. Any player can nominate any worthy game. There are very strict regulations which a particular game must meet to be "worthy". We also don't play too long, boring games, and games where score does not actually reflect how well the player performed.

Inappropriate games

Every player can nominate any game he/she want to play in next Megaman Cup. Because there are plenty and plenty of computer games, we have built this set of regulations, which helps us to keep some good level of order in games, as well as playability level and scoring system. These games are not welcomed:

1. Somebody can possibly finish the game (or he/she already did). Especially games finished during Megaman Cup are banned to avoid any problems often caused by impossibility to increase score even more. This also often means that one player can play the game much better than other players, and that is not welcome for a good tournament. And finally, our goal is to finish all games. When one game is finished, it is done for us and we take a new one from thousands of games available. (Lotus 3, Operation Wolf, Body Blows (finished by several players), Turrican 3 etc.)
2. The game can be played virtually endlessly, so it is getting boring. (Civilization, Iron Man, etc.)
3. The game is always the same, and usually also very short. This applies especially to many logic games. (Plotting, Puzznic, Snake Mania, etc.)
4. Too long games (by the mean of game duration) aren't good, because of technical reasons. They are also known to have very low attendance, which is not our goal. (Civilization, Snake Mania, Turrican 3, etc.)
5. The game score system is based on time, or generally "lower number is better". These games are hardly usable together with out x/10 points system. This applies mostly to racing games. Although we apologize for this, we also must say that there are plenty of other games which are better usable for our tournament. (Inverse or negative points system is technically possible, but we are not going into this.)
6. Some games can be played using a special agreed points system, so they will meet our requirements. But we are not going into this, because there are plenty of other games, and we don't need to bother with complicated rules, when there are plenty of other games very acceptable for HCC Cup. (Jirka Martinek's Unreal Tournament points system is an example)
7. Points earned in the game have no straight connection with player's performance, so it is useless (Command & Conquer, etc.)
8. The game is based mainly on the coincidence and fortune, or it is possible to earn some big bonus with it. This applies mainly on gambling and pinball games.
9. It is not possible to earn too many points in the game. The limit is 100 points for average player. If the game offers less points, it could damage our x/10 points system. (Heroes Of Might And Magic, Grand Prix Simulator 2, etc.) We are not going to play football: 1:0.

Note: An agreement of the players is possible, so a game which is not 100% perfect in scope of these rules is accepted and played in the tournament. The only requirement is that playability of that game must be higher than anything else.

These rules have been designed and Megaman Cup is being held Home Computer Club, and directed by Aley Keprt, who has experience in REGULAR organization of computer game competiotions since 1989. But don't be mistaken, nothing would be done withouth the help of many other people. Thank YOU guys.

Aley's home page