Make Your Monster Contest

The Make Your Monster (MYM) is a community event hosted by BatWorks Software. It is a competition where individuals can submit monster designs for the potential for that design to appear in the final game.

## Rules and Regulations

When an MYM occurs, a pinned tweet will appear on HorrorVale's Twitter account detailing the due date and type of prize (i.e. NPC, Party Member, etc.). To submit, a user must simply retweet and reply to the Tweet with their submission. In addition, there are a few extra rules:

* There is no limit to the number of submissions a person may enter.
* If a monster was submitted into a previous MYM contest, they are allowed to be resubmitted. However, if that monster became a finalist, it is dependent upon the specific ruleset of the current competition on whether it will be allowed as a submission.
* Submissions may be provided in any medium so long as a visual idea is clearly represented.

After the initial window for submissions ends, BatWorks decides on several finalists. These finalists are then redrawn by BatWorks to give them an equal artistic playing field. Once the finalists have been decided and redrawn, voting begins. The community is then presented with a poll and then votes for who they would like as the winner. Traditionally there are multiple winners: One decided by popular vote, and another two decided by BatWorks (one for each of the two individuals), however in the case of the eventual Party Member Contest there will only be two winners, one decided by the community and the other by BatWorks.

## Contest History

Currently, there have been five MYM contests held.

### Make Your Monster 1: Enemy

The first was for an enemy, however, due to the sheer volume of submissions, BatWorks then held a lightning round for an NPC. From this, there were a total of six winners. Below are the finalists.

Of these finalists, the winner of the popular vote was Candle Conductor, with the Matthew Rock Developer Choice being awarded to Puppet Boyo, and the Dustin Andrews Developer Choice being awarded to Crocoffin.

### Make Your Monster 1: NPC (Lightning Round)

As there were a multitude of entries for the first contest it was decided to hold another but for ones with a friendlier deposition, thus making them NPCs. Below are the finalists.

Of these finalists, the winner of the popular vote was Skele-TON, with the Matthew Rock Developer Choice being awarded to Beauty, and the Dustin Andrews Developer Choice being awarded to Fungail.

### Make Your Monster 2: NPC for Act 1

The second was for NPCs exclusively. Below are the finalists.

Unlike the previous MYM competition, which saw around 350 voters in the main vote and around 250 in the Lightning Round, MYM2 saw a massive turnout as a result of the campaigns several of the characters received from enthusiastic members of the community. During the first day Shirren and Marie led the polls at around a hundred votes each, however by day two Shirren's votes began to stall and Patrick (who had remained below the two front runners in third) began to dramatically climb in votes. By the end of MYM2, over a thousand votes had been cast, with Marie and Patrick possessing each around a third of the total votes each (approximately 350 each). During the final hours Patrick maintained a steady lead, and mere hours before the closing of the polls in a surprise move Marie withdrew from the competition, having instead been funded to appear as an NPC through Patreon. In the end, Patrick was the winner of the popular vote. Shirren, who had maintained a solid third place after his votes began to stall, won the Matt's Choice award. Finally the Dustin Choice slot was award to Nyabeth, whom Dustin had grown attached to after drawing several memes involving Nyabeth being secretly buff underneath his unassuming cloak, to which Nyabeth's creator decided to make Buff-Nyabeth canon. As ridiculous as that may have sounded, yes, what was just written was entirely true.

### Make Your Monster Tournament

    A bracket style elimination tournament that was held in July of 2019 between all of the previous finalists for a second chance to enter the game. Depending on the contest they initially entered, entrants who were finalists in MYM1 Enemy or Lightning Round had the potential to be either an enemy or an NPC if they won, any finalist entered into MYM2 however would be made as an NPC. The tournament was held over six rounds.

#### Preliminaries

The initial round consisting of four matchups. The Suit VS Patchley, Mira VS Gourdo, Dream Eater VS Slimeberry (Goop Girl), and Poltergold VS Coughin. Of these matchups: The Suit, Mira, Slimeberry, and Poltergold advanced to the First Round.

#### First Round

The first round consisted of the four matchups on the left half of the board. The Suit VS The Performers, Venus Shy Trap VS Gherkin, B. H. Mutt VS Skull Knight, and Saturday Night Reaper VS Mira. Of these matchups: The Suit, Venus Shy Trap, Skull Knight, and Saturday Night Reaper advanced towards Round 3.

#### Second Round

The second round consisting of the four matchups on the right half of the board. Slimeberry VS Swamp Thong, Pitch VS Scaredcrow, Nubis VS Otid, and Grave Punkster VS Poltergold. Of these matchups: Slimeberry, Pitch, Nubis, and Grave Punkster advanced towards Round 3.

#### Third Round

The halfway point of the competition featuring the final eight contestants remaining. The Suit VS Venus Shy Trap, Skull Knight VS Saturday Night Reaper, Slimeberry VS Pitch, and Nubis VS Grave Punkster. Of these matchups: Venus Shy Trap, Saturday Night Reaper, Slimeberry, and Grave Punkster advanced towards the semi finals.

#### Semifinals

The fifth round of the competition with four competitors remaining. Venus Shy Trap VS Saturday Night Reaper, and Slimeberry VS Grave Punkster. Advancing to become the two finalists were Saturday Night Reaper and Slimeberry.

#### Finals

The sixth and final round between Saturday Night Reaper and SlimeBerry. With a final vote of 293 to 134, SlimeBerry went on to become winner of the Community Vote, with Poltergold winning the Matthew Choice Award, and Dream Eater winning the Dustin Choice Award. In a surprise final announcement, it was informed that Saturday Night Reaper had been sponsored to appear as an NPC.

### Make Your Monster: Diamond Candy Edition (Party Member Competition)

The Make Your Monster: Diamond Candy Edition (Abbreviated to MYM: DE) was the fourth MYM held in October of 2019. Unlike previous competitions, MYM: DE would be a one of a kind where the winners would become party members in the final game. In addition there would only be two winners instead of three: one winner decided by the popular vote, and other decided by the dev pick. Finalists this time around would instead be picked by a panel of three judges, depicted as their respective characters: Mizurē, Jack, and Rosette, and only five finalists would be picked. Submissions opened on October 1st and closed at Midnight of October 10th. In total, there were 127 officially accepted submissions during this nine day window.

On October 13th, the finalists were introduced through a short video featuring one of the submissions, Millie, as a host. Finalists were revealed at this time as: Eva Ghost, Buster Experavit, El Carne Rojo, Lee, and Marcus Hackney, and voting to decide the popular vote began. During the week long period of voting, it was announced that there would be a second Dev Pick selected at the end of the contest, bringing the total number of winners up to three. At midnight of October 20th, voting for the finals closed, and the following morning the winners were announced as El Carne Rojo for the Popular Vote, Millie as Dev Pick 1, and Eva Ghost as Dev Pick 2. However, due to the high stakes involved with MYM: DE, it was announced early on that all finalists would be included in HorrorVale regardless of whether they won or lost, with all remaining finalists earning spots as either NPC's or Enemies, and the runner up, Buster Experavit, receiving a side quest.

Finally, in addition to all of the finalists becoming a part of HorrorVale, an additional 5 of the 127 entries were decided by Batworks as "Honorable Mentions" who would also become NPC's in the final game, bringing the total number of characters who would become a part of HorrorVale up to 11. These honorable mentions were announced throughout the competition at regular intervals during the finals. These honorable mentions are, in the order they were officially revealed: Slash-Man, Mr. Y, Madeline, Sadie Bainbridge, and Philip & Bucky.

### Make Your Monster: Anniversary Edition (Enemy)

The Make Your Monster: Anniversary Edition is the fifth official MYM held during the month of June 2020 for the anniversary of the release of HorrorVale's Act 1 Demo on 6/23/19. Like the first contest, AE was held for enemies who could appear in the final game. Five finalists were selected and are: Cuben (Experiment 86), Hexa P. Oda, Mandy, Leprechaun, and Sneaker.

Of the finalists the winner of the popular vote was Cuben (Experiment 86), the Matthew Rock Dev Pick winner was Hexa P. Oda, and the Dustin Andrews Dev Pick winner was Sneaker.

### Make Your Monster: Ruby Edition (Mini-Boss)

Make Your Monster Contest: Ruby Edition is the sixth official MYM held during the month of October 2020. The entrants of this contest are submitted for the chance to become a miniboss. In this MYM, voting occurs over 3 rounds, with the entrant holding the least votes being eliminated until the winner is decided.

The four finalists were as follows: Ms. Die, Eye Catcher, Scare-Crone, and Haniwa Joe.

The first round of voting concluded with the elimination of Eye Catcher. In the subsequent round Haniwa Joe fell out of the competition, and in the third and final round Scare-Crone won the popular vote and Ms. Die was revealed to have been awarded the Developer's Choice Award.

### Make Your Netherling

The Make Your Netherling contest was a Discord exclusive contest that opened submissions from October 10th and closed on the 15th, with the winners being revealed the night of the 15th. All entrants for the contest were required to be designed as Netherlings with the purpose of being enemies in the sidequest of the recruitable party member Plum, with the fate of being eaten. There was no voting period, as the winners were directly chosen by the developers.

Out of the 50+ entries, the winners were the Nethermound and the Netherhot.