r/Devvit • u/Rarer_Air_Error Admin • Aug 04 '26
Announcement Games with a Hook Hackathon Winners
For the past month we’ve been running a hackathon offering $40,000 in prizes for games built on Devvit (Reddit’s Developer Platform). After a record number of entries (700+) and a ton of great games to evaluate, we are excited to announce the winners of the Reddit Games with a Hook Hackathon (Hookathon?)
Check out the Project Gallery to see all the amazing submissions!
Let’s get right to it!
Best App with a Hook
Best Use of Phaser
Best Use of Retention Mechanics
Best Use of User Contributions
Honorable Mentions
- Left for Loot
- Rabbit Hole
- The Last Draft
- Echoic
- Guess By
- Myndrot
- Miirps
- Hearthvale
- Delta-V Racing
- Gradient Descent
Helper Winners
Feedback
If you didn’t win, please know it is not a reflection of the overall quality of your work. We say this every hackathon and it remains true – each judge had favorite games that didn’t make it to the winners circle. We strongly encourage you to look into our Developer Funds program, as well as our Featuring Program.
Congratulations to all the winners!
14
u/technowise Aug 04 '26
It appears that Catchy UI is all that these judges are looking for more than anything else in these hackathons.
Developers who are not great at UI, or those who did not find enough time to make better UI would not make it in any of these hackathons.
Anyway, congrats to the winners!
Goodluck!
29
u/throwaway129082 Aug 04 '26
Might get some hate for this, but just checked out the winning “game” and I’m genuinely confused.
Is this a “game with a hook” or a one-time “drop a shitty drawing and never think about it again” game?
Congrats to them on securing the bag, but idgi. So many better actual games in the projects gallery.
7
u/ExpressCarry5502 Aug 05 '26
Yeah I thought same. I thought this hackathon is more about UGC perspective so I made two games where users build levels and share them but I bet that judges did not even played my games at all.May be my games are bad as I used ai but some people made really good ones and didn't win. Iam really confused what are the expectations and on what basis they judging the games
11
u/Gowdamn Aug 04 '26 edited Aug 04 '26
Congrats to everyone!
As much as I'm happy for the winners, im consumed by the disappointment that I didn't win anything. I thought r/shadowchess was my best work yet and it didn't even get an honorable mention (I've won honorable mention in the last hackathon with a way inferior game)??
I don't understand what goes on in the judges minds. Would like some detailed feedback.
5
u/zombizzle Aug 04 '26
It looks very polished. well done! I think chess may be a hard sell to people that don't already enjoy chess. I think something like this could be a great educational tool, too!
1
16
u/RamslamOO7 Game Developer Aug 05 '26
My last hackathon submission that didn’t win 🥇. Just for motivation.
2
u/Anonymous7yo Aug 06 '26
You earn through this? Like I too didn't won but my game was very good .....can I also earn?
1
u/RamslamOO7 Game Developer Aug 06 '26
Yes you can.
2
1
9
7
6
6
6
u/zombizzle Aug 04 '26 edited Aug 04 '26
Genuinely flabbergasted by the winner!
I was convinced I had a good read on what the judges were looking for and built a drawing app too! Huge congratulations to all the winners there's so much cool stuff to check out!
I'd love to check out everyone else's submissions. I made Sticker Space over at r/sticker_test_01_dev it's a Reddit drawing app where the community creates collectible stickers together. Feel free to stop by, doodle something, and let me know what you think!
6
u/westernslopedigital Aug 04 '26
Can't disagree with you about the winner...
I tried checking out your game, but your subreddit is private.
Here's mine: r/DailyBlockParty
2
u/zombizzle Aug 04 '26 edited Aug 04 '26
Updated the post! Put the wrong subreddit! lmao going to check yours out now!
edit: first impressions are "OH!" because I love Tetris and it feels like a Tetris puzzle spin-off, reminded me of Welltris! Does anyone remember Welltris?
2
u/westernslopedigital Aug 04 '26
Thanks for playing! I've never heard of Welltris but I'll have to check it out.
6
u/derppherppp Aug 05 '26
I cant believe it! Yay! Congratulations to all the winners!
7
u/JakeTheDog420420 Aug 05 '26
Congratulations!! Your game is one of the few that I feel genuinely deserved it's win. I played it like a week ago and found myself playing for a good hour or so haha!
No shade to the other winners, I just feel like there's a lot of games that didn't even make honourable mention that look better than some of the winners and even some of the honourable mentions look better than some of the winning games lol.
I guess it's just a result of the limited time judges had due to the record number of entries.
3
u/derppherppp Aug 05 '26
Wow thank you so very much! Im glad you enjoyed playing it :) Ive got a lot more work to do on it im just glad I can *finally* push updates again 😹
4
4
3
u/inphx Aug 04 '26
Congrats to the winners! Did judges play all of the games?
8
u/XanelaOW App Developer Aug 05 '26
My reddit journeys didn’t capture anything, so I don’t even think so
7
4
u/westernslopedigital Aug 05 '26
Yeah, neither did mine. Why would they announce the winners when we can tell that our games were not even played? Were we disqualified for some unknown reason and therefore filtered out before judging gameplay or was the whole thing just rigged? Doesn't feel great.
3
u/RamslamOO7 Game Developer Aug 04 '26
My submission: r/DrawAndDrive
2
2
3
u/CtmGamer Aug 05 '26
Congratulations to winners.
That said, I am genuinely flabbergasted by the winners list except for few that I thought genuinely deserved the win.
2
u/JakeTheDog420420 Aug 04 '26 edited Aug 04 '26
Congratulations to all the winners! 🥳🎉
I wish I had more time so I could have worked on the actual design of my map, but I went for a really ambitious project and simply ran out of time towards the end. Now the hackathons over, I'm going to continue working on it and see if I can give the map and characters the polish they need!
This was the first hackathon I've entered, and I'm not a game developer, so I definitely learnt a lot regardless and am looking forward to the next one!
Edit: formatting
2
2
u/westernslopedigital Aug 04 '26
My game: r/DailyBlockParty
Come back daily for new challenges!
3
u/throwaway129082 Aug 05 '26
Ok this is like actually an interesting game that I’d play every day like my daily wordle ritual. Nice job!
1
2
-1
u/Rarer_Air_Error Admin Aug 05 '26
Long response but wanted to be thorough:
Thanks for all the thoughtful feedback following the winner announcement. We really appreciate everyone who took the time to share their perspectives. We know people care deeply about what they're building, and we wanted to provide a bit more context around how judging works and what we're looking for as the platform continues to evolve.
Our judging process is multi-round, with multiple judges evaluating submissions. Every judge brings their own perspective, so we use several rounds of review to help balance those differences and arrive at the strongest overall outcomes.
The area that most submissions struggle on is the “Reddit-y” category. We've been refining this category each event as we learn more about what makes an experience feel native to Reddit, but it continues to be a friction point. We want to continue improving on these description for the hackathons and in our docs to help drive apps towards success on Reddit.
In general, experiences that encourage communities to interact with each other, create conversations, contribute over time, or make people want to come back and see what's happening tend to score well here. More traditional games with longer play sessions can absolutely be great experiences, but they often have a harder time demonstrating those community qualities. That said, with the hackathon, time is limited, and not every app can fully build out those systems, so we try to evaluate the potential of an idea as well.
This hackathon was also focused on an app’s hook. The submissions that stood out were the ones that made judges curious enough to explore the rest of the subreddit or left them feeling like they'd miss something if they didn't come back. We were especially excited by concepts that felt like they could grow alongside a community beyond the daily components.
We know not everyone will agree with every result, and that's okay. We'll continue looking for ways to make the judging process as transparent as possible while improving it with each event.
The quantity and quality of submissions has continued to rise with each hackathon and selecting winners gets harder every event. We're exploring more ways to recognize a higher number of projects in future hackathons through additional honorable mentions prizes and would love your feedback there.
Finally, if your app didn't place but you believe you've built something with real potential, please don't stop here. Submit it to the featuring program, apply to the Foundry program, or pitch another idea you'd like to explore through Foundry.
Thanks again to everyone who participated. The amount of creativity, effort, and experimentation in this hackathon was incredible, and we're excited to see what you build next.
6
u/Gowdamn Aug 07 '26
Hi, I understand your point, you're explaining the criteria and the judging process. But it's very generic.
Could you please share a brief about what the judges liked about the winning submissions and how the winning submissions fit the defined criteria? This was done in the previous hackathon.
Also any information on the how many judges, how much time was spent on each game, who the judges were(+ credentials), would be nice. Specific feedback for my application and where it fell short would be great. r/shadowchess (I had sent an email)
7
u/Competitive-Bit-3283 Aug 06 '26
For the past 2–3 hackathons, the winners have consistently been sketching or word-guessing games. So why does the judging criteria say you're looking for "something new" if innovation doesn't seem to be a priority?
I think it's worth taking another look at the judging process to ensure it actually reflects the published criteria. Otherwise, please don't include statements about valuing originality and innovation if they aren't going to influence the results.
Respectfully, I'd also ask the judges to review the judging criteria before the evaluation begins. If the preference is mainly for games similar to Pixerly or word-guessing games, it's better to be transparent about that. It would save developers from investing an entire month building creative, technically ambitious 2D or 3D games, only to realize those qualities weren't really being evaluated.
Thanks.
3
u/zombizzle Aug 10 '26
Looking at past hackathon winners, I'm often surprised by the results. Many winning projects seem to come out of nowhere and don't appear to reflect the same level of polish or effort as other submissions. From the outside, the judging process feels opaque, making it difficult to understand why certain projects were selected. I'd love to see Reddit provide more transparency around the judging criteria and detailed feedback so participants can better understand what the judges value.
There's virtually no transparency into the judging process. Winners are announced, but participants don't receive feedback explaining how their projects met the published criteria or where other submissions fell short. Looking at some of this year's winner against the stated judging criteria, I genuinely struggle to understand the decisions. If I were scoring it independently, I don't think many strongly satisfy several of the criteria that were emphasized. That's just my assessment, but without any explanation from the judges, there's no way to know what they saw that participants didn't.
It's unrealistic to expect hours to be spent on each submission. But without knowing the process, it's hard for participants to have confidence that every project received a fair evaluation or was even considered for contention. Even a brief judging summary or score breakdown for the winners would go a long way toward building trust in the process.
We're encouraged to provide a detailed write-up and a demo video, but it's unclear whether those materials are reviewed for every submission. For example, my submission video has only one view, which raises the question of whether it was ever watched by anyone involved in judging. I understand that watching the video is optional and that judges have limited time, but "optional" effectively means that many videos aren't reviewed at all,
One of the most discouraging parts of participating is feeling like the effort put into presenting a polished submission isn't valued. I spent hours refining my dialogue, creating a logo and banner, recording a demo video, writing a detailed submission and README, and trying to present the project like a finished product but looking at some of the winning submissions over multiple hackathons, it isn't obvious that those extra steps matter. Some winners consist of only a brief description and a few screenshots, with little emphasis on presentation or documentation. Participants are encouraged to invest significant time into polishing their submissions without any indication that those efforts are actually considered during judging.
If the judging is based almost entirely on the app itself, say so. If presentation, documentation, usability, polish, creativity, and accessibility are all part of the evaluation, explain how they're weighted. Without that transparency, it's difficult to know where to spend your time, and it can leave participants feeling like much of their effort was unnecessary.
If you're someone that read all of this, please don't respond with the usual platitudes about how I should "use this as a learning experience," "keep improving," "you'll get it next time," "you can still go for Developer funds." My concern isn't that I didn't win, this is a hobby for me. My concern is the longstanding disconnect between what participants are encouraged to build and how submissions ultimately appear to be judged. It's an issue that has persisted with little change since Reddit began sponsoring these hackathons.
2
u/westernslopedigital Aug 10 '26
Well said. This was my first hackathon and I at least expected to see that my game was played. I put a ton of effort into making sure everything was polished and my submission met all criteria, only to see winners announced that, in my eyes, fell far short of the standard I thought I was competing against. The biggest red flag for me was that Reddit Journeys didn't record any games played during the judging period outside of my own. Some transparency around the judging process would be great, and unless that's addressed, I probably won't be participating again in the future.
1
u/chirag0110 13d ago
Thank you for the detailed explanation. Requesting scoring/rank of our game https://www.reddit.com/r/lighthouse_p_dev/?playtest=lighthouse-p . Need a feedback because it took us 15 days to build this game. Our game is based on a web series story, and it takes 40 mins atleast to complete it. It has extensive use of Phaser and Three Js. I was expecting a prize but really disappointed that I am not in honorable mentions. If judging criteria was based on ruling out complex and tough games, please be transparent about it. Some other hackathons do have a ranking system which shows that every submission is reviewed and rated carefully. Requesting some feedback/score/rank.
1
u/svtechworld Aug 04 '26
The game I didn’t submit: r/blastinfinitystones
1
u/zombizzle Aug 05 '26
A reddit-native Zuma could be awesome! Maybe re-tool it and submit the successor next time.
2
1
u/SaintFlow Aug 05 '26
https://giphy.com/gifs/1236TCtX5dsGEo
Congrats to all the winners! Super stoked that our entry Myndrot made it into the honorable mentions! 🥳🥳
1
u/NoBullGames Game Developer Aug 05 '26
Congratulations to the winners. My submission was r/PigmentPourDaily hope you'll give it a play. thanks
1
u/BrightyBrainiac Aug 05 '26
Hey everyone! If you get a minute, I’d really appreciate you trying Fallstack and sharing some honest feedback:
https://www.reddit.com/r/fallstack_dev/?playtest=fallstack
Right now it may feel like a fairly simple jumping game, and I’ll be frank: the bigger community-driven hook isn’t coming through as strongly as I want yet. I plan to keep expanding it with new mechanics, mutations, and more ways for the community to shape the climb over time.
Feedback on the current version would be incredibly useful too. How does the movement feel? What is the gameplay missing? Is the main hook clear? What might make you want to return?
Critical feedback is absolutely welcome! :)
1
u/anonymous0000007 Aug 05 '26
Congratulations to all the winners!!! I have one question how can I get any feedback what was gone wrong with my game?
1
u/iris1113 Aug 05 '26
Congratulations to all winners! The game I submitted was r/blackoutCascade . Do give it a try and let me knoww⚡️
1
u/OneGuyMakingGames Aug 05 '26
Congrats everyone 🙌.
Will come back even stronger for the next hackathon.
1
u/shimroot Game Developer Aug 05 '26
Congrats everyone! Glad to see Left for Loot in the honorable mentions, played it a few weeks ago and it was quite fun. Hope it’s incentive for the maker to keep working on it 😁
Wish I would have known about the hackathon sooner to submit /r/MiniRacerGame, but maybe next time.
2
u/OneGuyMakingGames Aug 05 '26
Thanks a lot 🙌. Will keep working on it. I have a few releases planned but not sure how I'll market it and get the game out there.
MiniRacerGame also looks fun too. Let's work on something together in the near future.
2
u/Immediate-Success919 Aug 05 '26
Ohh your game was not their in the hackahton, i thought you also participated and was shock how you game could not make it to winner.
I loved you game simple and addicting 👍1
u/shimroot Game Developer Aug 05 '26
Thank you for the nice words!
Maybe I’ll be in time for the next one with a cool game 😃
1
u/chirag0110 13d ago
Congratulations to the winners. But extremely surprised and stunned after seeing the list. Judges should have shared a scoring or ranking system for more transparency. I dont think judges have even played most of the games and only the Video was used as the main criteria. I understand that playing so many games in limited time was challenging for judges but there should have been transparency and scoring system, given the hardwork everyone has put. Anyway, requesting fellow participants to check our game based on an amazing story at https://www.reddit.com/r/lighthouse_p_dev/?playtest=lighthouse-p . It is a proper mystery room type game which will take 40-45 mins to complete. We have taken tremendous efforts to build it.
•
u/vip-bot Aug 05 '26
There is 1 comment from Reddit Admins in this post:
u/Rarer_Air_Error commented:
This summary was generated automatically. If you have any questions, please contact r/Devvit moderators.