Has it really been several months since IFTF was founded? Time flies… Since then, we’ve been busy, but it’s mostly been behind-the-scenes work, getting our next projects ready to announce.

There’s great things afoot right now, though, which merit our first ever blog post! When we founded IFTF, we also announced that we were taking on the Interactive Fiction Competition as a project. IFComp is now under way, and we’re thrilled to report that this year it’s received more entries than ever before—58, to be precise. (Last year, and in the year 2000, it received 53, the prior record.) Judging began on October 1, and in the first week, 109 judges submitted 734 ratings. That means it’s also on pace to be a record-breaking year in terms of number of ballots received! People all over the web have begun to take notice; we particularly appreciated that the Short Game podcast dedicated an episode to this year’s record-breaking comp.

If you haven’t ever taken part in IFComp before, it’s simple to do so. Everyone is invited to be a judge; you just have to play and rate five or more of the entered games. The IFComp website has more details (or, if you’ve judged before, you might just want to take a peek at the blog entry about it). Don’t worry if you only have experience with certain types of interactive fiction—the IFComp has a wide range of entries, from parser games to Twine games to interactive multimedia experiences that have never been seen before!

So all that’s fine and dandy, you might say, but IFComp was humming along fine before IFTF ever got involved. What have we done to make sure that it has a successful year? Two major things: we’ve taken over hosting duties, so now, you can make a tax-deductible donation to IFTF in order to make sure that IFComp’s servers stay up and running for years to come. We’ve also helped organize volunteers, so the full weight of the comp doesn’t fall on Jason McIntosh’s shoulders (however capable they may be). Line Hollis, Carolyn VanEseltine and Joe Johnston are three notable volunteers whose work helps make IFComp possible.

So go take a look at IFComp, rate some games, and have some fun! And, if you missed entering IFComp this year, consider entering another competition! There are two Halloween-themed comps going on right now which are still open to entries: the Saugus.net Halloween Ghost Story contest and Ectocomp 2016. (These aren’t IFTF-affiliated, but we’re really happy they’re around!)