Indie game contest tasks devs with fitting their entire game on to a 1.44 MB floppy disk

1,474,560 bytes may sound like a lot for those unfamiliar with the realities of modern data storage, but it amounts to a single 3.5-inch floppy disk. The hey-day of such a relic of physical media has long since passed, but floppy disks obviously still hold a certain allure for some judging by a certain Korean game dev contest.

Anyone can participate in the contest from Korean indie game site 2P Game Arcade, and the rules are very simple: devs just need to build a game that totals no more than 1,474,560 bytes (or 1.44 MB) after decompression (via Techspot).

Though there are no restrictions on which engine devs may use, the work itself must be an original creation made after the contest announcement date on May 26. The teeny-tiny game must also be playable as a standalone executable (browser-based games are not eligible). Devs have until midnight on September 4 to turn in their work.

There are prizes to be won, though a far cry from the $80,000 the EVE Online devs recently awarded to its own mod contest winners. The machine translation of the 2P Game Arcade contest page describes these prizes as only ‘a small souvenir,’ with first place taking home 720,000 won (about $490).

The judging criteria is just as straightforward as the rules: “1. Whether the game is complete. 2. Whether the capacity has been exceeded,” and perhaps most importantly, “3. Whether the game is fun.”

Considering how chunky modern game files are (not to mention what a premium system storage comes at these days), the whole premise of the contest is pretty refreshing. That said, 1.44 MB is barely enough room to swing around a pixel-based sprite of a cat. In the immortal words of Ru Paul, I can’t wait to see how this turns out.