Hello friends! The following is a list of rules and scheduling details for the 2023 rendition of the Newgrounds Audio Deathmatch (NGADM)!

I WANT TO ENTER! WHAT DO I DO???!!!

To submit a track for the audition round, simply go to this forum thread, click “respond to this topic” on the top-right, and post a link to your track. For this round, your track should fit the following criteria:

• The track is either made from scratch for the competition, or a track that you've made in the past. Either is fine.
• The track is of any genre you want.
• The track is only ONE song. There’s no length limit for NGADM submissions, but it should be an internally cohesive whole. Please don't submit entire albums, DJ sets, or the like.
• The track is uploaded to Newgrounds. No submissions from Bandcamp, YouTube, Soundcloud, etc. will be accepted. 
• The audition track is either an original composition, or a cover/arrangement of someone else’s track that DOES NOT use any direct samples from the original. If you want to grab a mic and try to mimic Waluigi’s voice on your track, that’s fine. But you can’t rip sounds directly from copyrighted songs, movies, TV shows, or video games just because someone else has uploaded clips of them to YouTube.
• Relatedly, the track must conform to ALL of the Newgrounds Audio Guidelines. 
• The track makes it clear and obvious whether you have any collaborators. You're allowed to enter the competition as a team of two, BUT your audition must be a collaborative effort between you and your collab partner, not a track made by either one of you individually. Likewise, if you’re NOT entering the competition as a team of 2, then you CAN’T submit a collaboration as your audition piece unless you truly did all of the creative work (composing notes, mixing, and mastering) yourself. Example: if you want your friend who’s a killer saxophone player to bust out a solo on your track, that’s fine, but you need to write all of the notes that he’s playing. He’s not allowed to have any creative control or do any improv unless he’s your teammate for the entire competition.
• The track is submitted on time! The submission deadline is July 13th at 11:59 p.m. EDT (GMT -4). Any and all exceptions must be cleared by me personally in advance of July 13th. That said, if you’d like to switch out your previous submission for a new one before the deadline, that’s totally fine. Simply post the new submission in the thread and make it clear that you’d rather have the new one in the competition.

WHAT HAPPENS IF I PASS AUDITIONS?

The contest itself is split into two phases: the group stage and the single-elimination phase. During the group stage, the top 64 competitors from the audition round will be seeded into groups of 4, where they will have 3 weeks to make a brand-new track. The (one) winner from each of these groups will advance to the next phase, in which each matchup is 1-v-1 and the participant with the lowest score is eliminated each time. For all of these rounds (the group stage and the single-elimination phase), your tracks should fit the following criteria:

• Each track must be made from scratch, by you, for the competition. No remixes, covers, arrangements, or revisiting old tracks. Having said that, you may still ask someone to play an instrument and/or sing for you IF you write all of their notes and lyrics and mix/master the track yourself.
• Each track must have been made (i.e., both started and finished) during the round that you’re submitting it to. You can’t just pick your favorite tracks that you made months and/or years ago and post a different one for each round. You also can’t start on a track for a future round if you finish your track for a previous round early. No selecting the instruments you want to use. No writing out chord progressions. The one exception is if you have a mixing template or customized DAW settings you use for all of your tracks.
• If you entered as a two-person team, each track should reflect the contributions of both members of the team. “Tag teaming” is not allowed.
• Each track must be posted in the forum thread corresponding to a given round of the competition. Upon creating these separate threads, I will tag users who have advanced to that round within the first few posts. Unlike previous NGADMs, you may also post any kind of discussion related to the NGADM or music in general in these threads. There’s no separate discussion thread.
• Each track should conform to all Audio Portal and all BBS rules. This should go without saying!
• Each track should reflect your best work. This contest is tough! You're expected to crank out a new track within two weeks. We love the huge turnout we get each year in terms of participants, but if you can't keep up with the pace, consider backing out of this one. Walkovers and last-minute dropouts tend to happen no matter what, but we'd like to keep them to a minimum.

FAQ

Will I get reviews on my submissions?

Not necessarily, especially in the earlier rounds. There are likely going to be several hundred auditions this year, and it'll be pretty much impossible for the judges to review them all. That said, in the past, judges have been very receptive to specific review requests sent via PM. Just make sure to be non-confrontational about it. These people are volunteering their time to help you improve your music, after all.

Is there a maximum/minimum length requirement for the contest track?

No, but use your common sense! Anything too long will be harder to keep interesting and coherent/structured, and anything too short might not have enough memorable content in it.

Can I use my NGADM submission for other contest submissions on Newgrounds? Or vice versa? 

Absolutely, yes! Just make sure you’re following the rules for both competitions. 

Who will be judging my submissions?

@ADR3-N, @Bosa, @ConnorGrail, @SplatterDash, @TaintedLogic, @TeraVex, @Wobwobrob, and @X3LL3N.

What is the judging criteria for the music?

Every judge is given free rein on how to judge the music. However, for general guidelines:

• Judges will take into consideration everything from mixing to mastering to melodies to harmonies to structure to originality to transitions to everything in-between.
• Make sure your track is one cohesive experience, has a suitable amount of content, and adequately maintains interest from start to finish. This means that "background music" that's 8 minutes long and only changes slightly once every 16 bars, 1-minute loops with little musical content and tracks that sound like three different tracks glued together all will have marks deducted.
• DO NOT blame any shortcoming of your track on the genre it's in. Comments like "This is House, obviously it will sound repetitive" or "This is Orchestral, it doesn't need good mixing" will get you nowhere. This competition receives submissions consisting of many different genres, and we try to remain as unbiased as possible, so we won't be turning a blind eye to any kind of shortcomings simply based upon the genre of a track.
• Remember that, first and foremost, this is a music competition. The less your track sounds like a piece of music, the lower your chances of success. Experimental noise, atonal ambience, voice-acting, sound effect compilations, etc... don't expect these to make it very high on a judge's score sheet.

PRIZES

1st place: Newgrounds Supporter Upgrade, 1st Place NGADM 2023 Forum Signature, Frontpage Showcase

2nd place: Newgrounds Supporter Upgrade, 2nd Place NGADM 2023 Forum Signature, Frontpage Showcase

3rd place: Newgrounds Supporter Upgrade, 3rd Place NGADM 2023 Forum Signature, Frontpage Showcase

4th place: Newgrounds Supporter Upgrade

FULL SCHEDULE

Thank you in advance for following the rules. Good luck and (most importantly) have fun! :D

Also, special thanks to @LD-W and @ChronoNomad. I’ve literally ripped bits and pieces of these rules directly from previous posts of theirs.