Hello fellow reviewers!!!!! Me, BastardHead and Gunther are inviting you to the first Review Challenge of 2012!

Basically, I wanted to do a specific theme challenge and we discussed several ideas, but choosing (and imposing one) was too tough, so I decided to let you guys choose between some options. The details of each category are as followed:

-Non black metal Norwegian metal Pretty self explanatory, Communic, Blood Red Throme, you choose...
-Early 90s death/doom (A suggestion of Droneriot) Try to pick obscure bands, but not necessarily bands without reviews.
-NWOBHM virgin or obscure albums (A Suggestion of Zodijackyl) Don't review Iron Maiden or Venom's obvious albums.
-USPM virgin or obscure albums
-Classic Mode Virgin review(s) of your choice
-All of the above (5 small challenges, maybe 1 each month?)

Rewards!!!
The Challenge has two themes, so we'll have two winners. They'll win a cd or a tshirt of their choice (no more than 25 bucks including shipping), the 2nd places are gonna get the Tony Special Silly Reward (also known as the TSSR), it's a surprise, of course, don't expect a car, a Russian wife or a Lykathea Aflame vinyl...

Also, the goal of the challenge is to have some fun and to contribute good and pertinent reviews to the site. It goes without saying that you could definitely win the Challenge even if you only wrote 1 or 2 reviews, we'll value quality over quantity.

Vote wisely, the poll gonna last 7 days. I suggest that you look at Arnold's awesome body while making your choice! Don't vote if you don't want to contribute though.

I prefer a challenge every month, there's so much to write about!

This. I look forward to my first review challenge.

Nothing like Conan to put you in challenge mode!

I'm not sure how we'd work a deflowering contest this year. The last time we did one, we used sisters_of_merciless's Needlebase data, but that's since been shut down. He's got his own site now where he hosts some more MA data, so maybe we should contact him and ask if he'd also host the data for virgin albums reviewed in this contest.

First, I'd like us to choose the themes we're gonna use, I will deal with this issue later.

I've been meaning to write more reviews lately. I'm down to do one for obscure Death/Doom.

I vote for Classic Mode. It'd be awesome to beat our daunting record, and it leaves a lot of space open for people to review whatever the kind of music they want to.

I'm all for five challenges maybe 4 weeks long each or 6 weeks long each?

Nothing but the classic mode makes sense, if you want to use the trademarked name "Review Challenge". You could have a "Let's All Write Reviews on Obscure USPM Albums Week", or a "Group Effort to Deflower Death-Doom Albums", or maybe "Metantoine's Super Happy Fun Progressive Dronecore Reviewing Fortnight Jamboree", but unless it's classic mode, you will be sued for it, I'm afraid.

Who's gonna sue me? Also, I'm broke, please don't. I like the classic mode, but I wanted to do something different, hence the poll,

Weeeelll... do as you wish, but the classic mode is the only one that will make me contribute. Of the other options, just the #1 and #2 are even remotely possible for me, since I don't have any albums from the other sets, and Nappy does not review downloads. Nappy is a geezer, and yells at clouds.

CM is interesting but with some variation of the rules (length for instance) and maybe only 4 per year.

classic mode is best mode.

Those voting for Classic Mode should consider voting for option 6 instead, we could have 5 challenges!!!!

Or you could just vote for the one you want to do, because why vote for five if you only want to do one of them?

I voted all of the above, I've been meaning to broaden my horizons a bit and all of the categories included look enticing in this respect.

If you want to do the classic mode only, you could vote for the 6th option since the votes are almost even, it would please the other persons... In the end, you could do the CM anyway and only this one if you're not interested in the others.

Will you have to pay for five prizes if option six is chosen?

Was Arnold posted in celebration/recognition of the upcoming Mr. Olympia? Anyway, sounds interesting either way...

Everyone is welcome!

Arnold will pay for the prices, him or Morri and HB, I don't remember...

By that regard, everybody should pick the last option because then nobody loses? Social engineering be damned, vote for what YOU will write for. If all five wins because a bunch of people voted for it despite only wanting to do one, you've given yourself five times the workload plus paradoxically less interest across the board.

One of my concerns is the waning interest that we'll most likely see if we go with All. By the time we hit the Classic Mode, everyone will be burnt out or uninterested, I fear.

I'd like to do all of them, but I'm only knowledgable in the death/doom department.

Im not voting because i dont write reviews, but this is a great idea!!

I have a question regarding the modes. For instance Classic Mode's intent is to write "virgin reviews", does that mean that only reviews for albums without reviews count?

Yes.

2 DAYS LEFT, MATES!

What happens in the Classic Mode if I want to write a review during the challenge for an album with no reviews, and someone else posts a review for it before I get to finish mine?

Both are gonna be considered, in my opinion. Also, yeah, this is the one winning. I wanted to do 2 themes though. Is death/doom alright with everyone for the 2nd theme? Since the 6th option got a lot of vote, I could let everyone choose their theme. Thoughts?

Wilytank, back in the day when we did Classic Mode challenges every six months or so, users that shared an unreviewed album got credit. So if you and I review Vomit Sodomy's Assbarfing Blasphemy, we both get credit for the challenge. If Tony reviews Regurgitated Cow Fetus' Farm Animal Funland of Satan's Hellish Placenta one day, you the next, Bastardhead on Friday and Empy on Saturday, all four users get credit for the review, and so on. I'm assuming we're going to do a week-long challenge like we used to, unless the consensus is not, but that wouldn't make much sense.....

I like the idea of being able to choose a theme, although it's fine if we can't; I just probably wouldn't contribute to a death/doom theme. Would that be the week after the Classic Mode challenge then, or what?

I think, considering that the classic mode will win and that's a broad theme, it would be better to scrap the 2 themes deal. We'll start with 1 for now.

I agree Tony. We're in no rush.

CLASSIC MODE IT IS! I guess it could start when everyone is ready.

Sweet, never done a review challenge before, ready to do this. Better start listening to an even more excessive amount of metal than usual.

We should all mutually agree on a week to do it...how about October 8-14?

I'll start univ next week, but no problem. Do we need a thread? I don't think so, I'll simply rename this one.

So, for this to be fair, should we not start writing until the next week or simply not submit them until next week? I know that's going to be hard to keep track of, but still...

Well, personally I'd prefer if the prize was given for the review deemed best rather than to the person who writes the most reviews. That way we don't have to worry about people "cheating" by starting before the challenge starts.