World Cup South Africa 2010 is here!

Right, let's see if this can get the blog flooded with comments :D

The vuvuzelas are widely known for granting psychic abilities to those who hear them, so we can see who in the HoO has picked up on this the most. I'll pad this post out a bit more ( :P ) once I've put up the essentials:

Predictions will be accepted at any time prior to the first relevant match being played (this is the first group match in the case of predicting the winner of the group, or the actual match in the case of predicting the result). We will start with Netherlands vs Denmark tomorrow, from group E. Of course, you may submit guesses for any future games and final standing for groups F, G and H too.

Points for you are scored as follows:

For each game, you get 2 points for the correct scoreline, or just one point for the correct result (i.e. who won, or if it's a draw). If I guessed that England would beat the USA 2-1, then I'd get 0 points; if I guessed 2-2 then I'd get 1 point; a guess of 1-1 would net me the maximum 2 points (the score for that game was 1-1, if anyone didn't know :P).

For each group, you get 1 point for picking the correct winner and a further point for the correct runner up. I'll give you half a point for getting the top 2 correct but in the wrong order.

Now to test your long range forecasting skills - guess the eventual winner before the start of the knockout stages for a whopping 5 points (you can guess now, but might as well wait until there are only 16 teams left), guess it correctly before the quarter finals start for 3 points, 2 points for before the semis and 1 point for guessing the outcome of the final. Note that if you change your guess, I will only consider your latest guess - if I back Brazil to win now, and they do indeed win the whole thing, I'd get 5 points (plus 2 or 1 points if I guess the right score or just result in the final). If I back Brazil now, switch to Spain prior to the quarter finals then back to Brazil before the semi finals, I'd only get 2 points for Brazil winning.

Leave your guesses in the comments for this post below. I'll make a new post for each round of the competition if things get too clutteres. See the comments for my example guess, then leave your own!

Upcoming deadlines (all times and dates are in BST, but they are just the times of the kick-offs):

14th June:
1230: Netherlands vs Denmark and final group E standings
1500: Japan vs Cameroon
1930: Italy vs Paraguay and final group F standings

Groups and whens of matches

And The Best Babysitter In The Hall Is...

Over the week many of you tried your hand at babysitting, but only one can have the coveted prize of best babysitter, decided by the Joll parents of course.

They watched your progress throughout the week, and gave you scores which they have kept secret until just now when they told me. Well, they tried to keep it secret, it seems that the scores of your competitors were continually leaked but we won't tell them that.

In reverse order, the best ball babysitters were:

5) Katare             14279
4) Soro99            14381
3) Kresick            14502
2) george076393 14839

And a big, red Kongratulations to Kong's best babysitter of baby balls, Zelja! He got the all time high score of 14860 and claims to have optimised every level!

Save The Children!

This week you've been asked to do some babysitting. Your charges are very adventurous, however, and have a tendency to roll off without warning - much like their parents actually.

Of course, babysitting some balls would be far too easy for the likes of you - a simple box would do the trick. No, first of all you must round up all the children by throwing their parents and grey strangers at them, who you can stuff or starve (don't worry, they're smiling so they don't mind). The jolls have been raised well so will only go off with their parents, who happen to be the same colour as them. Only once all rounded up can you babysit them, and the longer they spend indoors the happier the parents will be (you wouldn't want them to worry about their children perhaps being stuck at the bottom of a potential well, would you?).

Now for the rules: complete all the levels as quickly as possible, and the person with the highest total score at the end of the week will receive a huge red Kongratulations!

So, have fun rounding up the jolls from the land of King.com and good luck to you all!

PS: leave a comment if you figure out what the 9 diplomas mentioned in the game description are :P

Escaped the Zombies!

Only to be poleaxed by a yeti, massive bee or gravestone (or maybe a zombie did get you after all).

Kongratulations and thank you to everyone who had a go at this game, it was a much larger turnout than for zombie football. The top ten were:

RustyMetalBox    2591
LethalMutiny        3049
vaen                     3149
EatinCheez           3187
PR2_STORY       3328
Xymnala              3604
WiiPlayer113      4335
ribnag                 4983
elldaman311       5003

And Katare was the winner with a score of 5758 feet - the only competitor here to have run more than a mile, and getting the all time high score in the process! A huge red Kongratulations to you, Katare!

I'll post the final scores I saved earlier in the week in the comments below, so if I have missed you out then you can bring my attention to it. If I have missed you out for whatever reason, chat more in the HoO and/or leave a comment for the next time ;) In any case, I made sure I picked the right person to name as winner :P