The time has come once again. Pixelween awakens from it's unholy slumber. Beware it's tricks and get ready for the treats!

This year, you will be crafting 4 scenes that connect vertically over the course of four consecutive weekly challenges. Each challenge will be a new type of spooky scene that connects with the previous one. All of the scenes added together as a vertical panorama shall be your Pixelween entry. Think of these submissions as a collab with yourself, since you do not know the next week's theme in advance.


Rules:
To be eligible for the Pixelween prizes, you must submit to at least 2 of the 4 weeklies. As long as at least two of your submissions are on time, you are allowed (but not required) to submit more up until October 25th, the final deadline. Technically having a complete set is not required to win, but the fates favor a finished vertical panorama.
The winning entries will be chosen from all eligible entries by a jury of select PixelJoint members, perhaps with the help of some dark outsiders who for now remain in the shadows...
The weeklies also function as normal weekly challenges, with the usual prizes. Your success in the weeklies does not influence your chances in Pixelween judging.

There will be a fifth bonus challenge that can be added onto your entry but isn't part of the judging.

The palette begins with 8 colours but will gradually increase and participants can vote for which colours to add the next week on PJ Discord. For every scene the canvas size will be 140 x 80.


Prizes:

* 1st place will receive a printed Masters of Pixel art book volume of your choice, and a software key.
* 2nd & 3rd place will receive a 25$ steam gift card, a Master of Pixel art e-book, and a software key.
* 4th and 5th place will receive a Master of Pixel art ebook, and a software key.
* 6th - 9th (and possibly more) place will receive a software key, see info below.

More rewards (software keys) will be announced soon! From these, the highest placing winners get to choose first, and if a winner does not need a software license it will be moved on to the 10th place, and so on.

The winning entries shall be announced on the 31st of October.
All who participate shall earn the rare Pixelween trophy.


How to enter:

To participate, your works need to be submitted to the Pixel Joint challenges, details are in the challenge posts:

The first challenge is: Sounds from the Basement (September 25th - October 1st)
The second challenge will run from October 2nd - 8th
The third challenge will run from October 9th - 15th
The fourth challenge will run from October 16th - 22nd

Bonus round will run from October 23rd - 29th

If you've missed out on one of the challenges you can still submit your entry to Pixel Joint, as long as at least 2 of the scenes are posted as part of a weekly challenge within the deadline. While it probably won't be necessary, poking one of the moderators when you post your entry after its challenge deadline is a good idea.

Will you terrify the judges? Will you show them something hauntingly beautiful?

Should you feel frightened on your own, the community is here for you in the challenge forum threads and in the Pixelween channel on the PJ Discord. You're welcome to share your WIPs, so that we may conquer our fears together!

You can find the results of the 2020 Pixelween here.

You can find the results of the 2021 Pixelween here.

You can find the results of the 2022 Pixelween here.


For those who are new on Pixel Joint:

To submit to these challenges you enter it in the gallery and tick the "submit to weekly challenge" box before Sunday at midnight (12AM Pacific), challenge timer is on the front page.


This thread where you submit your final vertical panorama will all the parts (weekly challenges) added and connecting with each other.

When I saw the first day post was thinking ''Mmm, this looks pretty nice chance to do something cool and get software key for Aseprite, time to stop using paint.net'' now is more like ''DAMMMMMM this people is amazing, time to save mi dignitiy and do nothing''.

You guys/girls rocks XD

The final few entries:

Eyeballkid (the elder):