Welcome to Game Development Society's Winter Game Jam! This jam welcomes both beginner and expert level developers from across the university and is the perfect chance to collaborate, create and refine your skills while competing against fellow students. You will have two weeks to create a video game, using any engine and programming language you'd like. We will provide a basic theme for the games, which you should use as inspiration or as a foundation for your ideas. 

For master's students in the game engineering course participating in this jam, use this opportunity to collaborate with your team, discover how to work effectively together, and play off each other's strengths before tackling the big project next semester.

Not a master’s student? Don’t worry! The game jam is a great chance to test your skills alongside more experienced programmers, as well as  an incredible opportunity for you to add a polished, finished product to your portfolio.

Theme: Shot in the Dark

If you have any questions or want to find people to create a team with, you can contact us via our linktree, and joining the discord server to find like-minded developers.

• There is no maximum on team sizes, but the suggested maximum is four.
  
• You may join as a solo developer, but remember that this is a great opportunity to develop your teamwork skills.
• You can use any engine, tool or library to create your game, provided it runs on windows and/or browser.
• You can use any assets you've created, or any 3rd party assets as long as you have the rights to use them, and have properly credited them.
• Please don't use pre-made code in your project. The code should consist of your own original work completed during the jam. Tutorial code is fine :)
• Don't modify your game during the voting window, unless it's to fix a game-breaking bug
  
• Don't plagiarise.
  
• No AI-Generated content. Focus on your own creativity
• Make sure any content within your game is SFW (Safe for Work).
• Upload your game before 11:59PM on the 19th January
• This list isn't exhaustive, please just don't be cringe.
  
• If your game is caught breaking our rules, the game may be removed from participating.

Once the jam is over, you and your team will have a chance to play other people's games and rank them using the below criteria. 

Enjoyability/Engagement: 

• Were you hooked to the game?
• Did you find yourself wanting to keep playing?

Theme Implementation

• Did the game fit the theme well?
• Was the theme implemented in a creative, clever or unusual way?

Presentation/Game Design

• Was the game smooth and refined?
       • How well does the style of the game affect the atmosphere of the game?
•Does it have an interesting or engaging visual style?

Submissions

When submitting, try to build your game for as many platforms as possible, especially for browsers. This ensures that your game will have a higher chance of being played and rated by more people.

Please have only one person from each team submit the game and add all other members as contributors. This will prevent duplicate entries and allow each team member to rank games individually.

Even if you didn't finish everything you wanted on time, you're still encouraged to submit your efforts. You may be surprised by how well you do. In the situation that you haven't submitted and the deadline is over, contact a committee member on our Discord and we can get you a late submission link.

Time Constraints

Although the game-jam is two weeks long, you don't have to spend your entire time developing. It's up to you how you spend your time. You may also be in the situation where you have exams during this two week event and therefore won't be able to join at the start of the jam, you're allowed to join as late as you'd like. You can join for just the final weekend and treat it as a two day game jam. Countless amazing games have been built in jams with similar time windows.

Ranking Games

Once the submission period is over, you'll begin ranking other people's games. Please try as many games as you can and rank them fairly. These game jams don't work if people rank games strategically. In addition to ranking, leaving honest feedback can be very helpful, so please try to provide some as you playtest the games.

Results

The voting period is 7 days long, immediately after the submission window ends. Final results and winners will be announced on Sunday the 26th of January.