We recommend visiting our website for a recommended schedule and more information here! https://gamedevclub.tech/melonjam/

We will also be posting most of our updates on our Discord server, so join here: discord.gg/uYmNuZymJ2

Current (CASH) Total: $1545

PARTICIPANT PRIZES                                                                                        

Raffle

• 1x Aseprite key (worth $20)
  
• 5x $15 cash/gift cards
• 3x Advanced Leaderboard Creator Leaderboard (worth $15)
• 1x IGDA  Membership for 1 year (worth $60)
• 2x 1-year GameSalad Membership (worth $200)

All Participants

• 30-day Interview Cake pass (worth $83)
  
• 1-month access to Premium plan for Echo3D (worth $99)                                           
• 1 coupon for any PlusMusic music (+ tool) (worth $25)
  
• 1 Free Game Jam Soundpack
• $25 coupon for Synty Store (TIME-LIMITED, claim in our Discord server!)

1. In order to be eligible for each division's prize, you must fulfill the requirements for those divisions (can be found in our website).
2. To be eligible for a prize, you must provide an adequate explanation for how your game fits the theme when submitting your game.
3. Any digital project that is not malware may be submitted. Keep in mind, however, that some judges may only be able to grade web build games.
4. All submissions must be developed during the allotted time slot. However, you are free to use any assets (music, 3d models, etc.) and tools (game engines, graphic design programs, etc.) that you made yourself or are given permission to use by the creators, such as through a creative commons license, an open-source license, or a purchase. If you choose to do so, you must mention this in your submission. Judges may take points off or award points based on pre-made assets.
5. All games submitted to MelonJam are uploaded under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 Creative Commons license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/). Participants retain ownership of any projects they submit, though the Cupertino Game Development Club reserves the right record media of those projects and to publish said media. 
6. Participants may work alone, or form teams of up to 4 members in order to work on their submission. This rule may be broken if the team forfeits their prize when submitting.
7. The Cupertino Game Development Club reserves the right to not consider any uploaded games for prizes if the content does not follow the theme or is offensive or unsuitable. This includes but is not limited to: games with harmful or prejudicial themes related to gender, sexual orientation, age, ability, appearance, ethnicity, national origin, citizenship, or religion.
8. You may use any engines or tools at your disposal except for generative AI. No AI art, code, music, or any other assets is allowed apart from sponsored AI products (i.e. PlusMusic).
9. Participants who do not adhere to the rules above may have their submission canceled, or even banned from all future game jams hosted by the Cupertino Game Development Club.

Your game will be judged by professionals under the following criteria:                 

• Gameplay, or how well the game squeezes out value from its mechanics/how appropriate and appealing the controls feel (snappy platforming, impactful heavy attacks, or the like). This may differ depending on the genre of game.
• Graphics, or how impressive the project looks, sounds, etc. 
• Innovation, or how “new” a concept in the game is (new graphics, new gameplay, new interpretations of old concepts, etc.)
• Theme, or how interesting the game's interpretation of the game jam's theme is.
• Polish, or overall polish/how complete the game feels.

Our judges are:     

1. Mirek Stolee, Texts & Technology PhD Student at the University of Central Florida and past COSMOS game development instructor
2. Patrick Wang, incoming SWE intern at Roblox and Cupertino Game Development Club co-founder
   
3. Ethan Soo, professional game developer at techToy Studio and Cupertino Game Development Club co-founder
4. Manu Bhat, former Cupertino Game Development Club president and mobile game developer
5. Anooj Vadodkar, Webmaster at SGDA
6. Ryan Lee, former Cupertino Game Development Club president
   
7. Kerry Zhang, Incoming Mission Design Intern at Respawn, Co-Director at DogPunk
8. Felix Fei, Third year undergraduate at USC Games, Dogpunk Studio Co-director
9. Ryan Niu, Computer Science Master’s Student at USC
10. Jihong "Yuuki" Min, M.S. AGPM, Pixel Artist, Indie-dev
11. Ziyang Zhang, current student game developer in the Game Science and Design program at Northeastern University
12. Jeff Daul, Sr. Game Developer at Nerd Ninjas
13. Anderson Liu, Lead Unity Developer at Community Based Literaciesd
14. Rian Shinozaki, independent game developer
15. Saahil Gupta, Game Developer at University of Pennsylvania
16. Celine Tang, Director of Free Will at USC Games
17. Gabriella Martinez, USC Graduate
18. Jared Skold, independent game designer & project lead
19. Nathan Huynh, Games and Playable Media M.S. graduate student at UCSC
20. Elsa Liu, independent game developer and game user researcher
21. Larry Li, Game Developer, Grad GSND Student at NEU
22. Ed Slee, Associate Gameplay Engineer at Neureal
23. Harrison Roberts, producer at Cryptozoic Entertainment
24. Steph Ng, technical advisor at USC Immersive Media Lab
25. Alex Parrotto, Game Designer at Sour Lemon Studios
26. Claire Hu, narrative systems designer at 31st Union
27. Zaven Kazandjian, Associate Gameplay Engineer at Blizzard Entertainment
28. Darryl Kay, Lead Producer at Revolving Games
29. Yitong Hu, Technical Designer at EYES OUT
30. Jeremy Sachs, graphics programmer at Ethereal Engine
31. Afraz Zackria, Technical Designer and Independent Developer
32. Kevin Zhan, MS games design student at Northeastern and ex Software Engineer
33. Ariel Li, Illustrator, Concept Artist, and Game Art major at USC
34. Haocheng Liu, Technical Game Designer, Interactive Media MFA Candidate at USC Games
35. Jai Bhagu Dodechani, Game Designer at ALTGames Lab
36. Roger Wang, undergrad at UIUC, aspiring indie game dev
37. Host judges: Jolie Han, Rohan Naphade, Faye Yu, Winfred Lin, Jemian Lam, Arnav Gupta, Lydia Lei, Laurier Ke, Vaishak Renjith

All games are judged by as many judges as possible to ensure fairness. We wish you the best of luck and are excited to see your creations!