Hi! Game jams on itch.io are made up of three distinct periods of time.
Preparation (Now)
During this time, you can use either our Discord or the itch.io community to find a team, if you so wish. If you want to join solo, that's perfectly fine.
Submission Period
Begins when the jam begins, and lasts for seven days.
- You will use these seven days to build a game mostly from scratch.
- Since this is your first game jam, I recommend coming up with a very simple idea. Write out an in-depth list of all the assets and game mechanics you think you'll need to make it work, and then simplify the idea even more. You want to have a really small scope, to be able to make a nice, tight final product.
- On that note, understand that your game doesn't need to be finished! It's okay to submit an incomplete game, but it's even better if you plan the process so that you can cut things for time.
- As early as possible, set up a new project page on itch.io (top-right menu > "Upload New Project". Contrary to the name, you don't have to add any builds to start setting up the page. Submit it to the jam as early as you want by going to the jam page itself and following prompts
- As this submission period continues, keep filling out your game page. And try out uploading an early build. You don't want to be stuck messing around near the deadline.
Voting Period
After the submission period has finished, the voting period begins!
- You have seven days to rate games by other people, and leave constructive comments. You'll want to do this, so that people rate your own game and give helpful advice.
- You are not allowed to modify your game during this time, except to fix game-breaking bugs.
After the voting period ends, the results will be available.
Hope this helped!