Austin Global Game Jam!

General chatter / What's happening

Global Game Jam:
http://sites.google.com/site/ggjacc/ (PLEASE use the signup form and
sign up for the mailing list! Software and Food info is on the site.)

This is a good way to test your skills for game-making without a huge committment (a weekend)

Date/Time: January 30-February 1st, 2009 (5PM Jan 30th all the way
through to 8PM Feb 1st)
Location: ACC Northridge ( http://www.austincc.edu/locations/nrg.php )
Topic: In a Game Jam, participants come together to make video games.
Each participant works in a small team on a complete game project over
the course of a limited time period, usually over a weekend. With such
a small time frame, the games tend to be innovative and experimental.
The Global Game Jam (GGJ) is the first of its kind: a game Jam that
takes place in the same 48 hours all over the world! The global Game
Jam will start at 5:00PM Friday, January 30, 2009 through 5:00PM
Sunday, February 1, 2009, (all times local). All participants in the
Global Game Jam will be constrained by the same rules and limitations,
with each time zone having one distinct constraint. More info at
http://globalgamejam.org !

If you have any questions please email me!

Comments

We have 12 people signed up

Submitted by zratchet on Wed, Jan 14 2009 - 8:27 PM.

We have 12 people signed up so far. The Dallas Global Game Jam got cancelled so we may get some extras from up there as well.

A couple of questions I

Submitted by softwarejanitor on Wed, Jan 14 2009 - 8:51 PM.

A couple of questions I don't mind if you answer publicly, or you can email me back if you'd prefer.

What languages and/or toolkits can developers choose from? I see C++ and Python listed on the site, but what others (Java, Flash, etc), or is it up to the team members?

What platforms? Consoles? Mobile/handheld/phones? Windows? Mac? *nix? The software list on the site seemed somewhat Windows-centric.

What are the expectations as far as experience level? What about people who are experienced developers but haven't worked in the game industry?

Anything on the site can be

Submitted by zratchet on Wed, Jan 14 2009 - 9:17 PM.

Anything on the site can be used, and I'm pretty sure we will have Flash. Java isn't used quite as much in the industry, but since dev tools are free for it I'm pretty sure it can be installed on request. People can also bring their own systems if they want to.

We have Windows PC's in the labs we'll be using - I'm not sure if the Mac labs are available to us or not. But people can bring Macs/penguins in if they want to.

On the console side we do have devkitPro listed on the site:

http://www.devkitpro.org/about/

as well as XNA which technically means you could build on the Xbox (not sure about licenses there though).

All are welcome. Experience helps a lot, but I'm sure there will be some artists, musicians and designers involved as well as programmers. The goal is to experiment and have fun, not restrict based on experience level, either in programming or the game industry.

Hope this helps! Any more questions?

We are now up to 21 people.

Submitted by zratchet on Mon, Jan 19 2009 - 2:42 AM.

We are now up to 21 people. Especially looking for Artists and Audio people now. If you have experience in Graphic Design, Creative Writing, C#/.net, MIDI/Garageband/Music Playing or Composing, or similar skills and are looking to improve or learn these skills please consider coming to the Jam, it's free. We have 19 slots left.

Up to 34 people now, 6 slots

Submitted by zratchet on Mon, Jan 26 2009 - 5:00 AM.

Up to 34 people now, 6 slots left, and the Jam starts THIS Friday!

We have 1 slot left, though

Submitted by zratchet on Tue, Jan 27 2009 - 4:17 AM.

We have 1 slot left, though I still encourage signing up so we can ascertain interest.

The Austin Global Game Jam

Submitted by zratchet on Sat, Jan 31 2009 - 7:29 AM.

The Austin Global Game Jam (part of IGDA's Global Game Jam) is going great:

http://sites.google.com/site/ggjacc ( official site and blog )
http://flickr.com/photos/ggjaustin (photostream)
http://twitter.com/zratchet (text stream)
http://ustream.com (search for "Austin Global Game Jam")

Have fun! The science fair has gone INFO AGE!

We created an Xbox game, and

Submitted by zratchet on Sun, Feb 1 2009 - 5:37 AM.

We created an Xbox game, and it and 4 other games are still under development (Flash, and the rest are mostly in C++). 13 more hours!

Would anyone be interested

Submitted by zratchet on Fri, Feb 6 2009 - 8:07 PM.

Would anyone be interested in learning from our rapid software development at the jam in either a live or webcast postmortem?