What is a Game Jam?

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"Grouping tens of people in the same place to create games. It sounds like heaven, doesn’t it?"

1. The infinitely rich world of Game Jams
2. Real World Gathering, the fun and excitement to group together
3. “Hitbox Makers”: our convivial, medium sized, real world gathering
4. A guide about our experience, but some hints for other Jams
   

The infinitely rich world of Game Jams

Game Jams are events during which people create games (often video games, but also board games) in a short session: they often last between 24 and 72 hours. But many other format exist: some are much shorter (0h Game Jam, One hour Game Jam), and others much longer, lasting a week (7DRL challenge) or more...

It is difficult to date the first ever in history, but we know the first Ludum Dare, one of the most famous online Game Jam nowadays, had been hosted in 2002. And now, there literally are hundreds of them being organised at any time. Just check the  “Jams” page on itch.io

And of course, they all have their identity, and there is a huge diversity of them: online, as real world gathering, small, huge, thematic, for fun, as a competition, promotional…

Real World Gathering, the fun and excitement to group together

A Real World Gathering, is an event (and a place) where people group together during in a Game Jam. Some are independent, such as our main Jam, some take part in a larger even, such as the Global Game Jam (118 countries, 934 sites and 9601 games for January 2020 edition)

We have identified 4 main reasons why it is great to group together in a Real World Gathering:

REASON 1:
Teaming with other people, and creating something you thought was beyond your skills

REASON 2:
Entering a time bubble, where you are safe to give everything

REASON 3:
Being part of a creative profusion, and amazed at other’s game

REASON 4:
Showing your work, and seeing stars in other people's eyes

“Hitbox Makers”: our convivial, medium sized, real world gathering

After some editions, we have understood and defined “Hitbox Makers”, our local Game Jam:

• It is a convivial event. We want our participants to have fun, to enjoy every bit of it, to achieve something beyond them, to make efforts and fell rewarded for that. We are a casual event: it is wonderful to see unique skills, incredible games, and rich professional connections being tied there. But performance is in no way required: what we want, is to have fun.
  
  
• It is a local Real World Gathering, It means that all participant gather in the same building, meet each an interact with each other. Our jams are strongly connected to our local ecosystem of amateurs, associations, students, and professionals: we need this ecosystem, but we also make it richer. however, we also love having visitors from other cities, or even countries! (usually 30% of our participants)
  
  
• We want to mix skills, and skill levels, We welcome anyone, from the utter beginner who never touched a line of code, to the most experienced developer, who was already working in the gaming industry in the 80’s. Actually, our fun is to mix different profiles, and create magical interactions.
  
  
• It is a medium sized events. 70 participants at most.
  
  
• We are independent. We love our financial independence, and the freedom to define our own themes and rules. But it doesn’t stop us sometimes joining other larger events, to broaden our horizons!

A guide about our experience, but some hints for other Jams

There are many other wonderful Game Jams. But this one is ours, and we love it! So this guide reflects our experience and the way we like to do things.

However there are many different ways of doing things, and they are perfectly legitimate. So, when it applies, the guide will display an infobox, when things could be done differently for 4 other kinds of real world gathering:

Ludum Dare casual and fun, but synchronised with a global online event
Global Game Jam casual and fun, but synchronised with hundreds of other real world gatherings
a Competitive Jam professional or semi-professional competition, with the target to get some promotion
a Tech based Jam with experienced developers, and the target to experiment with a specific technology or equipment

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