Game Jams: Upcoming & In General

[ragmaan]

While we have the lovely Ace Jam currently going, and a multitude of other game jams going on, when I look at Indie Game Jams & Itch.io's Game Jam I see a dearth of game jams coming up in February as compared to the ones listed for January.

Are there game jams that happen regularly each year? I understand that anyone and their best friend can make a game jam, but is January just an outlier in incident rate of game jams, or are more of them listed the closer it comes to the precipitating event?

Furthermore, what are people's feelings on game jams? Are they a good motivator to produce works?

[sake-bento]

For VNs, the most well-known is NaNoRenO. It's an annual event that's been running for over a decade now, and it's probably got the highest participation rate. It runs in March every year. You can find a list of previous runs here: https://www.nanoreno.org/

[Mikomi]

There are tons of great, annual game jams every year, whether for typical games, linear visual novels, etc.

My personal favorite is the tri-annual Ludum Dare, the biggest and longest running game jam in the world with over 2,000 annual participants. It's a weekend long jam (48-72 hours, depending on the category you enter), so it's not for the faint of heart, but my very first "finished" game was a visual novel I made for Ludum Dare in 72 hours, so it's definitely doable- I've been entering it regularly for years and have submitted VNs every time, so don't think it's impossible to make a VN in such a short amount of time.

Another one that happens (usually) every year that's (sometimes) good for VNs is the Indie Game Maker Contest, or IGMC. It's a game jam held by Degica, the publishers of the RPG Maker engines, and has been held the past few years to bring about better games made on RPG Maker engines. I say "usually every year" because they did take 2016 off, though they started back this year. I say "sometimes good for VNs" because, well, it's a contest where you compete for money prizes with people who are typically making RPGs- so, your mileage may vary, as did mine.

Like sake-bento said, NaNoRenO is a great jam for VNs, and I recommend it as well.

I COMPLETELY recommend game jams, as they're such a great tool for learning so much about game development and engines in general. They force you to severely limit the scope of your project (something that is mandatory for ever finishing a game), they make you work in much smaller than usual confines, and most of the time you finish with a completed/near completed project- i.e. a finished game under your belt. And, not only do you now have a finished game, but you also have more knowledge of the engine you used and of game development in general. However, I wouldn't recommend jams that are over 1 month long- for me I find jams that are a weekend to a month long to be a sweet spot, as any longer than that you see a lot of drop off (which could be you). Less time means less time for you to have complications which means a better chance of finishing. So, yes, I fully believe game jams are great tools for inspiring creativity and learning.

[sasquatchii]

My favorite game jam is SuNoFes, or Summer Novel Festival. I really like it because it's very relaxed - it's a two month long jam with few constrictions on what you can make (development/story wise) - as long as your game is story-driven, it's acceptable. Plus, you can even get started before the jam!!

I also really like it because I think it encourages people to continue working on their projects or even finish things they've been working on. I think I'm going to participate this year and try to finish a game I've been working on that's been two years in the making

[ragmaan]

Thanks for all the input everyone! I'll def look forwards NaNoReNo, given its timeliness and the various other game jams with open eyes.

[Aviala]

My favourite game jam is the Global Game Jam, which is starting in 2 weeks, on the 26th if I remember right. You can participate from your home but the best part about it is that there are a lot of jam sites all over the world where you can go and jam for 2 days with other people. Making a game in a short time is great, but making one with other people in the same physical location? Nothing really compares. I've met a lot of cool people in the past couple of years at global game jams. It's not VN specific but you can definitely make a VN if you want.

For the last 3 years or so I've participated on the Kymenlaakso site in Finland and I've always just went there with some friends and a computer and teamed up with some random people to make a game. One year I completely split up with my friends and made a game with some random coding students. It's a great way to meet people, experiment and have fun.

So yeah, if you can find a game jam with an actual physical location, I'd definitely recommend that cause it's 100x more fun!