Berlin Mini Jam July 2013

Last July, I did my first Berlin Mini Jam. It’s a monthly event, usually on the 1st or 2nd Saturday of the month, where people from many backgrounds meet up at co.up and make games in just 8 hours.

I’ve been following their Facebook page since September 2012 but I never had the chance to do the game jam. So last month, while taking my vacation before starting my new job, I decided to join the July Mini Game Jam.

The event started at 12PM and I came 30 minutes late. There were like 30 people there  and they has voted for the themes which were Pixel Art, Retro Style, and Light & Darkness. I teamed up with Lothar Narnis and Adam Streck, both whom I just met on the game jam.

We sat on the same table, introduce ourselves (which skills and programming languages) and quickly brainstorm the idea. About 1 hour later, we came up with a simple game idea:

  • There’s a game character in a totally dark room.
  • There are a few of light sources (some kind of spot lights) which can be turn on and off.
  • The game character can only move within the lighted area.
  • The game character can rotate the spotlight until you can see the next spotlight so the character can walk towards it.
  • Explore the room until you see the exit door. Walk to the exit door and you win the level

I did the level editor using JavaScript, Adam did the game coding using Java and Processing library, and Lothar did all the pixel art. We worked 8 hours intensively.

Berlin MIni Game Jam July 2013.  Me on the end of the table with Lothar on the left and Adam on the right side.

Me on the end of the table with Lothar on the left and Adam on the right side. Making game is a serious business 😀

The development ended at 9PM and we managed to finish the game 🙂

There are many fetaures that we skipped, like the ability to find a sword and destroy the monster, secret coins, polished UI, and such, but at least the basic game works with 6 working levels and a levle editor. After 15 minute break, each team presented their game.

The LIght

Our game, The Light. Click picture to play the game (JavaScript)

Everyone were already tired but there were a lot of cheering and laughing during the demo. We were having fun on that day 🙂 The game jam ended around 10PM, everyone left and went out for a dinner together.

It was pretty exhausting but I have fun doing Game Jam. It’s nice to do different thing (level editor instead of game programming) and finishing a working prototype in a very short time. If I have spare time, my plan is to convert the game to JavaScript with CreateJS, do a little bit code cleanup, and put the source code on GitHub.

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1 thought on “Berlin Mini Jam July 2013

  1. Pingback: Sketches & Recap from 2013 | Abiyasa Blogs

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