After the game jams and the game developers conferences comes a Game Showdown like none other. A game jam with a twist is what Game Showdown 2014 can be described as in a nut shell. It’s an online gaming competition where students from schools and colleges along with professionals from the gaming industry will be participating for the ultimate glory.
Game Showdown 2014 is particularly focusing on bringing young students from all over India to the fore in the world of gaming and attempts at creating young entrepreneurs with a creative edge. What sets apart this game jam from the others is the fact that one does not really have to create a game for the competition but instead work on the presentations about the game concept. The three categories for the event are: schools – where the participants are aged between 10-15 years – college students – aged above 15 – and the professional category which is open to everybody.
Three different themes have been provided for each category; where school students will have to prepare a game for iOS or social media platform on the theme based on a ‘movie’. The college students have to prepare a game based on ‘cricket’and the professionals have to recreate the magic of old games like Mario, Contra, among others and make them relevant for the iOS and social media platform.
The participants have to prepare a presentation about how are they going to present the game and what is the idea behind it. They have to prepare a pitch as to how are they planning to make the game, how are they going to monetise through the game, what is that is different in the game and why is the game entertaining. Also, they have to talk about the game environments and how the characters are going to shape up.
The idea behind this initiative according to the organizers was not to complicate things with participation of school kids. It is also a move to encourage more and more school kids to participate in game jams and use these documents for future reference when they are ready to make games.
The competition commenced on 17 November and the submissions will have to be sent across by 20 November. The finalist will be announced on 21 November and the prize distribution on 22 November. The prize distribution will have an added bonus with a seminar conducted by the industry veterans about the future of gaming with the speaker list boasting of Dr. Deepak Shikarpur – Writer and Technopreneur, Syed Abbas – Director of Production at Ubisoft, Venkat Chandar – Co-Founder & Creative Developer at Axiom Studios and Vivek Dani – Founder CEO and Lead Designer at Rhippo Studios.
Jams like these have been an important catalyst in bringing the gaming talent to the forefront and let the young students get to know the industry. It also helps the students know that there are new avenues that can be tapped into for a future course and the education is not limited to engineering, MBBS or CA.