Wrap-up from inaugural SparksJam Game Jam event by GameSparks & Pulse College

Pulse College was delighted to recently host the guys from GameSparks for their inaugural SparksJam event, taking place both online and at our Games and Animation Campus in Dublin. The sell-out Jam ran for a short but sweet 12 hours on the 23rd of September and 60 registered participants teamed up against each other to create a game, using the theme ‘Invasion’.

Game Jam events like these are great for the game design community and give designers and students alike the opportunity to test out their skills and to network with fellow developers, all while under the constant pressure of having to deliver a playable game to a strict deadline and this event was no different!

As with all good Game Jams, there has to be a winner! This year’s awards have been split into two categories – The Judges Choice, chosen by members of GameSparks and Pulse College, and People’s Choice, where voting was opened up to SparksJam participants and an unlimited amount of Itch.io users.

‘Invaders‘ and ‘Invasion: Destroy All Buildings‘ (seen in the highlights reel below) won the Judges Choice awards, claiming tickets to PocketGamerConnects: London 2017 as their prize, while SparksJam participants and an unlimited amount of Itch members voted for ‘Mighty Crack‘ as the People’s Choice Award.

The quality of games were very impressive given the fact there was only 12hrs given to participants and the pressure of the game design process. Shane O’Brien, GameSparks Technical Project Lead said, “12 hours is a tiny amount of time, most would think it was barely enough to create anything remotely playable. I’m both impressed and proud of the games that were made at SparksJam. It’s always great to see what comes out of the pressure cooker!”.

SparksJam Game Jam Wrap Up

SparksJam Game Jam Game Play Footage

Game Design & Development Courses

Pulse College offers a range of Full and Part-Time courses in Game Design and Development.

Why not get in touch or come along to our next open event to find out more about our Games Development & Animation courses at our Dublin & Galway campuses!
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