Our team member Gabriella took some great footage of the experience inside the head.

The jam is over! A big thank you to all the jammers, our jury members, the sponsors and my co-organizer Mårten! You all did a great job and contributed to a wonderful global game jam.

The winner, by the way, was Coffee Simulator by Robin. His unique and interesting art style combined with playability and solid gameplay pulled through when it came to charming our jury the most on a general level (our jury was a fairly diversified group).

As for Thinking inside the box, what we called our game; we didn’t take part of the competition as I was part of the jury. It turned out great though, a solid experience in the vein of what I really wished to achieve without knowing how feasible it was in the context of the jam. It took a while to disassemble, but I got help from Mårten and a kind jammer.

I’m hoping to compile some footage of what it was like to experience Thinking inside the box later on, but for now it’s time to get rested. It’s a work day tomorrow. ; )

Coffee Simulator by Robin:
https://globalgamejam.org/2019/games/coffee-simulator
All the games of our jam site:
https://globalgamejam.org/2019/jam-sites/studio-level-ggj19/games

Ok, so it’s time to reveal what this game is about. So I noticed that I have made quite a few VR games during my recent game jams. I wanted to explore something new while also making something a bit unusual and physical. VR is a good choice for this, because it takes the player out of the physical context and allows for a lot of freedom regarding what it will look like in reality. However, the player is also very exposed as people can only the see the players actions out of context and without the players consent or awareness.

For this jam I wanted to explore creating a small, physical shelter which a player enters such that others cannot see what goes on inside. There were several possible ways to go, it could be a small escape room for instance. After this year’s theme, “what home means to you”, had been announced I was certain that I wanted to go for another approach though. The player would enter a head and the game would then be viewed through the eye sockets of this head and controlled with buttons and levers inside of it.

We have been a team of three persons this jam. I’m the only seasoned jammer, but both of my team mates are very skilled and drive in their respective ways so we have been able to do a lot (especially in light of the project being experimental and me also having organizer duties to tend to).

Currently, the player is pushed into the head on a wheeled armchair. On the arm rests there are joysticks and the virtual game is viewed through the head’s eye sockets which have screens attached to them on the outside. Tomorrow I’ll have to work alone, but I’m hoping to only add a head tilting function as well as expand on the virtual world which the player explores. Should be feasible…

Global game jam is officially started! This is one of the high lights of the year for me. It’s obviously extra fun when you are also an organizer and feel fairly well prepared.

The preparation of the venue and the opening ceremony went really well. I had an idea for what I wanted to explore during the jam, but I kept an open mind until I got to hear about this years theme. As an organizer, you get to learn the theme ahead of others, so while I could confirm that my idea would work I could obviously not tell anyone about it until it was official.

The theme will remain secret until tomorrow when it’s reached all time zones across the Earth. Nevertheless, I’d like to share my team’s progress. I think this image is vague enough…

I’ve organized a few jams, including a few global game jams. One thing I never did before was to have a jury and a prize, as (for me at least) game jams tend to focus on the creative and less on the competitive. This year we wanted to try getting some quality judges together, decide on a winning team and deliver a prize. So I created a trophy for the occasion. : )

There’s been a major water leak in the building where our venue is situated. It looks like the our space did OK, partially thanks to a recently painted, now hydrophobic floor. However, it’s probably time to keep an eye out for a plan B. : /