If you could achieve one goal in 36 hours, what would it be? For 33 folks who gathered in Exabytes’ premise located in SetiaWalk on 14-15 Dec, all of them had one goal – creating an awesome game in 36 hours. After days of preparation, Exabytes first game development marathon event – Photon CGM Game Jam 2013 finally kicked off on 14 Dec.
Seven teams consisting of 33 local game developers and university college students strove to create an awesome game in 36 hours with Unity + Photon to win the grand prize – a trip to Japan and $5000 CPI of ad network service for mobile game apps, respectively sponsored by MDec and tapsmart.net.
Before the marathon started, each jammer (participant) was given a Game Jam 2013 T-shirt and a cool military tag embossed with his/her name, courtesy of MalaysiaMilitaryTag.com.
Then, they were served an array of delicious food buffet for breakfast to face the upcoming challenge. While feasting their tummies, the jammers also took the chance to mingle and know each other better. Of course, being the hardcore gamer that they are, it had to revolve around games! What is your favorite game? Ooh what combination to get that power? You know, that sort of thang.
Shortly after the breakfast, the event started with Ms Sabrina from Exabytes as the MC of the event, welcoming Mr Chan Kee Siak, the CEO of Exabytes to present his keynote speech. Mr Chan gave a warm welcome with some useful advice to the all the jammers. He mentioned in his speech that he is hopeful to see that this event will become a good opportunity to all the participated game developers and students to learn from each other and make new friends.
Pn Faridah from MDec and the CEO of Fun & Cool Ventures, Dr Ganesan were also invited to become the speakers in the opening ceremony. Dr. Ganesan Velayathan, a successful game application developer who is best known for achieving over 2 million of worldwide download click-ons for his “Sushi Friends” Android OS-based game application, shared his impressive game developing experience and journey that turned to his success today.
Followed by the inspiring speech from the speakers, Mr TW Ku, the event coordinator, briefed the rules and guidelines of the game jam to the jammers. One week before the game jam, we had announced the theme was “Malaysia”. On top of that, we also requested the teams to blend in an additional “element” into their games. The element was announced on the event day itself, right before the game jam started. To the jammers’ surprise, it was something they were very familiar with…
Yeap, it was the king of fruits, DURIAN! Then the gun went off and the marathon started! Every team started scratching their heads for an idea to blend durian into their Malaysian game storyline. Would there be games like durian versus zombies, durian monster, or durian race car? 😀 Boy, we sure were excited to see the interesting results!
Time sure did fly and before we knew it, it was lunch time. We have prepared great delicacy to serve the jammers. Just look at ’em mouth watering dishes!
However, these hardcore jammers were so into developing their game, even these mouth watering dishes didn’t make them move an inch from their seats!
After one point, we thought the food were going to the bin, untouched! 😛 Luckily, their tummies growled just in time and they came out for lunch.. finally. Just look at the foodstuff we have prepared for the jammers besides the breakfasts, lunches and dinners!
Lots of snacks, coke and energy drinks to revitalize and help keeping their mind clear for 36 hours, yo! Anyway, back to what happened on that day — few hours passed and slowly but surely, we started to see some prototype designs.
Pretty cool, eh? 😀 Few jammers even brought some gadgets to aid their game development.
Countdown timer to keep their game development on track.
Also the books for reference. Every team was trying their best to win these grand prizes.
Pretty awesome, huh? 😀 More hours passed and soon, the sun started to set and it was dinner time. Look what these lucky participants had for their dinner — that’s right, some juicy chickens from Kenny Roger’s, yo!
Soon the day turned dark, and after having their dinner, it was time for the jammers to go back to their workstation and continue the “battle”.
When the time came to the wee hours in the morning, some jammers finally felt exhausted and were wrapped in a deep slumber.
This team, “The Noobs” enjoyed their breakfast and seen as fresh as daisy in the second day. Besides having a good rest, another possibility of their “freshness” could probably be the big pile of evidence left on their desks.
Hehe, sure looked like they had revitalized themselves with so many healing potion, eh? Nothing can beat ’em good ‘ol 100 Plus!
On the second day, we prepared pizza for the jammers as lunch, so they could work against the clock for their game development while filling their stomach.
The clock was ticking. Everyone rushed for the final hour so they could complete their games before the deadline.
And then.. the time was finally up. We gotta say, well done to all the jammers who has worked so hard for so many hours! Mean time, the panel judges also dropped by at the participants work station to check out their work before the actual presentation and judging took place.
Anxious to know what games each team has produced and most importantly, the winners that walked away with a trip to Japan and $5000 CPI of ad network service? Let’s find out in the next post!
