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  • 360iDev: Game Jam creations

    by 
    Mike Schramm
    Mike Schramm
    04.15.2010

    Tuesday night at the 360iDev conference in San Jose, around 60 developers gathered in a room on the eBay campus around 8pm as security locked them in for the night (one developer joined the group via Skype -- that's him on the big screen above). Their goal? A game jam. Before 8am the next day, they would put together working prototypes of games, either based on their own ideas, or revolving around the night's theme of "Tiny." Not all developers were there to make new games -- a few were there to work on current projects or offer up their help to others. But up until 2am and beyond (that's about when I chickened out and let them work), the room was full of developers punching away on their keyboards, writing code, designing art, and, well, developing. I originally thought that it was just a lark; a fun project that gave everyone an excuse to spend the night on the eBay campus. But no, this was serious stuff -- apparently at least one App Store game has its origins in past game jams at these conferences. So while developers were just testing their skills at putting their ideas into motion, it's possible that we may see some of these prototypes show up on the App Store eventually as working products. After the break, we'll provide a look at what a few developers were up to at Tuesday's game jam.