Inaugural York University Game Jam pursues a better tomorrow

White gaming console on wooden surface

The first-ever York University Game Jam, taking place Nov. 4 to 6, offers student teams the opportunity to conceptualize, design and build a functioning game.

Working in a condensed period of time, participants in this innovative event will work to create a small, experimental game from beginning to end. The tight timeline encourages creative thinking and innovation.

This year’s YU Game Jam will focus on creating games that echo and creatively address the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs).

The game jam event encourages students to create socially responsible games in the spirit of the serious games movement, an area of particular expertise in the School of the Arts, Media, Performance & Design. The SDG Games Challenge will run over one weekend and be open to all York University students who will work in small groups of five to six to create a game that tries to solve or educate about one of the UN SDGs. The game jam will be a friendly competition: a judging panel will select the best game made during the event. The winning team will receive a prize, including merchandise donated by local game companies like Ubisoft Toronto.

The event is open to all York University students and encourages participants with any level of experience in game development who wish to participate and make games.

More information about the event can be found here.