Global Game Jam 2025 at the Department of Automation and Computer Science
Since 2009, the Global Game Jam (GGJ) has brought together creative minds from all over the world every year at the end of January and is now the largest event for game development. Within just 48 hours, games are created on a given theme - a challenge that 29 students of media informatics and media and game conception took up this year. Last weekend, they developed innovative concepts in small groups around the theme of “bubbles”.
“The Global Game Jam pursues a very simple goal: the process of game development should be fun and challenging,” explains Prof. Dominik Wilhelm, who organized the event at Harz University of Applied Sciences. “Interestingly, many indie games - games from small, independent development teams or individuals - have their origins in such game jams.”
“It's a lot of work in a short space of time - that makes it quite challenging, because we all have a certain expectation of the quality of our results,” summarizes media informatics student Jonas Richter after the first 24 hours. Jessica Röll and Maik Osowski, both in their first semester of Media and Game Design, also found the balance between stress and fun to be key. “We divide up the tasks within the group and everyone can contribute and pursue their ideas,” explains Röll.
“However, we have to limit ourselves to the core elements,” says Osowski. “Familiar patterns often have no place here - you have to think creatively and in new ways.”
“Game jams are a great exercise where you can let off steam creatively,” says Johannes Kross, also a student on the Master's degree course in Media and Game Design. During the Global Game Jam, he focused on music and sound design and worked on various projects: “You learn to set priorities and clearly structure your own work.”
“Impressive prototypes are created here every year in just two days,” emphasizes Dominik Wilhelm. “Many students even stay overnight at the university to make the most of the short time.” Large development studios have also recognized the value of such creative intensive workshops and now use game jams specifically as a method to develop fresh ideas and innovative approaches for new projects in their day-to-day work. For the students, participation is therefore not only an exciting challenge, but also excellent preparation for the requirements and working methods in the games development industry.
This year, teams from the Harz University of Applied Sciences developed eight games as part of the Global Game Jam. These can not only be viewed on the official GGJ website, but can also be downloaded for playing.
29.01.2025
Author: Madeleine Gänge
Image author: © Tia Dell/Madeleine Gänge
Image rights: © Hochschule Harz
