Tag Archives: igda scotland

Global Game Jam – Talks and Advice!

This past September we hosted a night of talks on the topic of game jams, and with Global Game Jam this weekend in it seemed right to share them again with you all! Here is some advice for both participants and organisers, as well as some words from a team who decided to develop their idea further after the Global Game Jam.

First up was new board member Steven Taarland, talking about his experiences in organising Rainbow Jam ’16. He discusses some of the issues he faced regarding organisation, getting sponsorships, promotion and more.

Next was the winner of several of the Play Party Awards: Team Curvish. They spoke about how they came together during the jam and developed their game further after the play parties, including showing Curvish at EGX Rezzed, sourcing funding and how they plan to bring the game to market.

Finally Brian McDonald spoke about the Global Game Jam, his experience in helping to organise it as a site and as a board member, and several tips for people looking to take part in not only them but other jams.

IGDA Women in Games Ambassador applications are open!

igda_scholarships

 

The IGDA Foundation’s Women in Games Ambassador program for GDC 2017 is now taking in applications. The program is open to women-identified IGDA Members who are over 18 years old and in full time undergraduate, postgraduate or doctoral studies (or similar), or those who have graduated in the past 12 months prior to their application.

As with other IGDA Scholarships recipients will be provided with an all access GDC pass, a travel stipend, a week of insider events and access to Q&A sessions and group mentorships with industry professionals. The cutoff date for applications is the 30th of December 2016.

Scotland regularly punches above its weight when it somes to successful applicants, with one of the highest number of Scholars per capita. This year Scotland was represented by Kirsty Keatch at GDC Europe and Andrew Reid, Divij Sood and Caitlin Goodale at GDC, supported by the IGDA Foundation. Previous WiG Ambassadors from Scotland include Jess Hider, Zoë Sams and Caitlin Goodale.

Click here to apply for the program or find out more information on the WiG Ambassadors.

IGDA Scotland July Meeting – Save the Date!

Thanks to all who came to our June meeting in Glasgow, we heard some great talks about exhibiting at events from Andrew Dyce and Craig Fairweather (We Throw Switches), Steven Taarland (Insert Imagination) and Tony Gowland (Ant Workshop), chaired by Jon McKellan (No Code). We really appreciate you coming along and sharing your advice with everyone and making it such an informative event.

If you weren’t able to come then you can listen to the talks here.

There is also an excellent write-up of the event by Stephen McCallum on Gamasutra here.

This month we will be heading back to Codebase in Edinburgh on 19th July for another one of our regular monthly meetups. And this month’s theme is Audio! We will be putting together a collection of audio-experts to share with you their experiences and advice. There will also be the usual open-floor for announcements before the talks if you have any news you’d like to share.

If you would like to give a talk or want get in touch with us about anything to do with the event you can do so on [email protected].

We will also be giving you another chance to get your hands on some free tickets to RESONATE – Glasgow’s upcoming eSports and gaming festival –  which we will be raffling off on the night.

Tickets for July’s meeting are free and available now!

Eventbrite - IGDA Scotland Annual General Meeting 2014

Please join us on Twitter and Facebook to keep up to date with any announcements.

Shahid Ahmad Talk – Recap

shahid
On the 24th May we were delighted to welcome Shahid Ahmad to Dundee, where he gave an inspirational talk about his phenomenal career in games and shared his advice for both established and aspiring game developers.

Shahid gave a heartfelt talk about his years in the industry, explaining how his fascination with early game consoles inspired him to learn programming at a young age in order to make his own games. Shahid talks about the love he had for programming at this time, and how it enabled him to maintain a degree of control in amidst childhood situations which were ultimately uncontrollable. After establishing himself as a talented game developer Shahid eventually moved to Playstation, where he worked as a Developer Relations Manager, spending many successful years meeting with developers and securing games for the platform. The talk was filled with anecdotal examples of Shahid’s own experience, which danced between both the comical and the heart-wrenching. Using standout moments from his career, Shahid shared his practical advice in regards to success, reputation and pitching, from the point of view of someone who has lived, learned and evolved during their career.

Shahid spoke candidly about his own ‘mistakes’ during his career and shared the wisdom that followed. For instance, the necessity to be nice and respectful when talking with peers and clients, to be able to deliver on the promises you make, and to allow yourself to evolve with the ever changing circumstances of life in order to be the best you can be.

We want to thank Shahid for sharing with us his invaluable experience and providing us with a wonderfully entertaining talk. We’d also like to thank our partners for this event; Abertay University and Henderson Loggie.

049

050

052

IGDA Scotland June Meeting – Save the Date!

We will be returning to Glasgow on the 22nd June for one of our regular monthly meetups. Join us at Megabytes for the usual talks and announcements, then stick around afterwards for a drink and natter with everyone.

Our theme this month is Exhibiting and we would like to get a good mix of people together to discuss their tips and experiences covering all manner of showcasing at events. This could be from small indie games, right the way through to big-budget AAA projects. And if you are one of the people reading this thinking “hey, I’m going to be doing a bunch of that at E3!” then we would love you to come along and share your experience. Just get in touch with us at [email protected].

We also have a special giveaway this month. Our lovely friends at RESONATE – Glasgow’s upcoming eSports and gaming festival –  have given us some free tickets, which we will be raffling off on the night.

Tickets for the meetup to be released very soon! In the meantime you can follow any updates on Twitter or join us on Facebook.

IGDA Scotland March Meetup: GDC Round up!

Now that the dust has settled and jet lag is fading away, IGDA Scotland is happy to announce that we’re hosting our annual GDC Roundup at MEGABytes in Glasgow on Wednesday 30th of March from 7pm. We’ll be having a roundtable of students, academics and professionals discuss their experiences and takeaways from the biggest game developers event of the year, so if you’re interested in GDC at all then come hear about it from the horses’ mouths!

 

 

As always, we will have an open floor for announcements before the panel kicks off. So if you have any news you’d like to share then feel free to come down and do so! We’ll also be opening up to general networking after the panels.

Don’t miss your chance by registering your free ticket on Eventbrite or by using the handy registration box below. Our meetings are open to all, even if you’re not a member of the IGDA. Non-students must be registered ahead of the event in order to be guaranteed entry to the venue.

Monthly Meetings – Call for Speakers!

earlyAccessCrowd

Our monthly meetings will be starting up again in March and we are looking for speakers to join us. For those who have attended our meetings in the past they are a great opportunity for game devs to share their expertise with the rest of the community. If you have a subject you would like to talk about then please get in touch with us on [email protected], telling us a little bit about yourself, a summary of the talk you would like to give, and state the city you would like to speak out (Edinburgh, Glasgow or Dundee). The types of topics we would be looking for are:

  • Technical tips or tutorials
  • Discipline related insights (design, audio, etc.)
  • Game Postmortems
  • General development advice

Look forward to seeing you at the next meeting!
More information about the date and location of our next monthly meeting to follow shortly.