Wilderness Game Jam

An offgrid & offline camping game jam in nature with awesome outdoorsy folks. Make a game in a long weekend, using only what you bring and what you find. Hone your skills and get creative.

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Specifics are still TBD by the community! Here’s what we know so far:

Location

Somewhere within a few hours of the Bay Area.

Time

Some weekend in late spring/early summer.

Theme

To be voted upon, and announced shortly before the jam. Submit ideas here.

Wilderness Jam is organic and unsponsored.

Organized by: Aaron Suddjian (aaron@suddjian.com, Discord: dasuj)

I’m looking for co-organizers, especially women/nb/ts/poc/etc. Please contact me if you’re interested in helping to make Wilderness Jam happen!

Features

• Trails, streams and rocks.
• Tasty camp food.
• All four elements.
• Probably weed and drinks?
• Up to you. What we bring and share is what we have.

Rules

• Be respectful of each other and your surroundings.
• Introduce yourself at one of the meetups before the jam.
• Don’t come if you are not prepared to be safe and responsible in an outdoor camping situation. (See Preparation)
• Don’t work on your game until you are in the wilderness.
• Be inclusive, don’t be an asshole or a creep.
• No corporate nonsense or AI generated content.
• In all likelihood we’ll be sharing public space with families and children, so don’t make a fuckin porn game.

Preparation

There will be opportunities for park meetups ahead of the jam. Come to the park to meet other participants, form teams, and practice offgrid and offline game development methods.

Sharing of transportation and resources, and group planning, are strongly encouraged! You're welcome to coordinate in Discord.

Assuming the location is a campground with defined sites: You can arrange for your own campsite, or you can join the group site. Please claim your space with the group in advance so we know how many people to reserve space for.

Have a plan for campsites, food (including dietary restrictions as a group), water, toiletries, shelter, warm clothing, first aid supplies.

Offgrid Offline Game Dev

It’s up to you what kind of game to make and how you want to make it. Some folks bring a laptop to make a digital game. Some folks like to leave the computers at home, and make a game on paper or out of rocks and sticks.

If you’re using computers, you must plan ahead to successfully make a game. Here are some things to consider:

Electricity

I have used my hybrid car’s battery with a 150W DC-AC converter to charge my macbook air for 4 days of off-grid game dev (I set it to gas mode while driving to hold the charge). My car can probably manage 3 laptops for the duration of the jam, if they aren’t too power hungry.

Your power needs and supply may vary. A battery bank or solar array may be viable options as well. Loud generators are discouraged.

If you do use a car to charge your electronics, it might be a good idea to top up at the last available station.

Choice of tools can also impact electricity use! Some game engines seem to draw a lot of power just by being open.

Tools

Download documentation for programming languages, game engines, and code tools. Bring pen and paper. Download any assets you’ll want to have access to. Install your preferred offline tools for art and sound editing, and download those docs too if you can.

Teaming Up

If you’re working with a team, have a plan for sharing work and version management. This can be done with git or other VCS over a local-only network, with USB flash drives, airdrop, or other creative methods. Practice this ahead of time so you don’t get stuck!