Game Off
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/50/Color_Game_Off_Logo.png/220px-Color_Game_Off_Logo.png)
Game Off is an annual game jam celebrating open source created by Lee Reilly in 2012 and sponsored by GitHub. Participants are given the entire month of November to build a game based on a theme–individually or as a team. Inspired by the Global Game Jam, it encourages collaborative game development and promotes the use and sharing of open source software.
Intellectual property and licensing
The use of open source code and freely availably assets is encouraged, but it is not a strict requirement. Participants are required to share the code in a public GitHub repository, but the creators own the intellectual property and may license the code however they like. E.g. the overall winner of Game Off V was Daemon vs. Demon, a game built with the open source Godot game engine, with the source licensed under the MIT license and some assets made available under CC-BY-NC 4.0 licenses.[1]
Past Themes
Game Off | Theme |
---|---|
I (2012) | Forking, branching, cloning, pushing, pulling [2] |
II (2013) | Change [3] |
III (2015) | “The game has changed” [4] |
IV (2016) | Hacking, modding and/or augmenting [5] |
V (2017) | Throwback [6] |
VI (2018) | Hybrid[7] |
VII (2019) | Leaps and bounds[8] |
IX (2020) | MOONSHOT[9] |
X (2021) | BUG[10] |
XI (2022) | Cliché[11] |
XII (2023) | SCALE[12] |
Competition Structure
Game Off I and II required participants to "fork" an empty GitHub source code repository. Many other game jams and hackathons have adopted this approach e.g. Netflix's Cloud Prize, and Canonical's Juju Charm Championship.[13][14]
Game Off III required participants to choose an existing open source game jam entry to fork it as a starting point.
Game Off IV allowed participants to start with a new repository.
Game Off V was hosted on itch.io, and was recognized the 2nd most popular game jam by number participants and 5th most popular by number of submissions in their yearly review.[15]
Game Off VI was also hosted on itch.io. Overall winner was the game Singularity. There were 329 successful submissions.[16]
References
- ^ "securas/Daemon-vs-Demon". GitHub. Retrieved 2018-06-06.
- ^ leereilly. "GitHub Game Off | The GitHub Blog". blog.github.com. Retrieved 2018-06-06.
- ^ leereilly. "GitHub Game Off II | The GitHub Blog". blog.github.com. Retrieved 2018-06-06.
- ^ leereilly. "The Game Has Changed | The GitHub Blog". blog.github.com. Retrieved 2018-06-06.
- ^ leereilly. "Game Off Theme Announcement | The GitHub Blog". blog.github.com. Retrieved 2018-06-06.
- ^ leereilly. "And the theme for Game Off 2017 is… | The GitHub Blog". blog.github.com. Retrieved 2018-06-06.
- ^ leereilly (2018-11-01). "Game Off 2018 theme announcement". The GitHub Blog. Retrieved 2018-12-26.
- ^ leereilly (2019-11-01). "Game Off 2019 theme announcement". The GitHub Blog. Retrieved 2019-11-03.
- ^ Reilly, Lee. "GitHub Game Off 2020 theme announcement". The GitHub Blog. Retrieved 17 November 2020.
- ^ Reilly, Lee. "GitHub Game Off 2021 theme announcement". The GitHub Blog. Retrieved 1 November 2021.
- ^ Reilly, Lee. "GitHub Game Off 2022 theme announcement". The GitHub Blog. Retrieved 24 April 2023.
- ^ Reilly, Lee. "GitHub Game Off 2023 theme announcement". The GitHub Blog. Retrieved 15 November 2023.
- ^ "GitHub - Netflix/Cloud-Prize: Description and terms for the Netflix Cloud Prize, which runs from March-September 2013. Read the rules, fork to your GitHub account to create a Submission, then send us your email address". github.com. Retrieved 2018-06-06.
- ^ "GitHub - juju/charm-championship: Submissions for the Juju Charm Championship". github.com. Retrieved 2018-06-06.
- ^ "itch.io year in review 2017 - itch.io". itch.io. Retrieved 2018-06-06.
- ^ leereilly (2018-12-22). "Highlights for Game Off 2018". The GitHub Blog. Retrieved 2018-12-26.
External links
- Game Off website