Now I know how to do it, thanks to Game Jam event!

I attended to Laurea Game Jame event ( 25th – 27th September),  where game developers and health care professionals could meet and combine their skills for adopting healthier life styles. I wanted to participate in this event, because I have a strong health care knowledge, development expertise and I also wanted to see how the game development process progresses from idea to product.

What is the most important thing when you only have 48 hours?

I think that the need for game/application is the most important thing. You also need to know how to sell your ideas to others, if you want to attract the best resources for your team.  Passion is also required, you may have to work hard.

MakeMyRun

Our team Happy Rabbits began to develop a social running game. We found a study that reported that among young adults (age 18-24) loneliness is a big problem. Among them, only a fraction of them moved in accordance with the recommendations of physical activity. We wanted to develop an application that makes it easy to ask people to accompany your outdoor activities. We named the application MakeMyRun.

You can do it

Game Development process proceeds like any development process. At the beginning is brainstorming and preliminary studies. Then development, there you can use or benefit other previously developed applications. Unlike other development projects, the development of applications includes the interface design, which describes how the user proceeds to the application. There is also need to consider how an application will be experiential.  Experiences can be created, for example, sounds, odors and use of experience. There is many free prototype programs in Internet. Our team used Justinmind for that. And, finally, implementation and testing.

Game Jam experience was intense, exciting and  very useful. I would do it again!

Written by Sari Ullgren-Lajunen