The Global Game Jam is coming to Asheville on Friday. The event, which is held in cities around the world, will be held for the first time here, hosted by Top Floor Studio.
Think of the event as the 48-Hour Film Festival of game development. Folks will come together starting around 6 p.m. at Top Floor to get instructions, a final pep talk and do a little brainstorming. Then it’s off to the races.
While the event was initially built around video gaming, the Asheville version will be open to development of any kind of game. Organizer Brett McCall says he hopes there will be a focus on developing games within a social context that could help solve big problems, like global climate change.
The local jam will probably be relatively small this first years, Top Floor’s Ty Hallock told me. But lots of people in Asheville are excited about its future, and the prospect of Asheville growing a video game development industry.
The weekend event will wind up Sunday at Arcade Asheville with a little ceremony, and some pizza from Asheville Pizza. Check it out.
Here’s a link to my column about the game jam in today’s Asheville Citizen-Times.