First Meeting of the year!

Hey everyone!

Welcome back to the beginning of another year of hard work, tears, and sleep deprivation! I hope you all had a wonderful summer, and I'm excited to tell everybody that the first meeting of the year is this upcoming Monday, September 8th in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Building in room 105 at 5PM. So pretty much the usual time and place. 

For the first meeting of the semester, we'll be introducing ourselves to newer members. We then will be showcasing games that people have been making over the summer! If you made a game this summer ( or recently ), then send it to me! We'll show it off, playtest it, give you feedback, whatever you need! Even if it isn't done, we'd love to check it out and help you make it even better. So please email me at cindytrieu@email.arizona.edu and we'll show it during the first meeting!

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Game Night on Friday, May 9th!

The GameDev Club is teaming up with the IEEE club to hold the LAST game night of the year! Austin Wintory Jordan Wallet will be there!

 There will be food, and everyone is encouraged to bring their own games, consoles, snacks, computers, batteries, etc.

• When: Friday, May 9th, starting at 5:30pm until midnight.
• Where: Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) building, room 105 (map below)
• RSVP: http://bit.ly/IEEEGameNight

As usual, the free food that we get is funded by your donations, so if you plan to donate, remember to bring some money.

Important Info

1. You can park for free in the parking lot by the ECE building (lot #3039) after 5:00pm.
2. The doors for the building (as well as the elevator) close at around 6pm, so call the IEEE room at 520-626-7324 if you're locked out. It's best to add that number to your contacts, just in case.
3. In order to get to the bottom floor of the ECE building, please only use the South stairwell door, which will be left open.
4. While we've never had any incidents before, the clubs are not responsible for damaged, lost, or stolen valuables. It's generally good practice to label your things to make sure they don't get mixed up.
5. In accordance to university policy, no alcohol, firearms, or weapons will be allowed.

University Map

Below is a map of where the ECE building is. To view the map in another window, click here.


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Questions

If you have any questions, send an email to Livio at ldelac01@email.arizona.edu, Zuoming at zuomingshi@email.arizona.edu, or Cindy at cindytrieu@email.arizona.edu.

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Photos from the Spring 2014 Game Jam

This semester's game jam was so awesome that this post probably won't be able to do it justice. The theme for this game jam was flowers, and so everyone had to make a game that tied to the theme in some way within 42 hours. There were around 16 participants and about four non-participants. Fortunately, there was a healthy number of both frequent participants and newcomers, and they divided themselves into five teams.

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4/7/2014 - The GDC Rant Panel

We dedicated this week's meeting to talking about our club's trip to GDC. We organized the meeting like a typical GDC rant session, where everyone who went to GDC (all eight of us) sat at a long table in the front of the room. We each took turns talking about our favorite parts of the trip, what we learned, and advice for attending next year.

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Game Night on Friday, April 11th!

The GameDev Club is teaming up with the IEEE club to hold another game night! There will be food, and everyone is encouraged to bring their own games, consoles, snacks, computers, batteries, etc.

• When: Friday, April 11th, starting at 5:30pm until midnight.
• Where: Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) building, room 105 (map below)
• RSVP: http://bit.ly/IEEEGameNight

As usual, the free food that we get is funded by your donations, so if you plan to donate, remember to bring some money.

Important Info

1. You can park for free in the parking lot by the ECE building (lot #3039) after 5:00pm.
2. The doors for the building (as well as the elevator) close at around 6pm, so call the IEEE room at 520-626-7324 if you're locked out. It's best to add that number to your contacts, just in case.
3. In order to get to the bottom floor of the ECE building, please only use the South stairwell door, which will be left open.
4. While we've never had any incidents before, the clubs are not responsible for damaged, lost, or stolen valuables. It's generally good practice to label your things to make sure they don't get mixed up.
5. In accordance to university policy, no alcohol, firearms, or weapons will be allowed.

University Map

Below is a map of where the ECE building is. To view the map in another window, click here.


View Larger Map

Questions

If you have any questions, send an email to Livio at ldelac01@email.arizona.edu.

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Volunteer Opportunity for a Charity Game Project

Last week, Juan Cuadra came to our meeting to talk about this really cool project that he's working on to make some kind of interactive play experience for child patients of the Diamond Children's Hospital at the University of Arizona Medical Center. If you're interested in helping out with this project, please email Juan at: juan.cuadra7@gmail.com

Here's a quick summary of the project (this is my summary of the meeting, not a list of what Juan's looking for specifically, so if you have questions, please ask him directly):

• The goal of the project is to create something that will allow kids to play some kind of game without having to touch any toys or controllers or anything (which is an important safety precaution when dealing with patients). The display will use cameras, sensors, and projectors to make the game work, and there's an opportunity to make the game work with the Kinect.
• The project is mostly undefined and currently seeking funding, so if you were to get involved, part of your responsibilities will be to help define the project further, much in the same way that a game designer would define a game project, and it will likely involve doing some user research so that you can better understand the space that you're working in.
• In addition to the game design work that needs to be done, there is also engineering work to do, such as programming, art, sound, etc.
• There's also work to be done on the setup of the display. The technologies that will be used for the cameras and sensors are still to be determined, and you'll also have to figure out how to program for that technology.

Like I said during the meeting, you can probably get course credit for working on this project by pitching it to either a CS or SISTA professor as a potential research project. If you have questions about the specifics on how to do that, you can talk to either me (ldelac01@email.arizona.edu) or Zuoming (zuomingshi@email.arizona.edu)

So if you're interested in volunteering for this super cool project, please contact Juan Cuadra: juan.cuadra7@gmail.com

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3/31/2014 - Roblox talk, and Volunteer Opportunity

During this week's meeting, Greyson gave a talk about how he has been making money by making games on Roblox. Click here to download the slides from his presentation.

We also had Juan Cuadra from Pima Community College come to give a presentation about a new charity-based game project that he's starting. It looked like an awesome project, and he's looking for students who are willing to volunteer their time to help work on it. Click here to read more about his project.

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Buy a GameDev Club T-Shirt for $20

For the first time ever, the GameDev Club is selling club t-shirts! You can now proudly show your support for the coolest club on campus by having the our new logo printed on your chest. See the above image for the design of the shirt.

How to Buy a Club Shirt

1. Contact Zuoming (zuomingshi@email.arizona.edu)
2. Tell him what shirt size you want (small, medium, large, etc.)
3. Give him $20 for the shirt.

Please pay for your shirt by Monday, April 7th. We intend to make the order for shirts sometime after the GameDev Club meeting for that day, so please try to pay for your shirt before then.

How to Pay for your Shirt

We only accept cash, but you have three possible ways to give us money:

1. Come to Game Jam this weekend,
2. Come to the club meeting on Monday, April 7th at 5:00pm at the ECE building, room 105,
3. Or organize a meetup with Zuoming (zuomingshi@email.arizona.edu)

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3/24/2014 - Concept Art Talk

Today we had Ky Tran come to give a talk about concept art and how to become a good artist, in general. He also spoke about his experiences with learning the craft and how he's been trying to improve his skills by relying on practice, online resources, books, and lots and lots of more practice.

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42-Hour Game Jam on April 4th!!

Once every semester, the GameDev Club holds an epic, multi-day, game-making marathon known as a game jam. During this event, students from all sorts of different backgrounds and majors come together to form teams and make an entire game in a single weekend. The game jam is definitely one of the most fun things you'll do all year, and it's a great excuse to broaden your skill set. Plus, there's free food all weekend.

Our next game jam will be on the weekend of April 4th, and this time the event will last for 42 hours so that you can have time on Sunday to get plenty of rest and catch up on any homework you might have.

• Starts: Friday, April 4th at 5:00pm
• Ends: Sunday, April 6th at 1:00pm
• Location: Electrical and Computer Engineering building, room 105
• RSVP: http://bit.ly/uagamejam

As usual, it's a good idea to plan ahead so that you can minimize the amount of classwork that you'll have that weekend. For more information about the event, please read the rest of the post.

How does the Game Jam work?

Because the purpose of the game jam is to encourage students to improve and learn new skills, the game jam is open to anyone from any background and level of experience. For instance, the game jam is a great opportunity for artists and musicians to work on a game project and to see what it can be like to be part of a game development team.

In order to prevent people from starting their games early, every game has to be made around a theme, which is revealed at the start of the game jam. These themes are usually vague and open ended, so you'll have plenty of room to come up with something creative. Some examples of typical game jam themes are: evolution, color, artificial, etc.

If you want to get a much better idea of what the game jam is like, click here to read about how our previous game jam went.

Schedule

Friday, April 4th, from 4:00pm to 5:00pm: many people will be transporting their computers, monitors, musical instruments, drawing tablets, etc., into the room. If you want to bring anything earlier, please contact Livio at ldelac01@email.arizona.edu.

Friday, April 4th, from 5:00pm to 6:00pm: we're going to have a "social hour." During this time, participants will get a chance to eat dinner, talk to other participants, and most importantly, form teams. People also use this time to prepare their workspace so that they can work more closely with their team.

Friday, April 4th, at 6:00pm: the theme is announced and everyone gets to work. This is when the 42-hour countdown begins, and then everyone's games will be due at 12:00pm on Sunday.

Sunday, April 6th from 12:00pm to 1:00pm: At this point, everyone's games will be due! We'll present everyone's games and then the community will vote on which game they think was the best. After this, everyone will be free to go home, unless they want to help us clean up. After cleaning up, many of us will be going to eat lunch together at some restaurant, so you're encouraged to join us!

Most people will go home during the first night so that they can get some sleep, and this is especially convenient for those who live on campus. Some participants, however, like to bring in sleeping bags and toothbrushes so that they can sleep in the room. We will have multiple officers on duty throughout the entire event so that we can keep an eye on everything and to make sure that nothing gets stolen or damaged.

Important Tips and Advice

Important: Please put the room's phone number into your phone contacts: (520) 626-7324. If you ever get locked out of the building during the event, you can then call this number and we will send someone to let you in. We will likely have poor cellphone reception throughout the event, since we will be in what is essentially the basement of the ECE building. This is why we insist that you call the room phone because that will be the most reliable. Also, the poor reception will eat away at your phone's battery, so you might want to bring your charger.

You should be able to get free parking in the parking lot next to the ECE building starting at 5:00pm on Friday. Parking on campus is usually free during the weekends, unless there's a big event such as a home football game.

Also, please plan to take a lot of breaks. It's not healthy to sit in front of a computer for more than a few hours at a time, so use this as an excuse to get up, go outside, and get some sun. Having your entire team take breaks together can make for some great team-bonding moments since you typically spend that time having fun.

And finally, don't get discouraged if you don't have a lot of experience! Usually half of our participants are new to making games, and the game jam is actually a great environment to learn how to build your first game. The constraints of the event will teach you how to focus on the most important parts of your game, and you'll get to more clearly see how your work gets translated into the final product.

Finally, don't forget to RSVP!

Questions

If you have any more questions, please ask Zuoming at zuomingshi@email.arizona.edu.

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3/10/2014 - The Yawhg

We started this week's meeting with a visit by Vaughn Croft, who works for the Office of the Pima County School Superintendent. He helped us organize a couple of mini game design workshops that we held for middle school students as part of their Career Shadowing Day. He came to give us some of the great feedback he got from the students who participated, as well as to give us some pointers on how to make the next workshops better.

We then spent the rest of the meeting playing a game called The Yawhg, which is best described as a four-player choose-your-own-adventure story. Most of us agreed that this game worked amazingly well as a party game, and it's best enjoyed when knowing very little about the game. While playing the game, we talked about some of the interesting things that the game did, such as its at-first mysterious stats system, the unpredictability of events, and its strong RPG style.

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GameMaker Workshop Part 2 on Saturday!

Are you ready to learn more about GameMaker while finishing the MegaMan game that we started last time? If you didn't attend the first workshop, that's okay, since we'll try to keep this workshop as accessible as possible. You can also try skimming through the video recording of the last workshop. You can also download the source files that we created during the last workshop to get familiar with (or remind yourself about) what we did last time.

• When: Saturday, March 8th from 3:00pm to 5:00pm
• Where: Gould-Simpson building, room 701
• RSVP: Please click here to RSVP

If possible, please bring a computer to the workshop so that you can follow along. If you don't have a computer, tell us in the RSVP form so that we can try getting laptops for you in advance.

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