there’s a lot to love about game jams. It sort of depends on what part of it you’re participating in. Uh, but, for me, it’s - a lot of the appeal comes from the fact that I - I have a background - when I was younger, I was in, uh, crappy riot girl bands ten years too late. And it feels like, in game jams, I sort of traded in my sticker-covered guitar for my sticker-covered laptop. And instead of jamming in people’s garages, I’m jamming in people’s garages and just using different instruments. And it’s a really fun vibe. If you go to a game jam, the amount of energy, of being surrounded by other people that are doing what you’re doing, they are all sort of challenging yourself at - in, like, fighting the clock together, is just so inspiring. And it’s really a low stress environment in terms of taking risks, 'cause if you’re like I’m going to make this game, this is going to be my - my big project, that comes with so much time. That comes with so much risk. That comes with so much associated costs.But, when it’s like I have to finish this in 48 hours, you can take the - take risks to just see if, you know, this crazy idea will work or not, and sometimes they do. Sometimes they do, and they become things like Braid, and that’s super important to the health of our - our industry. I can take breaks from long-term projects and go jam for a weekend and sort of be rejuvenated by that because it can be very difficult to take a five year long dev cycle and see how much your voice and your skills change over those five years, but you’re still working on something you started that long ago. Whereas if you take that break, you can actually bring all these things in a low risk, low invested environment and actually, you know, make something that’s more representative of where you are now.
