It's been 5 years, and now we're back!
Castle Game Jam is a rapid result driven game development event where teams
create prototypes over the course of 1 week in a big castle.
Teams generally consist of 1 to 4 developers
which are either formed beforehand or during the start of the event.
The location of Castle Game Jam vary from
year to year and its participants come from all over the world.
After a successful game jam the teams
should've created prototypes and formed connections they can bring with themselves home.
There's also
lectures, workshops, live music, trade fair, parties and so much more for the participants to attend.
You
have
to be at least 18 years old to attend this event as a participant since there may be alcohol present at the
venue during the week.
The castle in Jaunpils is first time mentioned in 1411. Most likely
it's built in the end of the 14th century. The tower was added in
the 15th century. In the first half of 16th century Jaunpils Castle
was the place where many old and weak brothers of Livonian
Order settled.
In 1576 Jaunpils Castle became property of last
komtur of Dobele Matthias von der Recke. Castle was owned by
his descendants until 1920.
The castle was heavily damaged in
war by Swedes in 1625. Later a third floor was added and the old
fortress became a manor with all conveniences in the end of the
17th century.
The building was partly reconstructed in the 18th
century. The castle was burned down during the Russian Revolu-
tion of 1905. A year later it was rebuilt by architect Wilhelm
Bockslaff.
From the 16th century until 1920 the castle belonged to the
family of the Baltic German baron von der Recke. One of the
family members who lived there in the 18th century was the poet
Elisa von der Recke.
After the Latvian agrarian reforms of the
1920s, the castle complex housed a cattle-breeding experimen-
tal station. During the Soviet occupation of Latvia, the interior of
the castle was heavily reconstructed and for many years had typ-
ical Soviet interiors from the 1960s.
In the 2000s, a team of Latvian designers refitted the interior of the castle. Today it features
luxurious medieval style apartments which blend luxuries with
glimpses of the castle's history.
The actual game jam will last for 120 hours, midnight to midnight, 2023-06-11 to 2023-06-15. We recommend you
plan for a 24 hour game, and instead focus on polishing a small tight core of a game. The absolute best thing
you can bring with you home from a game jam are memories and new friends/connections, so make sure you also
spend time networking with others!
The theme for the jam will be announce 2023-06-10 20:00 at the BBQ party, and during the week leading up to the
start the event you'll have the opportunity to vote for various themes in order to impact the final choice.
If you're interested in participating in the competition to win a trophy or two to celebrate your ingenuity, the
rules
are simple. The amount of contributers may be max 4 people, all must be on-site and no other assets may be used
unless it's free and open-source, and each such asset should be mentioned in credits. No limitations on engines
or
platforms, but the game should be playable in the browser for the sake of simplifying the judging process.
There are some areas of game development which are hard to work with in a specialiazed manner, and still have
enough to do, in just one team. For that reason we're introducing a concept we're calling "Talent pool", where
teams
can submit requests for talent, and any person in the talent pool can pick it up if it fits their profile. Some
areas for
these would be music, sound effects and voice acting. Being a part of the talent pool doesn't mean you can't
also join
a team officially. Either way, each team using assets from the talent pool, should credit the person helping them
out!