IcehouseJam 2019 - November 8th to 30th!

Create a Game in 3 Weeks!

Anyone with a computer, an idea and an internet connection, is invited to create a game over the course of 22 days! The Winners will receive great prizes on Christmas Day!

The Icehouse is an online community of passionate indie creators who try to help each other. For some of us, making games (and more) is our primary job and we try, very hard, to do it for a living. For others it’s a genuine passion and we do it at home during our free time, but we all like to play and create adventure games of all kinds. More than anything else, we like Creation and Art in general! Whether you love old-school, point & click adventures, pixel games, modern and realistic 3D environments, stylized worlds or new gameplay ideas (etc.), we want you to create a game into which you put all your heart and creative passion, whatever that means for you!

IcehouseJam will begin on November 8th at 19:00 GMT, and end 22 days later on November 30th at 23:59 GMT. The voting process will follow immediately after the jam concludes, and will last until December 11th 23:59 GMT.

The main theme of this Game Jam is:

"MYTHS AND LEGENDS".

“If there is any myth, place, work of art, story or a legend (whether real or not) that fascinates you, we would like you to convert it into images in a new and truly personal way, trying not to allow yourself to be influenced by any existing work that you may have discovered in the present or in the past.”

And it's time to begin!
The secret (mandatory) additional theme is now revealed:
FAR AWAY AND LOST...

Storytellers, treasure hunters, library rats… GET READY for The Icehouse Jam!

And finally here's the list of Winners (External Judges / Final vote)! Congrats guys!
Please check the Community section for more info about the results.

1 Ikarus

2 The Heart's Fallacy

3 Seclusion

4 Valhalla

5 The Greek Escape

6 Bright Origin

6 Road to Aztlan

8 Queen of the Underworld

9 Growing Up

10 HOL†WUDU

11 The Secret of the Mirow Castle

***

Join our Community!

Meet your fellow IcehouseJammers, hang out, find teammates, and get advice on our Discord server!
You can learn more about us on our website www.theicehouse.fr and by joining us on our forums.
We are also on Facebook and Twitter if you want to follow us...

Activity Feed

Want to check out what our IcehouseJammers are creating? Click here to see what your fellow adventurers have been posting with the #IcehouseJam2019 hashtag on Twitter!

Rules

As we have said before, for us the most important aspect is Creativity, so we want the Jam’s rules to remain as simple as possible.

1. You have exactly 3 weeks to make a game with the engine of your choice. By "game" we mean any interactive experience with enough content, and more specifically: graphics, lifetime, gameplay, soundtrack and story. Your creations will be judged on these 5 main criteria...
2. Constructing the game itself is not allowed until the date of the beginning of the jam. However, you are allowed to assemble your team (if you choose to have one), write your story/dialogue, gather your assets, and map out your game right now.
3. You are free to reuse any assets that you have made in the past, or use freeware or commercially available assets. This includes sprites, models, music, sound effects, etc. (If using freeware or commercially available assets, please credit the original creators appropriately).
4. SUBMIT YOUR GAME!  In order to have your game included in IcehouseJam 2019, all you need to do is upload it to itch.io.

Judges List

1) An Icehouse “internal judging committee” will be composed of 4 current Icehouse Members:

• Fabien Berini (an enthusiast supporter of our collective and passionate gamer)
• Matthieu Gouby (independent game developer, creator of The Five Cores) https://www.thefivecores.com/
• Josh Reynolds (an enthusiast supporter of our collective and adventure gamer)
• Andy Rinaldi (programmer of ASA: Remastered Edition and founder of TheMechanism: https://themechanism.itch.io/)

2) An awesome “external committee”, composed of 4 talented and passionate game developers, not affiliated to the Icehouse collective, has been put together, and we think it's a real chance for all the participants. We are both excited and very proud to announce that the 4 following creators will choose the 3 Winners of this Game Jam:

• Atelier Sentô (The Coral Cave, Onibi) http://ateliersento.com/
• Aaron Gwynaire (Neyyah) https://www.facebook.com/DefyRealityEntertainment/
• Geoffroy Vincens and Nicolas Fouqué (Along the Edge, Seers Isle) (working at Nova-box studio: http://www.nova-box.com/)
• Jan Kavan (J.U.L.I.A. Among the Stars, Someday You'll Return) (working at CBE Software: http://cbe-software.com/)

The Judging Phase

On December 5th, the results of the public/open votes will be published. These will help us to make a first selection of the best submissions, based on the quality and diversity of your work, and on the feedback that we receive. The results of the public votes will thus be very important and will influence our decisions for the final judging phase.

An Icehouse internal committee composed of 4 judges (members of the Icehouse collective, see above) will choose their 10 favorite games from all of your creations. They will judge them on the same 5 criteria as before, and will give add an additional Overall note/value. 

On December 7th, based on the results of the Icehouse committee, the 10 best rated games will be sent in secret to the 4 external judges (see above). They will choose their 3 favorite games from amongst the top 10. The creators of the 3 selected games will be declared winners.

The results of the vote will remain secret until December 16th. Then they will be announced on the web-page of the Jam, and the prizes will be sent to you for Christmas.

The Voting Phase

Once the jam has ended, everyone is encouraged (not just participants) to play and rate as many entries as possible.

Voting categories:

• Graphics
  Does it appear that the creator spent sufficient time on the visuals of the game? Do you like it, and do you feel something special when you look at it?

• Depth
  Did you have enough fun, considering the amount of time given to the creator? Was the game too short (but maybe intense?) or, on the contrary, was it too long (but eventually lacked enough twists and turns?)?

• Gameplay
  Some games might appear weak in some of the other categories, but could surprise us with a very special gameplay. If you felt that a lot of programming and effort was put into the creation of this interactive experience, then say it!

• Soundtrack
  Globally the “soundtrack” category will refer mainly to any music involved, so you are asked here to share your opinion about how immersive the game’s audio was. Some creators put a lot of effort into their sound design and we want to encourage this.

• Story / Affinity with the theme
  We love to create adventure games, and it’s not just the other categories listed above that we admire: for most of us at The Icehouse, the story plays a very important part of a game - adventure or not! - and you should allow yourself to dive into the world that is revealed, to feel the challenges faced by the characters, or the sensitivity of a particular moment… that takes you on a journey! The storyline should also relate to the theme/s outlined in the Overview.

Note:
We (The Icehouse) do not wish to place any undue/unreasonable level of pressure on any team or developer, or (under any circumstances) for them to devote "too much time and effort" into what they submit.

The public/open vote will end on December 4th 23:59 GMT, at which time the judging phase will begin (see below).

Prizes

The winners of the Icehouse Game Jam will receive, on December 25th:

· 1st Place: 

2 new games (2019 releases) created by Members of the Icehouse collective:
1  Steam key of Myha: Return to the Lost Island (by Denis Martin and Simon Mesnard)
1  Steam key of The Five Cores Remastered (by Iridescent Waves)
+ a Icehouse Membership (creator access)
+ a text interview of the Winner by a Member of our collective, published on the Icehouse site(s) and forwarded on our social networks (Facebook, Twitter, Discord, Forums…)

· 2nd place: 

2 games created by Members of the Icehouse collective:
1 Steam or itchio key of ASA: A Space Adventure
1 Steam or itchio key of Catyph: The Kunci Experiment
+ 2 games from our 'External Games List' (will be able to choose in priority) (see list below)
+ Icehouse Membership (creator access) 

· 3rd place: 

1 game created by a Member of the Icehouse collective: 1 itchio key of ASA: A Space Adventure
+ 1 game from our 'External Games List' (among remaining games) (see list below)

· 1st to 10th place: 

Even though we cannot promise anything special, Judges will be encouraged to write a few words about your great projects on their social networks in order to share your Creativity with the rest of the world, and hopefully help you reach new players and fans!
+ In addition, you will receive early access to a private Demo of Neyyah, a 1st person adventure game.

Neyyah Demo is kindly offered by Aaron Gwynaire.

· Icehouse Committee Award - Honorary Prize:

A special prize will be given by our internal committee of The Icehouse Collective. It will reward a game that has not received any of the three previous Prizes. The criteria for selecting this prize are left to the discretion of the judges.
Winner will receive a Steam or itchio key of Along the Edge

· External Committee Award - Honorary Prize 2:

Another special prize will be given by the external committee. It will reward a game that has not received any of the three previous Prizes. The criteria for selecting this prize are left to the discretion of the judges.
Winner will receive a Steam or itchio key of Seers Isle

Along the Edge and Seers Isle are kindly offered by Nova-box

External Games List for 2nd & 3rd prizes (Steam keys only)
Dreamfall Chapters
Game of Thrones: A Telltale Games Series
Samorost 2
Trine 3: The Artifacts of Power
Warhammer: End Times - Vermintide

These games are kindly offered by Fabien Berini.