Progressive Game Jam (PGJ) is a long-form game jam designed to give the greatest possible opportunity for game developers to work with a team and design, develop, and complete a game. Started in 2014, PGJ has run annually for 9 years, with its 10th season happening this year starting in August. The program is always free for participants and has generated dozens of games over the years.
Starting in Season 5, we began to model the program more like an accelerator program or simulated real-world work environment. We instituted veteran mentoring, created executive roles including an Executive Producer role, and developed a framework based on a simplified Agile SCRUM methodology to provide oversight and simulate a produced product. The goal of this program was to provide participants with as near a real-world experience working on a game project for a development studio as possible. Several participants have used Progressive Game Jam on their resumes when applying for positions in the industry.
Donations for this project would go toward development of the program, supplies, venue fees, staff, or professional mentor salaries. If sufficiently funded, we would like to develop a micro-grant program for this project where we could issue small grants to teams that complete the project so that they have funds to further develop and publish their games.
