My story is the Imagine Cup, or how our ships sailed to the finals

Hello! In this article, I will tell you about our participation in the Imagine Cup competition held by Microsoft. About how this sea of ​​positive and innovation is and why it is worth doing stupid things like IT startups.

our team


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Since 2012, we started playing games. We started, of course, with mobile phones. We released several games that were relatively successful, as it seemed to us then.
It so happened that in February of this year we got to the Games Jam Kanobu, where new people joined our team, with whom we began to make a browser-based game about ships.
Actually, at this contest Microsoft selected several projects that received a quota for participation in the Imagine Cup final in Moscow. Among these lucky ones were we ...

Our project


We are making a browser-based online game about sailing ship battles in the ethnopunk setting that we developed. This setting models pagan, occult civilization, mastered navigation. Ethnopunk implies an alternative version of the development of mankind with a common stylization for the era of the Vikings, Indians and pirates.
A couple of screenshots
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In the game, you can participate in in-session naval battles, or explore the open world, conduct sea trade and rob ships.
The game is developed using Unity 3D technology in conjunction with SmartFox Server. For hosting a test server, Windows Azure is used.

Final Imagine Cup in Moscow


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Participation in such a competition aroused genuine interest in our team. We began fast preparations for the event. Gathered a fresh demo, shot a teaser video and even found sponsors.
Initially, we were preparing to show our game to as many users as possible and get as many reviews as possible. We were interested in receiving feedback from the jury, but we are making the game for the players, and it was very important for us to get feedback from them. Therefore, it was initially decided to spend the main efforts on conducting events at the exhibition of projects. We prepared a lot of gifts for our guests and put together a demo in which we could evaluate the possibilities of our project.

The first day of the competition we spent at the Microsoft Technology Center, which had a lot of interesting things, including lectures on innovative entrepreneurship and oratory.

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The next day, the finals took place in the office of Mail.ru Group. We are very tired, held contests, presented our project to the jury and, most importantly, received a lot of feedback from users. At the stand, we held contests with valuable prizes, and also distributed a mountain of gifts.

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The event had an amazing atmosphere. There was a lot of running around, excitement, but at the same time everything was very cool. We enjoyed it a lot, even though we did not win this time. We will definitely participate in the Imagine Cup next year to once again feel its indescribable atmosphere, when you don’t feel the pressure of competition, but simply enjoy participating in such a wonderful event, communicating with participants and organizers.

What's next


We continue to work on the project. And in the near future we have to get to Igromir 2014, if we can find sponsors for this event. Already in October of this year we will try to launch at least closed alpha.

Total


The Imagine Cup gave us a lot of strength and energy, probably a year in advance, in order to work on our product and reveal it to the world.
On my own behalf, I would like to wish students: do not go to work in boring outsourcing companies, do not sell your youth for $ 4 per hour. You are capable of more. Create, create your own products and you will succeed.

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