We create a concept game without programming skills: how we spent the first PixJam in the company

- And what is your idea of ​​the game?
- I want all ofigeli to convey a sense of speed, which increases until your meat starts to fly off your bones, and you don’t understand whether you can control it, but you continue to push like crazy!
- Match 3 or what?
- Yeah.

From conversations on PixJam.

We held the first Jam to create new game concepts within the company and want to share our impressions. The idea was to expand the scope and “infect” with creative as many employees as possible (regardless of the skill in programming or game design). The idea to hold such an event in Jam format arose from Igor Klyukin - our COO. As practice shows, this format as a whole is well suited for solving creative problems.

They didn’t make prototypes, the task was to convey the impression of the game when you see it in a mobile store for the first time in your life. Therefore, the teams showed pages of concepts at the output, using only art (any) and description. It was necessary to vote for those games that cause the desire to launch it immediately.

For the finalists, we will attract marketers, conduct a real study and find out how much their ideas will be in demand. Then it will already be possible to undertake development.

Move frames

Why did we want the whole company to participate in Jam? Because we believe that working on the implementation of our own ideas is much nicer than performing purely mechanical tasks. Making prototypes, tests and analytics is our everything, but it’s another thing to learn how to convey the impression of the game at the concept stage.

Do not forget that standing ideas can come to anyone's mind, and not just game designers. It is necessary to create an atmosphere and opportunity for employees to put forward any proposals. A lot of things in our company - from the transition from social to mobile games to the appearance of PS4 in the chillout - this was exactly what was implemented.

As for PixJam, the majority participated in such an event for the first time and did not have experience in public presentations. But since it was an internal event, everyone felt as free as possible.


COO Pixonic Igor Klyukin

Minimum rules: everyone is invited (as a result of 25 teams), no code, no professional art (if you yourself are not an artist), no restrictions on the genre / setting - only 5 hours for a brainstorm and a fake page for a mobile game in the result that everyone wants to download.

After the introduction, people began to team up based on different strategies. Someone took people from other departments, someone on the contrary assembled a team of closest colleagues. In fact, people pumped their organizational skills.

Emotions, not Prototypes

Mobile games, as a rule, are distinguished by the fact that one idea or mechanics is pronounced in them, there is nothing "superfluous". Therefore, it was allowed to take any screenshots, drawings, references, drafts and description in order to convey the desired feeling. Spectacular massive wall-to-wall mass battles on flying dinosaurs with bazookas? You are welcome. If only it turned out to hook someone.

The main thing is that at the end of Jam, each project should look something like this:


One of the

THUNDERGODZ concept options is a game where evil conquers, and the player is the only one whom it fears. But GG is already bored just killing monsters, so the player needs to help him do this as quickly and as sophisticatedly as possible. In a word, this is an action arcade game about speed.

“It's just like Diablo, just folded with Tony Hawk's Pro Skater. Only two buttons: “hit” and “jump + hit”. And you can jump on the enemy and ride on it, like on a snowboard. Because speed is your health, the more damage you take, the faster you have to run. Although, even when you die, you don’t really die. You get up, brush yourself off and go to rest - that’s how cool you are. Sometimes you meet bosses, sometimes they turn out to be other players. And then you have 10 seconds to accelerate, as soon as possible, break him as much as possible and knock out as much loot as possible from him ”, - c from the pitch of our Senior CM Artemy Kozlov and his team.

Rating

After short pitches (3 minutes for the presentation), all employees voted for the games they liked according to one criterion - they would like to play it if they saw this page in reality. You can vote for several projects at once.

The question arises: can people from the industry - developers and game designers (who themselves participated in the Jam) - objectively evaluate the projects of their colleagues? Firstly, these are not typical competitions and we have a very friendly team, and secondly, it is very important that the winning game ignites precisely those who may work on it.

What was invented for PixJam (and these are 25 options - according to the number of teams), we do not tell yet. Now we are just summing up the results of the vote, although the finalists are already known. If the genres of the three leaders are interesting, then here is the spoiler: this is an AR shooter; tactical PvP shooter and another interesting project. Still there, somewhere you can rob the corovans, but this is not accurate.

Exit to the world

We figured out the winners, but how do you know if the game will be in demand all over the world as well as among colleagues in the company? The answer is simple - create a real page for a non-existent game and drive more traffic to it. Before that, of course, we will make a professional, original art. Next up is a job for marketers in page design and market niche research.

We are very pleased with PixJam in terms of experience and results. We will definitely repeat it in the future, strengthening the positive aspects and working with the weak. If you haven’t done it yet, we recommend organizing something similar.

In the meantime, a few photos from the event:







For us, the experiment with PixJam was definitely a success - we selected 3 concepts by voting within the company. Next up are marketing tests to test the hypotheses of these games. And if they seem successful in different metrics, it is likely that one of them will turn into a new project.