AI Browser Game Jam 5

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Building a small team for Jam 5: AI welcome, ownership and polish matter

A topic by Small Loop Works created 29 days ago Views: 146 Replies: 2

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Small Loop Works29 days ago(+1)

Hey everyone! I’m putting together a small team to make something more ambitious for this jam.

My game Plug & Prosper won overall in AI Browser Game Jam 4, and White Approach won overall in Micro Jam 64: Mountains in the judges’ vote. I’d like to build on that with people who bring their own skills and ideas.

I’d lead the project, mainly handling game design and overall direction, and step into implementation and performance optimisation where needed. My responsibility would be to keep the scope clear, make decisions, and help everyone’s work fit into one coherent game. More ambitious still needs to mean something we can finish and polish within the jam.

I’m looking for people who are comfortable working independently and owning a part of the game. People who notice problems, raise them, and help solve them without waiting for every task to be assigned. You should know your way around Git and GitHub, or be comfortable using them for the work you contribute.

We’ll move quickly, test ideas, and change direction when something isn’t working. That means being willing to rework or cut things, including my own ideas, while communicating changes so nobody gets left behind. I’d rather agree on a small deliverable and finish it well than promise a lot and leave it half done.

Art, music, sound, code, design, AI workflows: all welcome. What matters is that you can deliver work that fits the game, respond to feedback, and follow through on what you take on. You’ll have room to make decisions within your area.

This is an unpaid hobby collaboration for the jam. I expect a reliable time commitment throughout the jam, based on availability we agree on before starting. If the jam deadline is extended, I’d like us to be open to continuing through that extension and confirm what everyone can commit to.

We’ll build the game in a private GitHub repository on my account, and I’ll add the team as collaborators. My preferred direction is to eventually make the repository and game code open source, so please be comfortable with your code contributions being released under an open-source licence. Treat this as hobby work intended for that direction, and flag any existing code or dependencies with licensing restrictions before adding them. We’ll agree on the specific licence before making the repo public.

If that sounds like your kind of team, reply with something you’ve made, what you’d like to own, and roughly how much time you can give during the jam. A small finished project or a solid prototype is enough. I’d like us to start by comparing our work and finding a direction we’re all excited to build.

You can also reach me at smallloopworks@proton.me.

StorytellerMeekaSubmitted28 days ago

Hi Small Loop Works,

Congrats on the wins with Plug & Prosper and White Approach. Your post is one of the clearer team pitches I've seen: small scope, real ownership, willingness to cut ideas. That's what caught my attention.

A bit about me: I'm Meeka, a storyteller and narrative designer. I've been building interactive fiction for about six months (Ink, Ren'Py, branching narrative, character-driven horror and dark romance). My work is at storytellermeeka.itch.io. Before that I spent years in IT consulting as a team lead and project manager, so I know how to work in a team, but I haven't done a game team yet.

To be upfront: I'm already preparing my own solo entry for this jam, "Goodbye Is Not an Option", and it's going well. So I'm not offering anything yet. I'd like to understand the project first and see whether it could work alongside that.

A few questions:

1. What direction are you leaning toward (genre, and how much story or dialogue the game would carry)? Is there a narrative role at all, or is this mostly systems and art?

2. What's the tech stack? I'm strong on the writing and structure side, less on JavaScript, so I'd want to know where a writer's work would plug in.

3. How much time per week do you expect from each person?

4. You mention releasing code under an open-source licence. Would that also cover writing and story content, or only code?

5. Does the jam allow someone to submit both a solo game and a team game, or would that be a problem?

No pressure to answer everything here, and happy to continue by email or DM. Thanks for putting this together.

Meeka

Small Loop Works27 days ago

Hi Meeka, thanks for the thoughtful questions!

Direction and narrative: Nothing is set in stone yet. The safest starting point is probably 2D, then exploring the theme when the jam begins, that’s how I approached the previous jams. I’m also exploring pipelines for an actual 3D game with an isometric-style camera. How much story or dialogue we include would depend on the concept we settle on. I’m open to it, but I wouldn’t want to promise a substantial narrative role before we know what the game needs.
Tools and workflow: Mainly Godot, various AI tools, and any purpose-built scripts or small test environments we need along the way. For writing, we’d work out how to structure and integrate the content once we know the game’s needs. Contributions would still be managed through GitHub, but we don’t have a specific narrative tool or integration pipeline decided yet.
Time commitment: I don’t have one fixed hours-per-week requirement for everyone. We’d agree on each person’s availability and responsibilities before starting. I do expect people to take what they commit to seriously: put real effort into it, communicate, and follow through. Ideally, that effort comes from their own interest in making something good and developing their skills. There’s room to explore ideas, but we’d agree on priorities before spending too much time polishing them, and everyone would need to be comfortable with work being revised or cut—including my own.
Open-source plans: Yes, that intention extends beyond code to writing, in-game text, story, tools, and other original work we create for the project and put in the repository. I’m leaning towards an AGPL-like licence for the code, with the creative content also openly licensed, although the exact licences still need to be agreed. It isn’t final, but everyone should join on the understanding that an openly licensed public release of their contributions is a likely outcome. Any third-party material or licensing restrictions would need to be flagged before adding it.
Solo and team entries: The current jam rules allow multiple entries as long as they’re significantly different, and welcome both solo developers and teams. That suggests a solo entry alongside a team entry should be fine, but they don’t explicitly address that combination, so I’d confirm with the organiser on Discord.