Written by GGJ Toronto organizer Troy Morrissey.

Toronto Global Game Jam Arcade

• When: June 15, 2013
• Where: George Brown College
• Street: 341, King St East
• City: Toronto
• Country: Canada

Toronto Global Game Jam Arcade is a daylong super arcade celebrating some of the games made in Toronto for Global Game Jam 2013 and the people who created them. With about 240 people in attendance at TGGJ 2013 it is hard to get to play every ones games at the jam, not to mention everyone is so exhausted. So we wanted to put on an event where everyone could get together and enjoy each other’s creations.

 There are thousands of games made each year during the annual event – so many it is impossible to play them all (thank heavens for my grad student Vince who played through this diversifier). This year I was asked by the Games for Change Festival to curate games that highlighted the diversifier, the Bigger Picture, beyond the theme of the jam, jammers were challenged to create games for social good.

Giving, Giving, Gone

Thirst

Privilege

What the Frack?

Parenthood

More than 300 Bigger Picture games were created at our 2013 jam. This year the games selected above will be on display in a special arcade at the 10th Anniversary Games for Change Festival along with games selected from the amazing people at Babycastles and Hide&Seek.

GGJ is so excited to be a part of so many communities and we are eager to grow. We are actively looking for new ways to increase our outreach, grow participation, gather greater diversity and intensify research opportunities. We are pleased to announce GGJ speakers at several upcoming conferences, if you are near, please come hear more about the Global Game Jam and join our community.

• 14 May, 2013 Annakaisa Kultmia @ FlashGamm, Moscow, Russia
• 14-17 May, 2013 GGJ Workshop @ Foundations of Digital Games, Crete, Greece 
• 17-19 June, 2013 Susan Gold @ Games for Change Festival, New York, NY USA
• 21-27 July, 2013 Foaad Khosmood @ SIGGRAPH, Anaheim, CA, USA
• 26-29 August, 2013 GGJ Workshop @ DiGRA, Atlanta, GA USA 

Dear researchers and educators,

The inaugural workshop on the Global Game Jam (GGJ'13) held at the FDG 2013 conference is accepting submissions up until March 21st, 2013 (extended).

• Notification date: March 26, 2013
• Call for Papers
• Workshop submission page

The Global Game Jam aims to stimulate innovation, experimentation, collaboration and creativity. With our partnerships we look for initiatives that bring the values of GGJ to a broader audience and/or creates opportunities for particpants to connect with their games on a broader scale.

This year Global Game Jam had a partnership with Mozilla Game On, an initiative that challenges game developers to "re-imagine the web as a gaming platform and use the power of the browser to revolutionize the way we make and play games".

We had an amazing GGJ 2013! Bigger and better than our previous jams. We received a great reaction to our theme and diversifiers, to our keynote speakers Erin Robinson and Bret Victor, to Adam and Amanda's great "day after" teaser and the wonderful message from the great Sid Meier. All of this is thanks to the hundreds of volunteers from around the world.

The games are available to be downloaded, played and discussed. Here are some interesting numbers about GGJ 2013.

(GGJ Lagos 2013 jammers hard at work)

• Locations
• 319 jam sites in 63 countries, 38 US States and 6 Canadian Provinces
• Number of countries hosting for the first time: 12 (Bolivia, Chile, Egypt, Greece, Hungary, India, Latvia, Macedonia, Morocco, Nigeria, Serbia and Tunisia)
• Jammers
• Total number registered: 16,705
• Total number credited in at least one project: 11,474
  
• Games
• Total projects registered: 3248
• Total projects associated with a jam site: 3128
• Team sizes

All of us at GGJ want to thank everyone who participated and helped in our 2013 event. Despite a few tech hurdles, we really feel GGJ was a very successful experience for all. We have grown tremendously and we are so happy that everyone had fun. This week we are going to put together an official count and great stories we have heard from around the world to share with you.

If you have any questions about uploads, ftp issues, or anything related to games on our site, please contact info@globlagamejam.org

At the time of writing the timezones that started first have already finished the 5th anniversary edition of the Global Game Jam and uploaded the games. Hawaii is the last to finish and will do so around 14 hours from now.