This weekend, something pretty special is taking place across the world. From Chicago to Copenhagen, Toronto to Tel Aviv, Baltimore to Boston, Los Angeles to London, aspiring game developers and designers will be teaming up in what’s being called the Global Game Jam. Their mission? To design and develop an entire game in 48 hours.

Is it possible? They’ll sure as hell try, and over here in Scotland I’ll be here to see if anyone can pull it off with some weekend coverage. Hit the jump for all the details on the Jam!

The Global Game Jam is being touted as the first event of its kind; it’s been set-up by the International Game Developers’ Association – probably to encourage people to get jobs in the industry in the wake of a worldwide shortage – and has sponsorship from Take-Two, game development tool Unity and DS puzzler Soul Bubbles developer Mekensleep. 

Across the world, teams of developers, designers, writers (anyone who could contribute to the production of a videogame) will work together to design and produce a videogame within 48 hours. The Jam begins at 5pm today (Friday) in each location’s local time zone, and ends at 5pm on Sunday. In that time, a game has to be made and ready to present to the judges.

Scotland’s only Game Jam is taking place at Glasgow Caledonian University (where I’m studying Games Development, of all things), and I’ll be there during the Jam to write up some thoughts and give you all a little insight into how a game might be made in as short a time as 48 hours. That is, if all the teams don’t simply implode into themselves under pressure, but here’s hoping that doesn’t happen.

In Glasgow, the judging team is comprised of folks from Crackdown developer Realtime Worlds, digital TV developer Denki and TrackMania DS developer Firebrand Games. Several locations will be streaming the event on ustream.tv so you might be able to catch a glimpse of my shaggy head, unless I’m careful to avoid the cameras.

Don’t go expecting huge RPGs from this sort of thing; games either be extremely conventional or extremely experimental. The fun of this event will be seeing how a team will produce a playable game in the space of 2 days. Without a doubt, this’ll be pretty cool to be a part of. 

Keep an eye on Sarcastic Gamer over the weekend for coverage of Glasgow’s Game Jam, but if you’re near another Jam taking place (full list here) why not pop along, see what it’s like, and write about it in your very own SGC Blog? I’ll be watching the blogs to see if anybody has written anything and I’ll put it up if you have!

Kick out the jams? Not today…

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