A little round up of what happened over May Half Term!
Ant from The Code Zone here to give you a quick roundup of all things Game Dev club with us over the half term. Yesterday your boys and girls had the option to either get cracking with the second week's guided hack on our current featured game 'Dungeon of Doom' or dive into working on their own fresh and unique project through the Game Jam.
This half term's Game Jam has come with the latest theme of 'EVOLUTION'. I say this every half term and I'll happily say again that I would encourage all take part who fancy the opportunity to put all that they've learned over the last few months into action. Not only is it a chance to reinforce our learning but in my biased opinion (as someone who loves all things and topics game dev) it's jolly good fun too.
A few notable pieces of work that have come to fruition so far include a planet that grows and transforms as time passes, an ant simulator where the minuscule arthropods get smarter as they collect more food and even a range of Pokemon-style evolution animations.
A common statement that I hear from new or perhaps slightly nervous coders is 'I don't know how to start'.
To this, I always say 'just pop us a message on what you would like to build and we'll walk you through it.'
This goes doubly so for anyone who's tempted to partake and thinks that it sounds like a blast but is apprehensive about taking those first steps, just reach out through your Code Zone Dashboard, it's what we're here for and we love to help!
I hope all our members had a cracking half term and best of luck to any entering their exam periods!
About our game jams
A game jam is a themed build: we announce a theme, and children across the Academy spend a few weeks making something from it. There is no brief beyond the theme and nothing to finish by a deadline you can fail. Children share what they made on our own platform, where chat and sharing between members is moderated by mentors.
Jams are included in Academy membership. They are the part of the Academy where everybody is working on the same thing at once, which for a self-paced course is worth having.
The blog is in two halves. Guides are the evergreen explainers written by the mentors who teach the clubs, covering the questions parents actually ask: what comes after Scratch, how to support a coding-mad child when you cannot code yourself, and what works for autistic and ADHD children.
Club news is the other half, and it is where posts like this one live: game jams, Minecraft builds and weekly roundups, written up by whoever ran the session. Neither is marketing. If you want to know what the work actually looks like before you sign up to anything, club news is the more honest read of the two.
