Decision Space Jam 3

Welcome to the third Decision Space Jam (DSJ), a free game design jam for everyone. We bring you this game jam to foster community, encourage engagement, get games made, and have a good time. The DSJ provides mechanical constraints without a thematic prompt, as is the focus of the decision space podcast on mechanisms and the decision space they create.

Apologies

The first decision space jam was an enormous success, with plenty of submission and quality feedback. However, the second jam left much to be desired. We are making adjustments to the format to deliver a better experience.

We, as a community, should offer user Wojts our deepest apology. They provided quality feedback to many games but received barely any themselves. There is no easy way to rectify this situation. If they choose to participate, I would encourage everyone to provide feedback on their game. If they choose not to, try and message them and offer feedback on any game they are currently working on.

Let’s do better this time!

Constraints - Shared Space X and Write

  • Submissions should adhere to the following constraints:

    • Two or more players - Note that the more players needed to play, the harder it will be to playtest.

    • The writing page should consist of a single A4 page.

    • Every space on the page should be equally accessible to every player - No private spaces.

    • A round of play should be initiated with input randomness by either:

      • Rolling dice.

      • Revealing cards from a deck.

    • Players should not need to keep private information such as a hand of cards.

    • Tokens may be used but should be limited to one or two generic tokens.

    • Different colored pens may be used.

    • The rules should be concise and easy to learn. Do not make the campaign for North Africa roll and write.

    • The game should be playable asynchronously via the Decision Space Discord - This means that the majority of the game can be played by saving the A4 page as an image, drawing on it, and then uploading it for the next player to use.

The constraints are meant to encourage creativity and make it easier to playtest games. You may choose to break these constraints, but be aware that if they break it too much, you may not receive feedback.

Theme

We encourage you to come up with interesting and unique themes. However, the DSJ staff reserves the right to reject submissions if deemed offensive, so please tread carefully with sensitive subjects like colonialism. If in doubt, please consult Aurore.

Bigotry, racism, and sexism will not be tolerated.

Competition

The competition will be in the form of a prize raffle. You may acquire tickets by providing feedback and getting feedback. Each time you provide feedback, you will receive one raffle ticket. Each time someone receives feedback and accepts it as valuable, the receiver and provider receive one raffle ticket each.

The participants who provided the most valuable feedback will receive five raffle tickets. The submission that received the most positive feedback will receive five raffle tickets.

Note that the DSJ staff reserves the right to nullify tickets if any form of “gaming the system” is suspected.

Prizes

Two $20 Amazon Gift Cards - Donated by Aurore.

If you wish to donate additional prizes, please contact Aurore.

Submissions

Participants maintain full ownership of their designs.

The DSJ will use an iterative submission process to encourage iterative design and ongoing feedback. The best way to participate in the game jam is to start a post in the #work-in-progess channel on the Decision Space Discord. Alternatively, you may host your own blog or files elsewhere.

To encourage engagement, once a week on Monday (starting February 6th), we will tag all participants and show a list of submissions that need playtesting. If you wish your design to be playtested this week, use the submission form to share a link to your design, and I will add it to the weekly post.
Additionally, you should host asynchronous playtests on Discord. Start a thread in #looking-for-playtesters, set up, and run the game. This will help players playtest with you.

Feedback

There are two feedback deadlines.

  • February 25th, 2025 

  • March 25th, 2025

Raffle tickets will be awarded at each deadline and no more than once per participant per design. This means you can receive raffle tickets for providing feedback a maximum of two times on each design.

The raffle will commence sometime after the second deadline.

Whether you submit feedback or accept feedback as valuable, please use the feedback form.

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DSJ Staff: Jake, Brendan, Aurore