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macewangadec-blog · 8 years ago

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Hi everyone,

We hope you’ve had an enjoyable summer! Hopefully you found something fulfilling to do, or at least were able to relax before the beginning of the new academic year. First off, we would like to announce that our new meeting time and place for the Fall semester is every Friday in room 5-215 from 1 PM to 4 PM. As always, if you have to leave early or come in late, that is completely fine. On Friday, September 8th, we will be hosting a Welcome Back meeting at our new meeting room and time. Secondly, over the past few months, we’ve made some big changes to the format of the club, and we’re excited to share them with you!

What Role Will You Play?

As bittersweet as summer’s ending is, we’re excited to start off the new school year with you! However, to really get started, we’re going to need a little help from you. Please fill out this form so we can get an idea of who you are, and what we can help you get out of your experience with us. The information we receive from this form will also help determine how the teams for this coming year will be laid out.

https://goo.gl/forms/L4mqFtj1c1RSIgM13

Smaller teams, smaller games.

A part of our mandate is to help you in your professional development by providing an environment where you can get hands-on experience and build your portfolio at the same time! To this end, we’ve developed a Game Jam/workshop format, where, upon completion, not only will you have at least three working prototypes to add to your portfolio at the end of the semester, you’ll also have developed a broader understanding of the game development process.

Our new format is as follows:

The Fall semester has been split into three 2 week sprints, with the goal of developing a prototype during each sprint.

Each of you will be split into teams of 3-5 people.

Each sprint will have a different theme, similar to a Game Jam.

At the end of each sprint, each team will pitch/present their prototype to the club—these prototypes will most likely be rough, so no pressure to present a polished demo! Present a GDD, a grey box, or even a pack of cards that’s been sharpied over—the important thing is to just get a proof of concept ready.

Teams with completed prototypes will have the opportunity to showcase their work at our Panel & Networking Showcase event at the beginning of December, which we will also be inviting Edmonton’s game development industry to attend.

During the Winter semester, each team will pick one of their prototypes and spend the rest of the semester on polishing it to completion.

An increased focus on learning.

One of our goals as a club is to help grow the game development community here by advocating at the student level—that means helping to spread awareness of the demand for games-related education and expand our current game design class stream. Improvements to the current game design stream are being developed through the Computer Science and Communications faculties. However, these changes will not be seen for some time, and so we’ve taken things one step further by developing games-related lessons and presentations of our own, as well as inviting local professionals in as occasional guest speakers. Additionally, we welcome any of you to share your experience and knowledge with the rest of us! As always, we take a dynamic stance on learning in GADEC—whether you’re self-taught or formally trained, we believe one of the best ways to learn is from each other.

Building a stronger community.

Building your network of connections isn’t just an important career move—it’s important for your personal well-being as well. Clubs are a great place to make new friends who share the same interests and passions as you do. In addition to helping you connect with people from all levels of the game development community, we want to help you create meaningful connections with your peers as well. We have a variety of small and large events planned for this upcoming year that will help you get involved and become a Face in our community! These events include:

Monthly mixers and hangouts for you to take a breather from school, relax, and get to know your fellow club members! These hangouts include activities such as the Table Top Cafe, escape rooms, games nights, and more!

Speed D&D—are you a Dungeon Master or an avid player? This is a great opportunity to both design and play exciting and interesting tabletop sessions!

Game Jams are a great way to learn new skills, meet new people, and add to your portfolio all at once!

Networking events, organized by both the club and by other entities within Edmonton’s game development community such as GameCamp Edmonton are a great way to connect with the community at large. The best way to join the community is to join the community.

We’re looking forward to starting a new chapter of GADEC with you, and hope to see you at our first meeting come September 8th!

All the best,

The GADEC Team.

Note: Unfortunately, we are not able to accommodate people outside of the Edmonton area. However, please feel free to follow along and use our resources (while crediting us).

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