Games industry comes together to put full weight behind next generation of developersGames industry comes together to put full weight behind next generation of developers

Since the launch of the Aardvark Swift 2018 student game development challenges, Search for a Star & Sumo Digital Rising Star, 130 developers from over 100 studios have come forward to assess student work, providing marks and a level of industry-tailored feedback which students would be hard-pressed to find anywhere else.

So far over 400 students from across the UK & Europe have registered and are taking part in the coding, art, animation and VFX challenges, with one month still to go before registration and stage 1 close.

With over 100 different companies involved, Search for a Star is working with volunteers from a broad representation of studios. Developers from AAA studios in Europe, including CD Projekt Red and EA Dice have come forward offering their help just as much as home-grown AAA studios such as Cloud Imperium and Creative Assembly. Smaller indie studios have come out in just as much force, such as Steven Knock from Funky Panda Games and Justin French and Loic Bramoulle from Dream Harvest, with Lunar Animation even volunteering their whole team.

We have seen a substantial number of assessors volunteering from Grads in Game partners as well, including Playground Games. We want to especially thank nDreams, who have gone above and beyond. Art Director Glenn Brace and Concept & UI Artist Ben Blethyn have been instrumental in developing the art briefs which our students are working from this year, alongside a number of other nDreams staff who are providing valued feedback. Joining nDreams in providing vital assistance in designing this year’s briefs were Tom Pickard from Boss Alien and Ubisoft Shangai’s Brian Cox.

“We’ve been blown away by the amount of support that the industry has shown us. Studios and individual developers alike have contacted us wanting to contribute to Search for a Star, it really does feel like an industry-wide team effort!” says Managing Director Ian Goodall.

We’re still looking for industry professionals who want to get involved and assess submissions. The challenge has only just opened its second round and we’re looking for judges to mark and provide feedback on games developed by our programming students. Specifically, we need anyone with a strong C#/Unity background to open the hood of our student’s games and take a look at the code, as well as developers with a background in programming or technical design to play & assess the finished games themselves.

A full list of the character & environment, and animation & VFX volunteer assessors is now online.

Developers interested in assessing Search for a Star challenge projects and taking an active role in helping the next generation of game developers, please email [email protected] .

Students interested in taking part still have time to register and complete the first stage by 11th December and can find more details on our website.

Notes to the Editor:

  • Last year was our biggest year ever, with over 800 students registering to compete in Search for a Star and Sumo Digital Rising Star.
  • Partners for this year’s competition include Sumo Digital, Playground Games, Boss Alien, nDreams, d3t, Red Kite Games, Sketchfab, HackerRank, Furious Bee, and Edge Case Games.
  • The challenges are for individual student developers, categorised into code, environment art, character art, animation and VFX disciplines.
  • Search for a Star challenges students in their final year of higher education, while Sumo Digital Rising Star is aimed at students who are not yet in their final year.
  • Registrations and stage one closes on 11th December 2017.
  • Over the last two years, the Grads in Games initiative has directly placed over 90 talented graduates into the games industry.
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