JuJu is a game concept I came up with about two months ago but couldn’t quite bring to life—that is, until Burakhan and I joined Win10GameJamTR and turned this idea into reality. The name JuJu is actually short for “Just Jump.”
The idea sparked on one of those nights when you wake up randomly and just start overthinking. While working on the game-style project Microsoft had given us, I thought to myself, “What if I came up with something of my own?” Something simple, yet addictive enough to hook players. I stayed in bed, racking my brain for a game mechanic, and out of nowhere, Pinball came to mind—you probably remember the classic one from Windows XP.
I took just the paddles from Pinball, stacked them on top of each other, and placed a ball in between. Boom—a fantastic game loop! The higher you climb, the more your score increases. Once people start sharing their high scores and competing with each other, you don’t even need an advertising budget. Burakhan and I finally found the opportunity to bring this project to life at the Game Jam. I handled the core concept, asset design, music, and sound effects, while Burakhan took charge of the programming.
Even though I initially designed the game with a red color palette, we abandoned that at the Game Jam and pivoted to a blue background instead. As Burakhan coded the mechanics in Unity, the game slowly started to come together alongside the visuals and audio. Granted, I have absolutely no idea how many times we completely broke the build during the process! 😀 But no matter what, the development phase was incredibly fun.When presentation time arrived, lady luck decided we would be the very first group to pitch based on the lottery draw. We stood up and explained our concept, Burakhan took the reins to run a live demo, and we successfully survived the presentation.
As the results were about to be announced, everyone gathered in the main area. Behice hoca made a surprise announcement, stating that they would be handing out prizes to the top four teams instead of just the top three. To be honest, we were secretly hoping for either 3rd or 4th place.
When Funda Behice hoca announced, “The 4th place team is JuJu,” I internally let out a massive “Hobaa!” 😀 The rest of the night wrapped up with us going up on stage and taking photos.
I want to extend a massive thank you to all our MSP (Microsoft Student Partner) friends who helped us out as alpha testers. This achievement is truly thanks to them; we were able to fully polish and finish this game because of their feedback. They seriously know how to hype you up when you’re working! 😀
This was the first time in my life participating in a Game Jam, and walking away with a ranking in my very first run feels amazing. Hopefully, here’s to many more (Nice—and I mean the Turkish word for “many”, not the English “nice” :D) Game Jams ahead.
Stay safe and healthy. Take care!
