Ludum Dare, the long-running game jam that requires participants to create a video game in just a matter of days, will shut down in 2028, according to organizer Mike Kasprzak. Kasprzak posted to the Ludum Dare website last week that he'll run six more events, extending the game jam's schedule until 2028. Some past participants and community members aren’t happy about how this influential game jam is drawing to a close.
Ludum Dare has been running in some form for the past 20 years. It's where the ideas and framework for plenty of successful, award-winning games started, games like Inscryption, Mini Metro, Dorfromantik, Hollow Knight, and Loop Hero.
Ludum Dare began simply as a forum, and a game jam spun out of it. The first event was held in 2002 with a small group of game developers. It grew from there, from a 24 hour event into a 48 hour event, and has operated free of charge since then. Kasprzak takes donations for working on the event. Over the years, a system grew out of the event—participants document the process, publish their game on the Ludum Dare site, and people play and vote on other games submitted to determine a winner. Every year, there's a theme, voted on by participants: stuff like growth, minimalism, islands, or tiny creators. At the last several events, there were at least 1,000 games submitted—a big jump from the original 18 that participated at the first event in 2002.
Acknowledging the legacy and importance of the event to its community, Kasprzak encouraged participants to start up something new—just don't call it Ludum Dare. "I want our legacy to go on, but this name (this era) should end," he wrote. He said he might run some extra or throwback events; "Ludum Dare will return 'as needed,'" Kasprzak wrote.
The community, as such, feels quite passionate at the event and its future and legacy. On Thursday, a community member, Sheepolution, published his own blog post about the future of the gam jam, calling Kasprzak's definition of the future for Ludum Dare "vague."
It makes it hard, Sheepolution argued, to truly set up a "new" Ludum Dare or figure out its future without clear expectations around the last Ludum Dare event and when a new figure should start over. Without that, he said, the community is at risk of fracture—people splitting off into different groups.
"So when it comes to building a better Ludum Dare, the website is not the problem," Sheepolution wrote. "If not Down2Jam, there exist a ton of other game jams for people to migrate to. But all those game jams, any 'better Ludum Dare' that anyone might build, miss one important thing: they are not Ludum Dare."
He continued: "To me, and many others, Ludum Dare is still the game jam, being one of the first big game jams, starting all the way in 2002. I don’t believe any new game jam could take over that title, no matter how well they replicate the original. The continuation of legacy will be broken, and Ludum Dare will be no more."
Aftermath has reached out to Kasprzak for comment.
Since Kasprzak published his blog post last week, there's been a lot of discussion about the game jam and its legacy. There is criticism of Kasprzak's handling of the wind down, to be sure, but there's also a lot of gratitude and respect. The community, though there are three years left of the game jam before it is slated to end, are sad to see such an important game developer community pillar shut down. They are, too, still preparing for the next game jam, which begins this weekend.
Community voting, as always, happens just before the game jam is scheduled to begin. They're at the final vote, in which the community will cull down a list of 16 themes to one. Finalists include “parasite,” “side effects,” “merge,” and “wrong tool for the job.” The theme will be chosen just before the game jam begins.
Meanwhile, other game jams are rallying to take up the Ludum Dare mantle. One such game is Down2Jam, a "community-cetenred game jam" that takes place over three days. It was spun up over the past few years, and the next game jam is scheduled for September. Other popular game jams include the Global Game Jam, Nordic Game Jam, and Train Jam.
