Generally speaking, game jams enforce restrictions on participants, like a specific theme, time limit, game engine, game genre, or even all of the above. But this year’s O2A2 VN Jam 2023 ~ Queer Edition ~ is a bit… different in that regard, as depicted by its full name: Only One of Any Asset. Very interesting and as shown in the title, very queer.
Why this change, and why now? Well, for starters, this is not so much as a change as an addition – there’ll be a regular edition of the game jam later this year, too. Which is just so darn groovy. Oh, right: the Queer Games Bundle will be returning in a few months, so O2A2 VN Jam 2023 ~ Queer Edition ~ is essentially a bit of a push for “LGBTQ+ developers of all skill levels”, to help them make something they can then submit to the bundle, basically.
O2A2 is a low pressure, anti-crunch, non-competitive jam without judging; everyone who completes a game by the deadline is a winner!
Now, with the jam lasting a full two weeks, crunch should not even be on the menu, even if that is pretty much automatically avoided due to the restrictions. See, for O2A2 VN Jam 2023 ~ Queer Edition ~, you’re allowed only one of… well, almost anything – except words. You can put up to a thousand of those in your visual novel. Actually, I should just paste the list below instead.
- one sprite / one character / one pose (multiple expressions without change in pose are okay)
- one background / one place / one time of day
- one illustration (in place of the one sprite and one background)
- one thousand words
- one background sound file (either one music track or one ambient background noise)
- one sound effect
- one voice actor
- one piece of menu background art
- one main project (submit only one entry where you are the creative lead/director. You may participate in other teams as a different role)
But wait, there’s more: did I mention how this year’s jam also allows bitsy-likes? For those, you can either
a) make a VN-style bitsy game with the above ruleset, or
b) make a classic bitsy game using at most:
- one avatar (or its equivalent if you’re not using bitsy)
- one sprite / one character / one interactable NPC (or its equivalent if you’re not using bitsy)
- one item which you can reuse throughout the game by using a sequence/shuffle (or its equivalent if you’re not using bitsy)
- (There’s no restriction on number of tiles!)
- one thousand words
- one background sound file (either one music track or one ambient background noise)
- one sound effect file
- one main project (submit only one entry where you are the creative lead/director. You may participate in other teams as a different role
Now, to (hopefully) avoid any confusion… here’s what is allowed/unrestricted, as well:
- themes / genres (e.g. romance, horror, comedy)
- suggestive/explicit or violent content (so long as such content is tagged appropriately on the game page)
- using Creative Commons, similarly licensed free-to-use, or paid assets (this time we’re strongly suggesting that you avoid CC assets that include the Noncommercial or -NC license part!)
- usage of solid color backgrounds (all white, black, or other)
- programming and scripting effects
- minigames, so long the main portion of your entry can be considered a VN (e.g. point and click, fill in the blank/Madlibs, etc. all OK!)
- special effects / movement / zoom / animation (such as blinking, lipflap/mouth movement, sparkles, moving side to side, etc. Complex frame-by-frame animations that would change a significant portion of an image are not allowed.)
- custom GUI assets like buttons, text boxes, textures and other elements
- price point of completed entries
- submitting your entry to other jams (as long as you follow the rules of those jams!)
- language your game is in, you’re free to write your game in a language other than English as long as it’s equivalent to one thousand words
- omake/fandiscs and fangames are welcome. However, if you do not own the IP, please do not steal assets from the source material
Just in case… rules, because there’s a bunch of those too (please don’t break them):
- submitting partial works e.g. demo, Part 1 of x, etc… Self-contained prologues are okay!
- submitting unfinished works or placeholder pages for future uploads
- submitting entries that promote bigotry and hateful conduct, or are otherwise made in bad faith
- using non-GUI assets (sprite, BG, audio, etc.) from a larger project of yours
- using illegal assets (pirated/stolen, or you do not have a proper license for)
- using engines or programming in a manner that would make hybrid games (e.g. a half VN/RPG hybrid, due to the assets required to make a functional RPG with an overworld map)
Adding to that, you’d do well to stop by the website – as linked below – and read up on what is not allowed, seeing how any entry that disregards the rule will be removed. It would be a shame to spend an entire week – or two, as the 2023 edition of O2A2 is longer than previous iterations – working on something only to be unable to participate. So play nice and join the DevTalk Discord if you’re feeling social and/or need assistance. And last but not least, dates: from April 7, 2023, to April 22, 2023. Remember, there can be only one… of each.
