We are incredibly excited to reveal the winners of the Diverse Game Developers Jam! It’s been an exciting few weeks watching diverse developers in the community create new games, implement ideas, and execute their vision. This effort was made possibly by our special panel of judges: Alex Lakatos, Alyssa Askew, Monica Fan, Nika Nour, Renee Blair, and Steven Taarland.
A special thanks to Grant for the Web for providing support to marginalised developers across the industry to create opportunities to explore innovative monetization of video games through the Web Monetisation API.
Diverse Developers Game Jam Winners
Kathrin Radtke is a game programmer based in Stuttgart, Germany. After her computer science degree, she started working at the indie game studio “Studio Fizbin” in 2016 where she was part of the team for games like “The Inner World”, “Minute of Islands” and Lead Programmer for “Say No! More”.
Zoë Koç is a game designer and started her career as a working student at Studio Fizbin during her game design studies in Berlin. After her graduation, she decided to stay with the company and moved to Ludwigsburg in August 2020.
Sophie Alicia Herrmann was born and raised in Chile but currently lives and works in Ludwigsburg, Germany. Some years ago, after university, she landed a job at ‘Studio Fizbin’ as a game artist, where she gained lots of experience working on games such as “Minute of Islands”, “Say No! More” and apps for kids. There, she also got to know her other groovy game jam team members Kathrin, Zoë and Kasimir. Together at “Spellgarden Games” they are on a mission to work on wholesome and fun games to share with people around the globe.
Kasimir Blust was born in Karlsruhe in Germany. He works as a programmer at Studio Fizbin, an indie studio in Germany. Recently he worked on Minute of Islands. He started his games journey with a student project called Elena – Displaced Reality. After a short sidestep into interactive advertising, he joined Studio Fizbin to work on games with a purpose. He wants to create games that focus on accessibility and a good narrative. Apart from games he is all about cooking new recipes.
Ivonne Prado Barros: Project leader, Director, programmer, music composer, screenwriter. She has 8 years of experience in video game development. She worked on 3 published games (1 for consoles) and several mobile interactive multimedia applications.She likes to be called Goky.
Paola Tejada: Lead Team Artist 3D, modeler, texturizer, rigger, concept artist 3D. She has 4 years of experience in 3D modeling and sculptures, she has experience in 1 console game and several hobby video games. She likes to be called Himmel Hilf 3D.
Roberto Ardila: Writer, programmer, lighting effects, he is passionate about exploring new ideas for video games. He has 13 years of experience in video games. He likes to be called Roberto.
Ethan Jennings: an indie game developer based in Maryland, USA who’s been developing games for 5 years now. I mostly work on small projects although I’m open to anything!
Web Monetisation API Award – $7,500
Grogh
Noa Beazley is a composer and Women in Games ambassador. She recently worked on A Token War from UpRoom Games and is currently working on several TBA indie titles, including a tic-tac-toe/Myst mashup, a big band era time attack, and a himbo dating sim. Noa lives in Boston with her long-term girlfriend.
Bruno Chiovoloni is an Argentinian artist and teacher. He’s been enthusiastic about videogames as a medium from a young age. He participated in some gamejams as a multimedia and game designer but it wasn’t until this year that he met beautiful talented people around the world that shared his passion for videogame development.
Joshua Tsuji is a Boston based software developer, who’s always wanted to try using his experience developing apps to work on a game project. Together with his audio and art friends, Josh programmed Grogh, his video game debut.
IGDA Foundation Innovation Award – $7,500
Cherry’s Dream
Talia Skyles is a Baltimore-based illustrator and painter. A graduate from the Maryland Institute College of Art, she currently loves telling stories and creating colorful, emotionally expressive illustrations with a sprinkle of whimsy. She’s also intrigued by color and light and enjoys exploring its impact on the composition, emotion, and storytelling of her work. When not at her drawing table, Talia enjoys reading books, roller skating with friends, and taking care of her many plant children.
Xander Jake De Los Santos is a Filipino illustrator, concept artist, and video game developer. Based in Washington DC, Xander’s passions are in storytelling and project development.
Community Award
Overall Community Award, as voted for by the Jam Participants – $5,000 – PixlPatches
