Smart potatoes and escape from the computer: try all the games created at Unreal Jam 2024

Kristina Janković Obućina,
Executive Manager, SGA
07.11.2024.
What sandbox mode is to gamers, a game jam is to anyone learning to make games. An open field for any idea, playing with tools, with the bonus of meeting new people who love and do the same things as you. That's why we love it when the Unreal Day conference approaches - it's an opportunity for us to do just that.

This year, thanks to the cooperation with the company 3Lateral and Epic Games, we held two game jams. Unreal Jam, to which 19 teams from 4 countries of the region applied, set the theme The only way out is through. The second IRL jam was held in the Epic Games Novi Sad community area, where seven teams tried their hand at creating a UEFN island on the theme Serbia to Japan.

The top three teams from the regional jam and the winning team from the UEFN Jam presented their games live at the Unreal Day conference, at a packed hall of UE enthusiasts. One of those “you should have been there” situations, but take my word for it, there were cheers, laughter, applause… and valuable prizes from the PackDev Interactive team and AMD.  We always like to send a big thank you to the mentors who encouraged the teams to push to the end this year as well.

You can try all the games on itch.io – here’s a handy chart

And here we highlight the Top 3 games and the winning UEFN game.

 

The Escape PLANt - the winning game

You are an intelligent potato. I know. Roll with it. You can move your root above and below the ground and solve puzzles to escape from the laboratory. The plants and environments are adorable, the puzzles are challenging enough and reminiscent of the Incredible Machines game. We all wish we were potatoes. Maybe that’s why this game won.

The Great ESCape - 2nd place

You are a combination of Tyler Durden and Nikola Tesla, wearing a red leather jacket and running away from a housing complex. The game is a combination of platformer and puzzles. It has a cool RGB mechanic – you need to match the color to the puzzle. Most of the visuals are made from scratch and the whole experience smacks of nostalgia. Can you get to the top of the leaderboard?

Lean and Doomed - 3rd place

Among the famous heroes zou’ve seen on a screen in this game there is a version of Bruce Willis that we seem to have ordered from TEMU. As luck would have it, a space helmet is placed on his grown baby head shortly after the start of the game. This tells us that the game takes place in a space station. In weightlessness, we repair numerous malfunctions, find our way through floating debris. Attention: both the mentors and the jury say that this is the most difficult game to pass.

NOSTALGIA

What does a person do when they are abroad? Their heart rushes for a piece of home. In this UEFN game, the foreign country is Japan, and the home part is the tavern At Mića’s. Two players race through devastated streets, a Japanese garden and a frozen forest. Fast, fun, addictive, can be played in a circle a thousand times. The island code is: 2840-2196-2391.