Development giants join Dare to be Digital

The biggest names in gaming are getting involved in this year’s Dare to be Digital game development competition.

Industry heavyweights such as Rockstar North, Sega, Realtime Worlds and SCEE will be available to assess and mentor students competing for a place in the University of Abertay Dundee’s development ‘hothouse’, where successful entrants will eventually go on to form teams and build a prototype game.

This pool of developers and publishers will be sent out to initial selection events in London, Liverpool and Glasgow, where talented student teams will be spotted.

Successful entrants will then be sent to University of Abertay and split into teams of five and tasked with prototyping a game within ten weeks. Here, individuals from within the industry consortium – known as the ‘Developer Accord’ – will offer their advice and support.

“The combination of experience and expertise brought by the members of our Developer Accord is second to none,” said Paul Durrant, Director of Business Development at Abertay University.

“We have attracted support from the cream of development studios throughout the UK. The students taking part in this year’s competition will benefit from the experience of the best in the business.”

Upon completing their game, the development teams at Abertay will then be assessed again, with each game showcased at the Dare ProtoPlay event in Edinburgh this August. This will be the first time each team’s game will be played by both the public and industry experts, while the most successful games will go on to pick up honours at a special awards ceremony.

Later in the year, one of these teams will be honoured with a BAFTA ‘One to Watch’ Award.

“Dare to be Digital has become a unique and unifying project for the development community” added Durrant. “All of the members of the Developer Accord are participating on an equal basis because they recognise the value of the project to the future of the games sector.”

The full list of participating groups follows:

Black Rock Studio
Blitz Games Studios
BBC Scotland
Cohort Studios,
Denki,
Ninja Theory,
Rare,
Realtime Worlds,
Rockstar North,
SEGA
Sony Computer Entertainment Europe