We successfully hosted the second edition of our interdisciplinary game design marathon, BetaJam 2, on May 8–10 at our Taksim Campus. Following this intense production period, I had the opportunity to evaluate the academic and operational outcomes of the event on Beykent Radio’s “Beykent Gündem” program. In this post, aligned with the vision I shared on air, I would like to outline what we successfully achieved, areas we can further develop, and the key insights we gained.
For us, BetaJam is not just a series of isolated events, but rather an institutional building where we add new floors each year. The experiences and hardware limitations from our inaugural year provided clear direction. Evaluation surveys conducted with our students immediately after that first event, combined with comprehensive feedback analysis, directly shaped this year’s operational strategy. Consequently, we positioned BetaJam 2 on the 6th floor of our Taksim Campus. The venue’s 360-degree view of Istanbul offered participants a serene working environment, allowing them to step away from their phones and city noise to focus entirely on their projects.
Game jam organizations are the closest approximation to real-world industry conditions, severely testing physical and mental boundaries through 36-hour time constraints and sleep deprivation. While continuous focus can strain cognitive performance, the perseverance demonstrated by our teams this year was remarkably valuable. In contrast to last year, where some groups had to leave their projects unfinished due to time pressure, this year all 17 teams successfully delivered their completed games.
Another significant milestone of this edition was opening our doors to external stakeholders. Alongside guest students from Istanbul University and Istanbul Technical University (ITU), our university’s Digital Game Design (Turkish/English), Software Engineering, Visual Communication Design, and Graphic Design departments came together. For us, communication is not merely about producing and broadcasting content; our true objective was to build a collaborative community while maintaining this multidisciplinary framework. Seeing the clear potential to achieve this has been highly rewarding.
You can watch the highlight video “How We Spent 3 Days at BetaJam 2?” below. Prepared by our MediaLab and BETA teams, it showcases the on-site atmosphere and chronological flow of the 3-day production process. Together, we will continue to foster a sustainable academic and industrial culture.
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