Mar 20, 2019

Train Jam 2019: Railway to GDC

As you probably realize, only certain types of people choose to set aside a weekend with the goal of creating a game/application, and yet, most would agree that game jams and hackathons are a staple of the gaming/VR community. No matter your level of expertise, these game jams + hackathons make for invaluable ways for us to learn, collaborate, connect and grow as professionals and people. This is why our team Oculus was excited to support this year's 5th annual Train Jam⁠, a 52-hour jam taking place on a massive train launching from Chicago and finally arriving in SF for Game Developer Conference.

Train Jam 2019: By The Numbers

To provide a bit of context around the scale of Train Jam, it helps to first check out Train Jam by the numbers:

400 Jammers from around the world developing, designing, testing and collaborating

Jam Theme - Circuitous: Of a route or journey, longer than the most direct way

7 states travelled by train (obviously many more for those that first travelled to Chicago)

72.5 hours

12 Train Cars:

2 Engines

3 Coach

3 Sleepers

1 Baggage

1 Staff

1 Dining

1 Observation

5+ Karaoke Parties

~60% reliable internet

80+ games

The Community

During a jam, it's always a best practice to find the time to cut loose and do something other than jam. Train Jam offered numerous opportunities to cut loose and have fun with your fellow jammers, from spontaneous karaoke showdowns, to gazing upon the majestic landscapes, or simply munching on chocolate pretzels (which were a special favorite of the main organizer of the event).

It's good to enjoy oneself, but the community garnered by these 400 people on a cross country train was truly at the heart of this spectacular event. After 5 years of Train Jam, recurring birthdays were celebrated, while a majority of the staff had even made it a point to work this event for the 5th year in a row. Mentorship was also provided throughout the entire weekend, with 30+ jammers holding literally centuries of experience in the technology/gaming world. It is daunting that 80+ games were made on a train in 72 hours, but 400 people also singing karaoke, mentoring one another, and taking in the sights are the moments that Train Jam is made of. This is encapsulated in the following feedback from Nathan on the Narrow Your Scope Team:

What stood out to me was the sense of community/"togetherness" that a lot of people had. Nobody was curt or mean despite the delays or lack of good sleep. Everybody was very excited to make games or play other people's games, which is one of my favorite parts of the game dev community.
- Nathan Ferguson

The Detour

An especially unique part to this year's Train Jam was the fact that a detour was required due to a section of more than harsh weather. The train was not only required to change its direction, but also slow down heavily as it went through rising water levels in the mid west, requiring the trip to be extended by a number of hours. ON the bright side, rerouting of the train enabled those repeat jammers to check out parts of the country they had never seen, while the extended time made for gorgeous, unique morning views of Colorado and Utah.

The Games

Mountain Men
Dev Team: Mike Morrone & Corey King

Produced for the Oculus Go, in Mountain Men the user is driving down a treacherous country road, looking to avoid falling objects along the way while leveraging a single use shield via the trigger, and the touch pad to change lanes.

Extra points go to this team for taking the time to create a node system as opposed to using a nav mesh. This enabled the ability to direct the player to a modifiable end point, all while making the vehicle feel more like it is traveling down the roadway.

From the Developer:

A big moment to me was the first time we got in VR and step by step resolving our problems. I also really enjoyed figuring out creative ways to use UI in our game (it’s mostly on the windshield of the car).

Narrow Scope
Dev Team: Nick Tiemeyer, Alexandria Heston, Nathaniel Ferguson, and Peter Galbraith

While this game may hit a little too close to home, Narrow Your Scope is a VR experience where you must pitch a game concept in hopes of it being in scope. Created for the Oculus Go, you are dealt a series of cards and must pick a Mechanic, Style and Theme to make the best game possible.

Highlights From The Developer:

Always unwrap your models along natural seams, and while uniformity is hard, auto aligns and distributions are your friend.

Working in VR as an artist, I had to keep in mind geometry and texture restraints, as well as accounting for working on a moving train. I learned to focus on a silhouette and make sure that any objects that you would interact with are modeled well.

Iconography is the art of conveying as much meaning as possible with as little detail as possible. Human brains recognize forms from general shapes, but if they're too abstract then comprehension is lost. Rely more on maintaining more structure than visual style, keeping it balanced.

There are obviously elements of any game jam/hackathon that stay constant from event to event: lack of sleep, meeting new people, trying new things, (hopefully) showing off a game/app that you created in a very short period of time, etc. etc. but Train Jam is certainly a unique pixel within the larger screen of events available to our community. We thank the organizers, coders, designers and mentors of this year's Train Jam for continuing to elevate this wonderful community of ours and look forward Train jam 2020.

If you're at GDC this week, you can also check out the games produced during Train Jam 2019 on the show floor: P1585.

Happy Jamming,

- The Oculus Team

GDC

Games

Did you find this page helpful?

Explore more

May 13, 2026Build Faster, Earn More: How We’re Helping VR Developers Succeed on Meta Quest

New AI development tools and monetization features are coming to Meta Quest. See what we're shipping to help developers build faster and earn more this quarter.

All, Debugging, Design, GDC, Optimization, Quest, Unity, Unreal

Read article