For the first time, the University of Skövde has given a summer course in game development together with two Chinese universities. In just a few weeks, this cooperation has resulted in several games. On Thursday morning, a closing ceremony was held at the University.
A brand new summer course in game development has been held at the University of Skövde during this summer. On the theme “building culture”, Chinese and Swedish students have, in just a few weeks, created games together – both digital games and analogue board games.
Cooperation across the borders
Since the participants have been divided into international groups, the course has given the students a chance to cooperate across the borders, even though they speak different languages. At the beginning of the course, some students were in China, while others were in Sweden, all while each of the groups needed to start developing their games. It has been a challenge to start develop games from different sides of the world and with different means to communicate.
– At first, we had some troubles communicating, but I have learnt much about timing and cooperation. It got better once we started working on our game. We realised that if we don’t communicate properly, we can’t execute each other’s ideas, says the animator Chen Yan Pei from Shanghai Normal University.
Her group has developed a 3D game, called ChingChing’s Adventure, which is about an adventurer who explores a city. Both Chen Yan Pei and her fellow group members all feel very positive about the summer course and the exchange of experiences between the Swedish and the Chinese students.
– I am very happy! My group members have been very friendly and nice. We even learnt some Swedish!, says Chen Yan Pei.
Welcome back for further studies
On Thursday morning, a closing ceremony was held. The Chinese and Swedish students gathered at the University of Skövde together with teachers and representatives from Skövde Municipality, to receive their diplomas. Conny Brännberg, the Mayor of Skövde, thanked the schools for a well performed cooperation and hoped that the Chinese students would like to come back for further studies at the University of Skövde.
Per Backlund, Professor of Informatics at the University of Skövde, aimed his gratitude towards the students participating in the course.
– This was just a pilot. Thank you for developing it with us. It has been very rewarding and we hope that we can continue doing this during future summers as well.
The course has been arranged in cooperation between the University of Skövde, Game Hub Scandinavia, Sweden Game Arena and the Chinese universities Shanghai Normal University and Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications.