Love-Focused Game Jams

The ability to explore love, relationships, intimacy and connections in video games is often disregarded, but the Heartbeat Symposium hopes to change that with its three-day event. The annual game jam was started by the Blushbox Collective and seeks to explore a more empathetic view of video games by exposing developers to speakers from various disciplines working in love and intimacy. This exploration of love is fairly unique to the Heartbeat Symposium, and the focus has always been to use the power of video games to capture the "nuance, silliness, fun, excitement and heartbreak" of love and intimacy.

The Heartbeat Symposium is designed to be a comforting space for developers to experiment, as well as receive advice from other developers, psychologists, actresses, writers and other creatives. This diversity in insight is meant to change and allow game makers to express greater themes of love in their work in both a mainstream and indie setting.