Abstract
Can games be made at the pace of news? The Newsjam, an event held in Miami, Florida in November of 2017, aimed to investigate whether short, simple games about current topics could be made in less than two days. While the plethora of game jam events does demonstrate that such games can be made, the larger questions was by whom and how? The Newsjam event convened a mixture of media professionals and non-gamers to test the hypothesis that game-making tools have become so simple those who have never made a game previously could make a game in a single weekend. The results indicate that while it possible to make simple digital toys, the highest quality contemporary newsgames were made by teams that had previously existing experience in game making. 19 participants, produced 5 games in just over 36 hours. Their expertise ranged from first time game maker to seasoned independent developers.