A great way to kick-start students’ careers in the games industry, the 7th annual Ubisoft Toronto NEXT competition is back — and this time, with some exciting new challenges!
Starting November 6th, 2019, students and recent graduates residing in Ontario can compete across seven game development disciplines to showcase their talents. Winners receive paid apprenticeships at the Ubisoft Toronto studio.
Disciplines this year are:
- 3D Art (formerly Modelling)
- Animation
- Concept Art
- Level Design
- Programming
- Tech Art
- User Interface
Submission deadlines run through early 2020, and winners will be announced in May 2020. Learn more about this great opportunity and get started on your winning submissions here: http://toronto.Ubisoft.com/next
This year’s challenges
Flex your game development skills across art and technical challenges.
For the 3D Art (previously Modelling) challenge, students will make a 3D video game environment diorama.
In the Animation challenge, participants can choose to create an animation using one of the provided cinematic scenes, or to create an animation sequence using one of two gameplay actions.
Concept Art is our original discipline, and our judges have created a new scenario this year for students to bring to life.
The Level Design challenge is a multi-part assignment that begins with an “elevator pitch” of your level, with chosen finalists building a playable block mesh of their levels.
The Programming challenge returns with a weekend-long test to create a game in C++ using our provided API. We’ll release the API on February 7th, 2020, and the challenge begins March 20th, 2020 when we publish the full brief. From there, students have just over 48 hours to make a working game.
To compete in the Tech Art challenge (a mixture of cold, hard science and creative skill), construct the 3D Art challenge scene and choose a technical area of focus to take it to the next level.
The User Interface challenge sees participants to create a package of JPG & PSD files and motion concepts for a cohesive, intuitive, and creative User Interface Style Guide.
All of these challenges provide students and recent graduates a real sense of what it is like to work in production teams at Ubisoft. The challenges allow them to experience the pipeline that takes an idea to a finished product in a AAA game development studio.
Meet the NEXT judges
The NEXT challenges are created each year by a wide variety of Ubisoft team members who aim to create opportunities they never had.
Find out more about the people behind the challenge, and what students can expect from the competition: https://toronto.ubisoft.com/next
