Tentacle Zone | University of Greenwich Students Visit Tentacle Zone

University of Greenwich Students Visit Tentacle Zone

On the previous Friday, the Tentacle Zone hosted students from the University of Greenwich, Game Design and Development course for a careers event afternoon.

Leading and supporting the students were Jon Weinel, the Academic Portfolio Leader in Games, and Martyn Broadhead, Lecturer in 3D Modelling and Animation. It was a pleasure to meet all the students, and we kicked off the event with a studio tour of our co-working space. Vincent Scheurer, the Founder & Director of Operations at Payload Studios, along with Karen Yun, the Game Hub and Events Manager at Tentacle Zone, gave an introduction highlighting the core values of the Tentacle Zone. Following this, everyone enjoyed a casual networking lunch with some of our TZ residents.

Careers Table

We had Tentacle Zone residents from diverse disciplines for the careers table activity. To encourage fun interactions, the students were divided into five groups. Each group had the opportunity to meet a couple of residents at a time, and we rotated the groups to ensure that they had the chance to engage with different game professionals. Students also had chances to ask insightful career-related questions, while our residents shared advice and recounted their own journeys in the games industry. It was an enjoyable and valuable experience for all participants to engage in different types of conversations.

Thanks so much to:

Kae Cheung, Designer; Payload Studios
Anton Korubov, Senior Artist; Payload Studios
Antonio Salreta, Senior Designer; Payload Studios
Sammi Luzon, QA Lead; Payload Studios
Taku Mavhunduke, Junior Designer, Payload Studios
Matt McGuinness, Sound Designer; Payload Studios
Yuuki Teja Due, QA Tester; Payload Studios
Beltain Jordaan, Gameplay Programmer; Payload Studios
Pietro De Grandi, CEO and Co-founder, Strelka Games
Chris Dawson, Co-founder and CCO, Robot Squid
Dirk Van Dijk, Game Artist; Robot Squid

Portfolio Review

In preparation for the event, we opened portfolio registration to allow interested students to bring along their works and showcase them to industry professionals with expertise in the same area. Each student had the opportunity to engage in a 20-minute one-on-one session with our residents, discussing their projects in detail. We would like to express our appreciation to Chris Dawson (COO & Co-founder of Robot Squid), Dirk Van Dijk (Game Artist), John Brewer (Gameplay Lead Programmer), Kae Cheung (Designer), Anton Korubov (Senior Artist), Beltain Jordaan (Gameplay Programmer), and Harriet Alice Bain (Junior Designer) for providing tips and practical feedback on how the students can improve and uplift their projects.

Thank you to all the UOG lecturers, Tentacle Zone residents, and, of course, the students themselves for contributing to a fun and eventful afternoon.

Furthermore, the students will be hosting their Digital Shark Expo on campus on Wednesday, May 24th, alongside their peers from the School of Computing and Mathematical Sciences. This expo will showcase their incredible works, and we wish them the best of luck for their end-of-year show!

Thank you everyone for joining us!