The RuneScape Future Talent Jam was the second stage of the RS25 Future Talent Pathway, a mentorship and development programme launched by Jagex to celebrate RuneScape's 25th anniversary and encourage new talent to explore game development. Into Games is thrilled to be a part of the Future Talent Pathway and host the jam to help make careers in video games more accessible for young people from all backgrounds. By working with partners like Jagex, Into Games offers students and recent graduates real opportunities to enter the industry, providing mentorship, training, and direct connections to studios.

Between 1st June and 26th July, contestants were asked to design a game experience that showed how a short journey and a single mysterious object can feel epic, personal, and meaningful, set against the backdrop of whispered legends about a lost relic hidden somewhere in Gielinor.

We also asked those who wished to submit individual entries showcasing their skills to attempt challenges focused on Art, Programming and Animation. Judging the jam was a two-phase process, carried out by a panel of judges from Jagex and Game Anglia.

The quality across submissions was excellent, and we have, with great difficulty, ranked our favourites as follows:

University/Graduate Winner: The First King's Relic

Joe Cheetham, from Canterbury Christ Church University

University/Graduate Runner-Up: Ye Olde Guard

Quinn Walker, from the University for the Creative Arts

Milly Hunter, from the University for the Creative Arts

Robin Smith, from Teesside University

College Winner: The First King's Crown

Logan Saville, from Cambridge Regional College

Art Challenge Winner: Art Challenge

Allison Dawson, from Canterbury Christ Church University

Programming Challenge Winner: Rhythm Quest

Matthew Henderson, from Abertay University

Highly Commended: The Adventure of the Rotten Potatoes

James Grant, from the University of Northampton

How the Winners Were Chosen

Judging the jam was a two-phase process, carried out by a panel of judges from Jagex and Game Anglia. Each judge was assigned a set of submissions to play and evaluate individually, scoring entries from 1 to 5 across five criteria:

• Originality and Creativity: Did the game bring something fresh to the table?
• Technical Proficiency: How skilfully are its systems built and executed?
• Artistic Execution: How polished and cohesive were its visuals and audio?
• Gameplay and User Experience: Was it engaging, and easy to pick up and play?
• Storytelling and Game Design: How interesting were the story, characters, and design choices?

You can browse all submissions on the jam's itch.io page.

Each of these teams has been invited to showcase their game at the new Jagex studio in October, and will receive incredible prizes, including Laptops from MSI, PlayStation Plus Passes, exclusive RuneScape merch and access to the Into Games Career Launchpad course!

We would like to express our great gratitude to everyone who signed up, submitted entries, and put a lot of heart into them, as well as to the panel of judges who gave up their time and knowledge to support this shortlisting and scoring process.