Category: making games

BAFTA Young games designer competition

Making Games: BAFTA Young Games Designer competition 2026

Education Scotland is keen to support as many children and young people participate in playing and making games as possible.

We are excited to work with Into Film and West College Scotland to deliver ideas, resources and live lessons to help children and young people participate in the BAFTA Young Games Designer (YGD) competition. 

YGD is “a chance for 10–18-year-olds to design, develop and present new game ideas”. 

The competition is now open and the closing date for entries is 12th March 2026. 

Children and young people will need an account on BAFTA to enter the competition – educators should check their employers’ rules on children and young people creating and accessing accounts. Educators can create an account to oversee and create accounts for children – *Check the T&Cs.

There are two categories: Game Concept and Game Making (use this link to visit the YGD site)

Game Concept Award

Entrants must submit an original game idea created by themselves or with a team of up to two other people.

Entries will be judged on:

  • gameplay design
  • creativity
  • suitability for chosen games platform

There is an award for:

  • 10 to 14 year olds
  • 15 to 18 year olds

Game Making Award

Entrants must submit an original game created by themselves or with a team of up to two other people.

Entries will be judged on:

  • gameplay design
  • creativity
  • suitability for your chosen games platform

There is an award for:

  • 10 to 14 year olds
  • 15 to 18 year olds

*Check the T&Cs to see what software you can use to build your game.

Support for YGD Game Concept Award

Into Film will run two Live Lessons in January and February for Scottish educators. These are free to join and will explain the rules of YGD, what makes a ‘good game concept’ and an overview of their games resources. 

You can access Into Film’s FREE games resources using this link: https://www.intofilm.org/theme/131/about

YouTube player

Support for YGD Game Making Award

Dr Amanda Ford, West College Scotland, will present recorded videos and guidance for young people and educators on developing their own games. This will support computing and games development classes to link their learning to YGD.

You can access free game making platforms, such as:

Microsoft MakeCode Arcade

GameMaker | Make 2D Games With The Free Engine

*Remember to check with your local authority data security team/officer before registering any learners as users.

YouTube player

Examples of learning from previous games live lessons

A primary teacher from Rowantree Primary School in Dundee shared this with us:

“My class recently attended the above session and following on from your email we were keen to share our learning. They really engaged well with the session and loved making game ideas. We used their ideas later the same day to create a short piece of writing talking about their gaming ideas. Some really exciting and dark stories emerged!

I liked the simple materials and found it fun myself. I’d consider using the materials again.”

A primary teacher from Glenlee Primary School, South Lanarkshire shared this:

A primary teacher from North Queensferry Primary, Fife, shared this:

“My P5/6/7 class loved getting involved in the Games Jam last term. I have attached of what they created. They were all very engaged an this is probably the least terrifying one!

On the back of this work, the class have chosen that their topic for this term be about ‘Video Games’.”

A link to a pdf of the game design: Plague Game

festival of play 2025 community post by Blackness Primary in Dundee

Digital Schoolhouse: Festival of Play 2025 by Blackness Primary, Dundee City

We were lucky that a parent of a child in our class works with Digital School House and they let us know about the event. There were spaces available and the children were really enthusiastic and keen to go. It would be great to let more schools know about the event – I am sure they would find it very worthwhile.

 

This event was especially engaging as the children worked in their co-operative learning groups, designing games and presentations for Ninja Kiwi (a local games developer). They created their own amazing and unique games that they then pitched Ninja Kiwi staff like in Dragon’s Den. This allowed them to pull together an array of skills and during this time we looked into Dundee and its gaming history.

 

On the day, children and young people were excited to arrive at the University where they received tote bags on arrivals with some ‘merch’. They really enjoyed the session with Olive, about her game Private Joke, and enjoyed how much creativity and fun it involved. Lunches were a big hit as well, and the gaming exhibit at the end where they got to play games and try things out. They were big fans of the design a character, with Ninja Kiwi, and after this I heard two boys discussing coming to Abertay to study and design a game together. 

“The monkey bit was really fun and creative as you could do anything; the exhibit at the games were really fun. I liked the whole day as it was really interactive and wasn’t just sitting around for like 25 minutes.” Hamish M, 10 years old.

“I really liked it because I liked the workshops and the VR headset. My The part I really liked was playing on the Nintendo Switch; the commentating workshop was very interesting because I liked the instructor because he told us all sorts of information.” Akshara, 10 years old. 

 

As a teacher, I really liked the range of speakers and activities for the children to engage with. I thought the sessions were a good length and covered a lot of different aspects of learning. The games were a good opportunity to play. My favourite was the Private Joke session as it was the most transferable and the games commentary workshop was also really engaging. 

 

We had a great time and loved being a part of the day, especially it being the first in Scotland. The children felt really inspired afterwards and comments about not knowing how many skills were needed in gaming, some children who are really creative and love drawing realising there were career opportunities, children who love playing games, children who love maths and numbers and then the ones who love reading, they all came away talking about how what they liked learning about and how there were pathways in gaming and computing industries.

Find out more about our school: Welcome to Blackness Primary School Website

 

Game Maker

Game Maker

go to Making Games page

GameMaker is a development tool for making 2D games, used by indie developers, professional studios, and educators worldwide. Users can create games for Windows, Mac, Linux, Android, iOS, HTML5, Xbox, PlayStation 5, and Nintendo Switch.

Remember to check with your local authority data security team/officer before registering any learners as users.

Explore tutorials using this link – Learn How To Develop Games 

Find out more about the Game Maker Education license with this link – Teaching Using Game Design