Dare ProtoPlay is an event that should be attended by thousands of people this coming weekend. It will be held in Dundee’s Caird Hall, in Scottland. While many of the readers of this site may have little to no way to make it to this festival, there are a few things to take note of, especially my PC Gaming fans.

The festival is completely free to attend and will run from Aug 10-12th. During those three days, 15 games will be showcased for attendees, in addition to mainstream titles that are soon to hit, or fresh off the presses. Most of that is a minor blip on the radar when compared to bigger events like CES or E3, but what is worth taking notice of is a competition for the specific 15 games that will be shown.

These titles were developed over the course of nine weeks by teams of students from around the world. Three of them will be chosen during the festival with one earning the “Ones to Watch” Bafta new talent award. With indie gaming on such a rise, it is easy to understand why Dare ProtoPlay is something to keep an eye on. Students pumping out games in just nine weeks is pretty impressive, but the ideas that will grow from them to be the next big indie hit is even more important.

The Scottish Culture Secretary, Fiona Hyslop, who started the event had this to say about the festival:

“Dare ProtoPlay is a fantastic festival which attracts the world’s best young game designers to Scotland and showcases Dundee’s cutting-edge skills in computer games development.

“By inspiring and developing a new generation of games designers, Dare ProtoPlay is enhancing Scotland’s creative reputation on a world stage and helping to maintain our competitive edge in a fast-growing global industry.”

Hopefully other countries will take note of competitions like this to really inspire their youth to focus on art, math and physics as they work their way towards a job in our favorite industry.

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