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Yadu is an independent Game Designer and Developer. He is currently the Chief Creative Officer at Second Quest. Yadu has been building communities since 2008 and is building http://gamedev.in. Yadu is an Executive Committee for Global Game Jam and also a council member of the IndiaGDC. His work primarily revolves around the medium of games and interactive art; but he has donned multiple hats as a writer, educator and ux designer. In 2011, he co-founded Hashstash (now MyyHashstash) where he designed and developed multiple award winning games. He has held senior and lead roles in companies like RedBus, Srishti Manipal Institute of Art, Design and Technology, Byjus/Osmo and PlaySimple Games.
In 2011, he co-founded Hashstash (now MyyHashstash), where he worked on the award winning game Circulets and many others. After Hashstash, Yadu worked as a Senior User Experience Designer at RedBus for a short period. Later he moved on to teach user experience design, web design, game design and game development at Srishti Institute of Art, Design and Technology for 5 years after which he joined BYJU’S as a Lead Game Designer in 2020. After his tenure creating games for the Osmo platform for young children, he returned to focus on building free to play games with PlaySimple Games as a Lead Game Designer in 2021. Yadu is currently the Chief Creative Officer at Second Quest.
He has been building and supporting game-design and development communities since 2008 and is currently working on gamedev.in. Yadu has about 20 years of experience in Game Development, Teaching and User Experience Design. He writes about game design, game UX and development on Twitter under his handle, @yadurajiv as well as on his blog.
Yadu is the author of Developing Turn-Based Multiplayer Games with GameMaker Studio 2 and NodeJS which was published by Apress. He has donned multiple hats, as an organiser, a speaker and a panellist on multiple occasions at the India Game Developers Conference since 2013. He has been a Keynote Speaker at the Jam Jam Festival organised by the Finnish Game Jam held in Helsinki.
Yadu was also selected to be one of the IGDA Foundation’s Next Gen Leaders of 2020. He was recently selected as one of @GIbiz’s Top100 Game Changers of 2020 as well. He was one of @GIbiz’s Top100 Game Changers of 2020 as well as featured in POC in Play #SAHMGames100 list as part of South Asian Heritage Month, 2021. He also serves as a member of the Executive Committee for Global Game Jam since 2021.
Gameography
- PlaySimple Games – Tile Match – Triple puzzle game (2022 – 2024)
- PlaySimple Games – Tile Empire – Mahjong Match (2024)
- PlaySimple Games – Jigsaw (2022 – 2023)
- PlaySimple Games – Destination Solitaire (2021 – 2022)
- GGJ 2021 – Lost and Found at the Mall (2021)
- Social Media Massacre (2020)
- Byjus/Osmo – Wyverndell Express (2020)
- GMTK Jam – Gone to Pieces (2017)
- Badass (2017)
- The Rhizome, an interactive installation at the Serendipity Arts Festival, Goa (2016)
- GGJ 2016 – Wayfarer (2016)
- Hashstash – Circulets (2013)
Publications by
- Developing Turn-Based Multiplayer Games with GameMaker Studio 2 and NodeJS – Apress, 2018
- How to Learn Flixel – tutsplus.com, Mar 2013
- 5 Tools to Develop AAA Games – Linux For You, Feb 2010.
- Moonrise by Savithri Rajeevan, Translated from Malayalam, 2010.
- Getting Started with Game Development – Linux For You, Dec 2009.
- Video Game by Savithri Rajeevan, Indian Literature Vol. 47, No. 3 (215) (May-June, 2003), pp. 76-78 Translated from Malayalam, 2003.
Publications/Collaborations/Interviews with
- Exploring the Rise of Hybrid-Casual Games, Eximius Echo, Sept 2024
- Online Gaming Is Pretend – But the Harassment In-Game Isn’t, The Swaddle, Nov 2023
- First Person Encounters #9: Yadu Rajiv, DiGRA India Podcast, Nov 2021
- Making Space to Make Games, with Yadu Rajiv, Everybody’s Talking At Once Podcast, Episode109, May 2021
- Gamescapes: Art in The World of Video Game Design – STIR delves into the elements that make video games a form of art, a medium that engages the audience in immersive experiences through visually exceptional storytelling. Gamescapes: Are video games contemporary art, too? – The first in the series of eight stories examines video games as a formal media in the purview of contemporary art. Interview/Conversations, STIR, 2020
- Yadu Rajiv, Kinshuk Sunil, Co-founders, Hashstash Studios, NGDC, 2013
Conferences and Awards
- 🤼 Diversity, Equity and Inclusion – Where does the Indian games industry stand on DEI when compared to global standards?, Moderator, IGDC, 2024
- 🗣️ WTF Community Masterclasses – On Game Jams, Speaker, WTFxIGDC Jam, 2024
- 🤼 WTF Community Masterclasses – Code to make a Game, Host, WTFxIGDC Jam, 2024
- 🗣️ The Garden of Forking Paths – Tales from alternate realities, Speaker, IGDC Dev Days, 2024
- 🤼 Brewing in Kerala for the World, Moderator, IGDC Dev Days, 2024
- 🗣️ A self-taught programmer to a Lead Game Designer at PlaySimple Games, #HumansOfGaming by Outscal 2023
- 🗣️ Learn by Doing – Empowering yourself to be Independent, Design Track, Speaker, IGDC 2022 (extended slides)
- 🎮 Xbox Discovery Day (XDD), Speaker, Bangalore, 16th Sept 2022
- 💝 Featured in POC in Play #SAHMGames100 list as part of South Asian Heritage Month, 2021
- 🤼 Putting India On The Global Map – IGX Creators Summit, Moderator, 2021
- 🗣️ Hand-made Game Scenes – The Game Arts International Assembly (GAIA) symposium, Speaker, 2021 | (Video)
- 💝 Games Industry Biz Top 100 Game Changers, 2020 | (GI 100 List)
- 💝 IGDA Next Gen Leaders 2020, GDC 2020
- 🗣️ Jam Jam Festival (watch Jupiter Hadley, who was the other keynote speaker, explain what Jam Jam Festival is), Keynote Speaker, Helsinki 2019
- 🤼 Game Design Education, Panel, NGDC 2017
- 🗣️ Tales from Game Designers: Things we learned the hard way, Panel Moderator, NGDC 2017
- 🗣️ Evil Game Design Challenge, Speaker, NGDC 2016
- 🎪 Caveman Game Design Challenge, Workshop, NGDC 2016
- 🎪 Entanglement, a play of Art and Science for Science Gallery Bengaluru, at ITBIZ and Serendipity Art Festival (2016)
- 🤼 Reality Check: Ground Realities of Being Indie, Panel, NGDC 2013
- 🗣️ Using Open Source for Game Development, Speaker, India Game Developer Summit 2010
Professional Associations
- Gamedev.in, Founder, Volunteer, 2009 – Present
- Runs the BYOG, Discord, Podcast, Blog, Steam Curator, People’s page, Directory and more
- Build Your Own Game, Game jam with Gamedev.in/NGDC/IGDC – BYOG – Founder, Organiser, 2010 – Present
- Global Game Jam, Executive Committee Member, 2021 – Present
- IndiaGDC, Council Member, 2022 – Present
- WTFxIGDC Game Jam, Host, July 2024
- Coordinator for the Media Game Jam – Goethe-Institut / Max Mueller Bhavan Kolkata, Dec 2023
- Global Game Jam Bangalore, Organiser, 2013 – 2022
- NASSCOM/IGDC, Volunteer, 2011 – 2022
- NID R & D Campus Bangalore, Visiting faculty, Mentor and Jury Member, 2016 – 2023
- IGDC – Student Game of the Year, Jury Member, 2022
- Design Championship Jury, 2016, 2019
- Indie Game Shindig – https://indiegameshindig.com/ – India’s first Independent games festival with Srishti Institute of Art Design and Technology, Organiser, 2015
- IGDA Bangalore Chapter, Founder, Volunteer, 2011 – 2018
- Author at tutsplus (now envato tuts+), 2013
- Game Jams with Swissnex India
- OSSCamp with OSSCube
Education
- Master of Design (M.Des) in Design for Digital Experience, National Institute of Design (NID)
- BA in English Language and Literature, St Alberts College, Kochi, Kerala
Resume