Best Student Game Awards finalists
Special thanks and congratulations to everyone who submitted their project. After long debates, we decided to nominate 22 student games from 192 submitted! The number of amazing games did not make the choice easy.
Dead Curious Games "Caroline's Underworld" (USA)
A young and curious girl named Caroline falls into a fantastical underworld after following a mysterious goat down a hole. Now stuck in Limbo, she must navigate a mystical, hellish landscape. By talking to weird and wacky creatures, she uncovers clues, unlocks puzzles, plays minigames, and finds the way forward. Made entirely from hand-drawn assets, Caroline's Underworld is about a girl's journey of learning lessons in loneliness and friendship, and discovering her true self.
Desborde Games "Control, I'm Not Coming Back" (Spain)
A short and emotional narrative game about a lost astronaut searching for a reason to keep going while facing the emptiness of space. Inspired by the Hopecore aesthetic, it is a story about optimism, friendship, and our human connection with Voyager 1.
Sentiment Games "Deck of Memories" (Germany)
A unique blend of narrative and deckbuilding, where memories manifest as cards on hand-painted dioramas.
Darklim "Demersus" (Poland)
A first-person walking sim and psychological thriller that explores the harsh reality of alcohol addiction and how it affects the people around you, told through environmental storytelling and immersive atmosphere. Navigate the protagonist's fractured psyche, rendered as a beautifully haunting, hand-crafted clay mindscape.
SensGames "Digsite Zero" (Poland)
A compact mining and exploration game about digging into a mysterious meteorite, discovering the history of a cosmic civilization, and upgrading tools to reach deeper layers faster. You are not exploring a huge world, but going deeper into a single unknown structure, where each layer can hide new resources, artifacts, mechanics, and dangers.
Mrged Mistakes "Forge & Forget" (Poland)
A hands-on forging experience where voxel-based metal ingots can be stretched, shaped, sharpened, and cut exactly as you envision, built on the team's own proprietary C++ engine. Beyond the mechanics, it offers an immersive story of redemption in a stylized fantasy world, where you are guided by a fully voiced raven mentor.
Jellyfish "Jellyfish" (Czech Republic)
Immerse yourself in flow as a luminous jellyfish. Enjoy the vibrant, ever-changing ocean and its bioluminescent glow, while you still can. On a journey across the open sea to find your lost partner, you must face a shifting reality and uncover the truth hidden behind the surface. Because the illusion of beauty is fleeting, and the magnificent ocean is not what it seems.
Whales don't fall "Joyscroller" (Czech Republic)
A satirical game about doomscrolling and the cheap internet dopamine we get hooked on, from junk content to junk food.
KathiParty "Let me See the Sea" (Germany)
A point-and-click game about the longing for the sea and the experiences it inspires. Guided by an unknown narrator recalling her last trip, an ordinary morning unfolds into a memory-filled journey where you explore what lies behind this feeling. Through hand-painted gouache visuals, the game invites you to reflect on your own connection to the sea, and on what it means to long for something.
cola2 "Lights Out" (Czech Republic)
In the solemn, dark times of the First World War, your job is to light the lamps in the heart of Prague. Your brother writes to you daily, and it is in your nature to worry: your anxiety grows worse by the day as you read his troubling letters. Your mind wanders into your own fantasies, straying you from your fear of the dark. It is time to face your fears.
Masterworks Studios "Masterworks of Horror: The Prologue" (USA)
A real-time digital card game in which you play as horror's most iconic authors. Inhabit the likes of Edgar Allan Poe, H.P. Lovecraft, Mary Shelley, and Bram Stoker as you pit their creations against one another to decide who is truly the Master of Horror.
CatHat Games "Meal Quest" (Lithuania)
An educational action roguelike in which your in-game nutrition choices grant combat bonuses that reflect each vitamin's real role in the body. It stands out through its blend of education and fun combat mechanics, letting players learn about nutrition almost without noticing as they play.
Totem Game Dev "Overcharged!" (The Netherlands)
An educational game that makes sustainable energy, the energy transition, and their impact on the electricity grid more tangible for a broad audience. Players explore an isometric world powered by wind and solar energy, full of EV chargers and smart LED lighting, discovering minigames that highlight different aspects of the energy transition.
3BIT "Radium: Dziedzictwo Skłodowskiej-Curie – Polska Iskra Nauki" (Poland)
An educational first-person game that takes players to Paris in 1898 to experience the scientific journey of Marie Skłodowska-Curie. Explore a historically inspired laboratory, perform experiments, process materials, and follow the steps that led to the discovery of radium. The game combines history, chemistry, and interactive gameplay, making scientific knowledge more engaging and easier to understand.
Gniot-Pol "Rat King" (Poland)
An isometric rogue-like set in a medieval world with fantasy elements. You play a rat charmer imprisoned at the bottom of a dungeon for his misdeeds, and your goal is to find a way out. The distinguishing feature is the combat: trapped in a cage carried by rats, your only weapon is the horde of rodents you gather along the way. You move the horde with the mouse, and you attack by drawing a path for the rats to follow, damaging every enemy they cross.
Ella Weger & Viktor Bobůrka "Say Cheese!" (Czech Republic)
You go on a typical Czech family holiday to Croatia. It is not all fun and games: when a relative with a camera appears and shouts "say cheese!", you have to muster a smile, even when you don't want to. You vent your frustration through a button-mashing mechanic, which also shapes your mouth into a satisfactory smile.
Tiny Crypt "Secret Ingredient" (Latvia)
A fantasy adventure game in a pixel-art style, where you play a bakery owner exploring a mysterious world in search of ingredients for a royal cake recipe. The game combines world exploration with experimentation in the kitchen, letting you creatively mix ingredients and discover unexpected results, all in a dreamy, poetic, curiosity-inspiring atmosphere.
Low Sanity Cave "Solakrats" (Poland)
A game about climbing down toward your obligation, inside a giant, endless monolith formed from dozens of worlds. But the terrain is a lie, and so is your home. It twists around you, shifting and reorienting itself as you move. Directions invert: down becomes up, up becomes down. Yet the destination stays the same. Just remember where to climb, and try to keep everyone alive while you do.
cjgamedev "Stories of a Coup d'État: The Three Siblings" (Chile)
A visual novel set in Chile, 1973. As the military dictatorship rises, a family of siblings tries to live their daily life, interrupted by the regime's activities. You are cornered and forced to make tough decisions that test your morality. Remember: every decision has consequences.
PAJO-EGG "Titan OS" (Poland)
A 1 to 4 player cooperative underwater survival roguelike where you descend into the depths of an alien ocean in search of power and answers. Explore abandoned human research stations and mysterious alien facilities while scavenging batteries and supplies to keep your expedition alive. The deeper you go, the harsher the environment and the deadlier the creatures. With a state-of-the-art SIM machine, survivors can transfer their consciousness into genetically modified bodies, specializing to become faster, stronger, or able to carry more.
SuurkaevK "Townfall" (Estonia)
A city-building survival game centered on a dynamic, moving world. Your goal is to keep your town alive for as long as possible while the world around it changes. The town starts on an island floating in an endless abyss. As time passes, new areas appear with more resources and space, while old ones disappear, taking any structures built on them. To survive, you must expand alongside the moving world before it is too late.
Duck Games "Whisper" (Poland)
An asymmetric multiplayer horror game where a group of survivors tries to power up a generator and escape, while a player-controlled monster hunts them in the dark. The monster is blind and sees the world in monochrome, reacting to sounds and to intense red elements: every noise the survivors make leaves a visual trail that can give away their position. Yellow marks quiet objects and actions, red signals loud sources that instantly draw the monster in. To escape, survivors must explore and gather the tools to repair the generator, and every action risks making noise.
Finalists’ Game Zone
The nominees will be contacted by email and officially invited to Warsaw for the Festival. During the event, all nominated creators will have their own booths, where visitors can play their games and talk with the developers. On the main stage there will also be short game presentations, giving the audience a closer look at each project. At the end of the Festival, the Final Jury will select and award the best games in four categories.
Best Student Game Awards categories:
01
ARTISTIC GREATNESS
Given to a game with a distinctive, elegant, and original visual style, not only in its static graphics but also in motion, be it animation, lighting, interface, or the overall perception of the game from the eye-of-the-beholder perspective.
02
TECHNICAL GREATNESS
Given to a game with an extraordinary use of technology, seen in fluent performance, spectacular shaders, lighting, and camera work, and in a one-of-a-kind use of technology, whether online features, a custom engine, or an outstanding use of an existing one.
03
THE MEANINGFUL GAME
Given to a game that cleverly communicates its message through gameplay, speaks about social issues and the state of humankind, provokes important questions, and has the ability to improve us as humans simply by being played.
04
BEST STUDENT GAME AWARD
Given to a game that plays best: clever design and that addictive loop that draws you in and makes you want more, with a great visual style and solid code that just does not break. It stands out as a work of creativity and an engaging game at the same time.