O2A2 Visual Novel Jam

The O2A2 VN Jam stands for "Only One of Any Asset", and is a week-long minimalist visual novel jam with restrictions on allowed assets, while keeping the themes free. The goal is to create short and self-contained works.

History

The jam started in May 2020 as a way for mikey to create a fun and simple week-long challenge for another DevTalk community user to pass the time waiting for another major jam. To aid motivation, mikey promised to join as well, if the challenge was accepted. After a simple jam page was created, the invitation was extended to anyone else, with only a week's notice before the jam began. The jam ended with 20 finished works, and was a surprise success.

Initially mikey had no plans to run the jam again in 2021, but later on by popular demand together with BaiYu who created the 2020 logo another round of the jam was set up. This time the jam was promoted more intensely and produced almost 5x as many entries. Due to the ongoing OtomeJam, the jam was scheduled for July.

In 2022 the jam was set up again, with BaiYu as the leading host, together with PRINCESSINTERNETCAFé, in a similar July time slot. The jam surpassed the 2021 iteration in terms of participants and submissions, and became the 3rd most submission-producing VN jam event at the time.

Rules

The following rules are taken from the O2A2 2021 itch.io jam page:

It's simple, you have one week to make a visual novel and you can use at most:

• one sprite / one character / one pose (multiple expressions without change in pose are okay)
• one background / one place / one time of day
• one illustration (in place of the one sprite and one background)
• one thousand words
• one music track or one ambient background noise
• one sound effect
• one voice actor
• one piece of menu background art
• one project (submit only one entry where you are the creative lead/director. You may participate in other teams as a different role)

Further rules specify non-restricted areas, as well as disallowed content.

Trophies

To encourage the spirit of the jam, at various times trophies were awarded to participants who met certain requirements. These are called "Obfuscated Achievements", and all of them have some form of words starting with "A" and "O". In the first three jams they were not revealed to the participants beforehand, and were "unlocked" only after the first VN that qualified for them was released, or revealed at the end of the jam in full.

Since 2023 and as of 2024, the jam no longer awards trophies.

Rank	Name	Description
2020
--	"Admirably Organized"	awarded to VNs submitted 2 days before the jam's end
2021
Gold	"Objective Accomplished, Overwhelm Avoided"	published your VN 2 days before the jam ends
Silver	"Abolishment Of Archetypal Obligations"	VN features either no visuals, no text, or no audio
Silver	"Outran All Other Authors"	published the first VN of the jam
Bronze	"Advent Of Original Art"	finished the jam
Bronze	"An Offhand Alphabetical Obscurity"	the name of the submitted VN contains exactly two "O"s, and two "A"s
Bronze	"Ongoing Annual Operation Allusion"	submitted the 20th and 21st VN of the jam
2022
Gold	"Objective Accomplished, Overwhelm Avoided"	published your VN 12 hours before the jam deadline
Silver	"An Origin of Achievements"	the VN is the main author's first published game
Silver	"Advent of Original Art"	finished the jam
Bronze	"Outran All Other Authors"	published the first VN of the jam
Bronze	"An Offhand Alphabetical Obscurity"	the title of the VN contains exactly two "O"s, and two "A"s
Bronze	"Ongoing Annual Operation Allusion"	submitted the 20th and 22nd VN of the jam