Ludum Dare organizer ponders the game jam's future

As the latest results of popular game jam Ludum Dare are revealed, the organizer of the jam has admitted that the movement has simply become too big for him to handle as a side-project anymore. Talking candidly on the Ludum Dare blog, Mike Kasprzak explained that over 5,000 games have been made for Ludum Dare game jams in 2014 -- that's more than were made in all of the first 10 years of Ludum Dare combined. In the latest Ludum Dare alone, 2,500 games were submitted. Ludum Dare has now been running for nearly 13 years, and Kasprzak says that it has reached the point where he cannot organize it alongside his full-time job. As a result, Kasprzak hopes to make his Ludum Dare work his full-time job, and start properly monetizing the game jam. Right now Ludum Dare users can donate money to the jam, but Kasprzak wants to put in place some way for the jam to earn him a full-time wage. "We're never going to charge for Ludum Dare," he noted, "but we have real manpower costs: mine. I’ve been here, running the show for 6 years now, supporting it for all 12, and I still want to do it!" "How we make money is a discussion for another day," he added. "Crowdfunding, Kickstarters, Patreons, Sponsors, heck even the wild idea of making it a proper charitable organization." The developer is looking to gauge the reaction of the Ludum Dare community before he decides how to push forward. Want to know what makes Ludum Dare so special? We asked a bunch of game developers recently about why they participate in the jam.