TL;DR: I'm surprised by many of the game entires. Often they are well rounded little games, with menu, instructions, story intros, scene transitions and some of them even have a long of content.

https://itch.io/jam/uncrankd-game-jam-winter-edition

At this point I want to congratulate everyone that made an entry. This is really the most important thing: you could commit to making a game with a theme not chosen by yourselves, you did stick to it and let your creativity flow within this limitation and actually made something.

This is already a great achievement!

In the few game jams I had the privilege to judge and the few I had the pleasure to join, the game entries often are of very different quality. So sometimes it's hard to judge games in their infancy, because there might just be a bug which make the actual experience not come through or a game mechanic isn't there at all and it's not obvious how the game is suppose to work.

The jam had the three themes: Below Zero, Metal and Night

Great pick of Xania and IrishJiminy. Especially coming from the initial idea of "Snow" to a broader definition which can be interpreter by the game devs is great. This is reflected in the different stories, settings or theme the game jam entries have. So there are the direct interpretations something connected to snow or ice. But there are which look at that from an measurement or math angle. And there is even a fishing game, which we all hold dear to our heart in the playdate community. As the stories goes: the first idea people come up with on how to use the crank, is fishing :)

I didn't have time to think about the theme, as I was participating another game jam during at that time. But I took the time to play the games and provide feedback. IMO feedback is the most important thing you can get when designing something for others to enjoy. Ratings, notes, measurement or ranking aren't that valuable, it more important to understand the users / players experience.

I hope this will encourage game devs to finish or see it as a valuable stepping stone for the next project. I'm looking forward to playing the full versions of some of the game entries.

Also if you haven't played the game entries, you should: https://itch.io/jam/uncrankd-game-jam-winter-edition/entries