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Two-Week Game Development Training in the Heart of Europe!

The first edition was a GREAT success!
See you in March-April 2027!
(Dates to be announced)

​Are you a female-identifying game developer from Belgium, South Africa, Kenya, or Uganda?

 

Do you want to enhance your skills in digital storytelling, game design & development, collaborate with international peers, and participate in a game jam focused on creating games for impact - together with inspiring devs from across the globe? This is your chance!!

 

We are offering an exclusive opportunity for maximum 17 talented women (9 female devs from South Africa, Kenya, and Uganda, and maximum 8 from Belgium) to join a two-week training hosted in Kortrijk, Belgium at the campus of Howest Digital Arts & Entertainment (DAE). The program is designed to elevate your expertise, build industry connections, and, above all, empower you as a female dev.

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The overview of the training is as follows (see the 'Program' tab for more info):​

--> Week 1: Masterclasses week

--> Week 2: Game Jam week

 

Thanks to the generous support of VLIR-UOS, all costs, including travel, accommodation, and program expenses, are fully covered for intercontinental participants (participants joining us from South Africa, Kenya, and Uganda).

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**UPDATE: We are busy preparing the project for 2027. We welcome you to apply for the 2027 cycle from 1 June 2026!

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Check out the games made during the 2026 edition!

Theme: Outgrow Hunger

During the first edition of Roots & Pixels, 9 female devs from South Africa and Kenya and 6 female devs from Belgium joined forces to create 4 ready-to-play games surrounding the theme of 'Outgrow Hunger,' thanks to a collaboration with Games for Change and the World Food Programme.

Root Resistance

Powered by: Yvette Kooke,
Princess Kabeya, Ruby
Walne, Sithe Ncube

WINNER!

PsPsPsPsPs

Powered by: Hannah Peeters, Joanna Oluoch, Kaatje Geerits

Driftwood Grove

Powered by: Mijide Kemoli, Mergery Wanjiru, Catharina Broes, Femke Van Dael

SeedKeeper

Powered by: Azra Parker, Ioanna Efthymiadou, 
Avuzwa Ntshongwana, Cassie Simpson

Check out the games made during Microsoft Xbox Game Camp  Belgium!

Theme: Outgrow Hunger

The Microsoft Xbox Game Camp Belgium, held at Howest Digital Arts & Entertainment (DAE), collaborated with Roots & Pixels for its inaugural year. Students of Howest DAE - and professionals - could also choose to work on the theme of 'Outgrow Hunger' during their coinciding game jam.

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Hoppy Bunny

Powered by: Arielle Lichtman, Hovo Hakobyan, Patrick-Raul Babinsky, Petru Grati, Rei Messely, Zain Al Rubaie
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Boomin' Acres

Powered by: Mia, Xander, Tristan, Kyan, Miguel, Gulliver, Ezra, Keano
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Orbital Fish Delivery

Powered by: Robby Roodhuyzen de Vries, Aris Lohr, Kreya Kropsch, Elaine Reis, Yve El-Sawaf
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Eaternal Hunger

Powered by: Alice, Nils, Daphny, Isabelle, Aaron, Ash, Madara, Yulan
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Stroberry

Powered by: Nore, Trisha, Noor, aneacsu, kasra_ftn, Seb, Robin
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Flock Off

Powered by: Siebe Boogaerts, Mats Roelandt, Jesse Peeters, Pepijn Vanhumbeeck, Bauwen De Ron, Loic Delaey
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VROOM-BOOM DASH

Powered by: Trisha Gupta, Jarne Horemans, Lilia Hranova, Garrett Mooney, Dasha Nguyen, Tim Van De Perre
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Hungry Games

Powered by: Trisha Gupta, Jarne Horemans, Lilia Hranova, Garrett Mooney, Dasha Nguyen, Tim Van De Perre
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Exploding Eggplants

Powered by: Nairolf, shano19, Christopher Null

Roots & Pixels, a project powered by the awesomeness of WOMEN.

A two-week training focused on the power of storytelling and the indelible value of
cross-cultural communication.

Join us: Empower yourself, Empower others.

Check us out on national Belgian news!

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Powered by:

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VLIR-UOS is a Belgian organization that supports partnerships between universities and institutions in Flanders and the Global South. Through education, research, and capacity-building programs, VLIR-UOS fosters sustainable development, innovation, and knowledge exchange. Their funding enables students, researchers, and professionals from diverse backgrounds to collaborate on transformative projects, such as this initiative aimed at empowering women in the games industry.

Mergery Wanjiru

Kenya

Mergery is a game designer based in Kenya. She works as a junior Game Designer at Astrapuff and supports emerging African creatives through mentorship and community workshops.

Mijide Kemoli

Kenya

Mijide Kemoli is a multidisciplinary designer and the founder of Keeke Art, a creative consultancy based in Nairobi, Kenya that aids non-profit organizations and socially-conscious companies in educating their audiences on a myriad of social issues in a fun and engaging way through art, design and gaming.

With a professional background in art education and community work, Mijide has had the opportunity to speak about the impact of artistic expression in marginalized Kenyan communities in international forums including the 2019 Annual Comparative and International Education Summit held in San Francisco, Humanity Rising 2020: Personal Empowerment and Leadership in Times of Crisis hosted by Ubiquity, and MCW Global’s 2021 Annual Fundraising Gala held in New York. She has also had her journey and work featured on various platforms including For Creative Girls, Youth Time magazine, People Daily, KTN News and Nation. 

Moreover, Mijide’s creative practice has enabled her to attend workshops, conferences and training programmes in Kenya, the USA and Europe, providing her with the skills that allowed her to found and successfully run her multidisciplinary creative consultancy practice. Her clients to date include Amnesty International, APHRC, UN Women, CARE International, Teach for All and The Freedom Fund, just to name a few. Her most notable game design and development projects to date include What Will You Do?, Mbeteza, Gutuka and Tamaduni.

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Princess Kabeya

South Africa

Princess Kabeya is a multimedia creative passionate about turning real stories and ideas into beautiful, purposeful visuals. With nine years of experience in the industry, she has discovered that good design is not only about looks but also about how it makes people feel.

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Ruby Walne

South Africa

Ruby Walne is a game developer and programmer based in Cape Town, South Africa.
Growing up she had a keen interest in problem solving and technology (all while desperately trying to get her favourite games to work on ancient hardware). Now, after a short stint in the tech industry, she's creating her own games as a programmer, both independently and in a team.
She is heavily invested in her local game dev community, attending events and game jams, even winning a few. Ruby strives to create a supportive space that encourages people to get involved in their local game dev communities.

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Sithe Ncube

South Africa

Sithe has been an active member of the African game development community since 2013, beginning with organizing community events in Lusaka, Zambia. She is passionate about advancing opportunities for games to be used as a medium of cultural expression and preservation for underrepresented voices. Her background in Computer Science informs her interest in the technical side of game development but she’s also taken a great interest in how people power our world of play. She is currently a producer at Nyamakop in South Africa working on the heist game Relooted."

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Kaatje Geerits

Belgium

Kaatje is a technical sound designer who recently graduated from Digital Arts and Entertainment. After completing a bachelor’s degree in Television and Film, she developed a strong interest in sound creation and implementation, alongside a growing curiosity for game development. This led her to pursue a second degree focused on game sound integration, allowing her to combine both fields.

Hannah Peeters

Belgium

Hannah Peeters is a freelance concept artist working in the indie game scene, as well as a teacher/content creator at Artwod and Syntra. As a kid she deeply loved stories and spent all her days drawing characters and places from imagination. Now that this is what she does for work and something she teaches others how to do, it is needless to say that it often doesn’t feel like “work” to her at all.

One of her favourite parts of her job has been meeting the creative community that comes with it. To be passionate about creating meaningful stories, characters and worlds, and finding that same passion in others has been the driving force behind everything she does. This is why she loves teaching too, because there is nothing else she would rather talk for hours about. If anything, she hopes enough of that passion rubs off on her students so they will tell their own stories one day.

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Catharina Broes

Belgium

Catharina is a Game Artist, DAE graduate from Belgium with a special interest in environments and props. She got to that role due to a childhood filled with all kinds of art, playing video games and having many international travels that inspired her to create her own stories, experiences and environments. With a groundwork set in traditional art, architecture, art history, theatre and music, there isn't a form of expression she is unfamiliar with. Her goal is to create impactful, insightful experiences that inspire both the consumer and the creator to escape and appreciate life, whether that is through beauty, melancholy or something else entirely. During her studies, Catharina discovered a passion for community and has carried that over to later endeavours of her life, working on projects such as "Lesbian Simulator", a VR narrative experience detailing what it's like to be a queer woman in Northern Europe. Other projects involve "Station to Station", "Town To City" and "Drone Tanks", the debut title for the Belgian start-up Ludum Elite, where she currently volunteers as main 3D artist.

Ioanna Efthymiadou

Belgium / Greece

Ioanna Efthymiadou is an artist and game designer from Greece, currently residing in Belgium. She has a background in Philosophy and Education, and after completing her Master’s degree, she decided to become involved in game development as a way to share stories and ideas that resonate with her. Her academic background always informs her creative practices, and she enjoys challenging prevailing concepts and ideas we have of games as playful, yet culturally significant form of expression. As game development becomes more and more accessible, she believes this is an important moment for queer and female developers to contribute their own perspectives and narratives, while exploring alternative approaches to storytelling, worldbuilding, and immersion. From a young age, she has been inspired by any form of storytelling such as games, film, and literature and has experimented with various media. Currently, her primary interest lies in 3D graphics, specifically environment creation and prop design. She is working as a freelance 3D artist and designer in Brussels and is actively involved in the local indie game community.

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Yvette Kooke

Belgium / The Netherlands

Yvette Kooke is an independent game developer with a lifelong passion for games. Over the years, this passion has driven her to build skills across multiple disciplines within game development. She runs her own indie game studio, StickyTable, where she creates original titles such as Streep and Viking Nudgers, focusing on strong gameplay mechanics and creative experimentation.

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Femke Van Dael

Belgium

Femke van Dael is a 26 year old programming teacher and game designer driven by a passion for immersive storytelling and innovative play. Got her masters degree in game design at luca school of arts. And is the founder of Power and Petticoats, her own LARP and game design company, she focuses on narrative-driven experiences that invite players to step into rich, emotionally resonant worlds.

With a Master’s  completed through the creation of a tabletop RPG, Femke shaped her academic journey around her dedication to game and narrative design. She is particularly fascinated by the way mechanics and player actions can evoke genuine emotion crafting systems where choices matter and stories unfold organically through play.

Alongside running her company, Femke shares her expertise as a programming teacher, inspiring the next generation to explore technology as a creative medium. She values passing on knowledge just as much as carving out space for her own creative exploration.

Her curiosity extends beyond borders. Through travel and international collaboration, she continually seeks new perspectives to enrich her work. During her internship at Cyborn as a game designer on Wall Town Wonders, she further developed her skills in interactive game design and world-building.

Creative, passionate, and always experimenting with new forms of play, Femke strives to build imaginative, emotionally engaging experiences and to open doors for others to do the same.

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