Track A
Tabletop
Board games, card games, dice games, anything played on a table.
Registration closes in 02:15:31:53
Spend a day building a game about AI safety. It can be a board game, card game, video game, simulation, party game, or something we haven't thought of yet.
$1,000
$250
$250
$250
$250
Sep 24, 2:00 PM
Register by
Sep 25, 3:00 PM
Kickoff
Sep 27, 3:00 AM
Submissions close
Sep 30, 9:00 PM
Peer reviews close
Oct 4, 9:00 PM
Results expected
Use the arrows, or the left and right keys with the strip focused, to move one card at a time.
Fun to play
Judges will consider whether the game is fun, compelling, and worth playing.
40%
Judges will consider whether the game is fun, compelling, and worth playing.
Relevance to AI risks
How thoughtfully the game uses AI safety topics at its core. Features should balance educating on AI-risk as well as playability.
40%
How thoughtfully the game uses AI safety topics at its core. Features should balance educating on AI-risk as well as playability.
Worth playing again?
A game people actually want to play may do more for AI safety than one designed around teaching every concept perfectly.
20%
A game people actually want to play may do more for AI safety than one designed around teaching every concept perfectly.
Teams register, sprint to produce output in 36 hours, then receive feedback from peers on what they made. Top contenders win prize money and everyone receives feedback.
We welcome people from all backgrounds. You might know a lot about AI safety, game design, neither, or both.
It needs to be about AI safety, but it doesn't need to teach it. We would rather see a genuinely fun game that explores one interesting idea than an educational game trying to explain the entire field. AI safety should matter to the game, but fun is a feature, not a distraction from the mission.
Not at all. Mangrove's matchmaking software can connect you with others who share your interests and availability. In fact, it is our specialty! If you already have a group you would like to register with, you are more than welcome to do that too.
Shoot us a message in Slack. We can help.
Whatever someone needs to experience your game, plus a three to five minute video showing us how it works. A rough prototype is completely fine. We care much more about whether the idea works than whether everything is polished.
The hackathon lasts 36 hours so that participants anywhere in the world have a full day to work on their submission. You can commit as much or as little time as you would like: you will have the opportunity to communicate your commitment level when matching to a team.
Absolutely. We ask that you disclose your usage so others can learn from and provide informed feedback on your output.
More about Mangrove hackathons
Not directly. Mangrove does not hand out GPUs or API credits of its own. Our platform can connect you with people who provide this funding though, through our funding page. If your project needs compute, the fastest route is a BlueDot rapid grant (see next question).
BlueDot Impact runs a rolling grants programme for small, concrete AI safety needs: compute and API credits, events, travel, research access and project tooling. Grants run from about fifty dollars to about ten thousand. They are fast: the average reply lands within a day, and ninety percent of applicants hear back within a week. You apply to BlueDot yourself, and our funding page carries the link. Mangrove does not sit between you and them. A BlueDot rapid grant funded our August hackathon, so we can say from experience that the process is as quick as it sounds.
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