Games Lift 2024: Hamburg Incubator Funding

The Games Lift Incubator, an initiative organized by Gamecity Hamburg on behalf of the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg, has selected five developer teams to participate in its 2024 support program. This incubator aims to foster professional growth for early-stage game developers by providing a comprehensive one-year curriculum that includes workshops, mentoring, and networking opportunities. The program is designed to strengthen Hamburg’s position as a leading hub for the games industry by offering both financial and structural support to emerging talent.

Selected teams receive 15,000 euros in financial backing alongside access to a network of over 30 international industry experts. The curriculum covers essential business and development topics, including game design, marketing, pitching, and project management. A new feature for the 2024 cohort is a joint trip to an international industry event, intended to provide participants with broader exposure to global business practices. The selection process for this year’s incubator was competitive, drawing 21 applications from both local and external developers.

The five winning projects represent a diverse range of genres and mechanics: ForeFeathers (a 3D puzzle-platformer), Frisia – Cozy Villages (a town-building strategy game), Light of Atlantis (a 2D puzzle metroidvania), Pubcrawler (a cooperative PC game), and Tiny Garden (a simulation game). These teams will undergo a three-month intensive workshop phase followed by a public pitch in December 2024, with continued mentoring support extending through September 2025. This initiative serves as a key component of Hamburg’s broader strategy to support the local games value chain, which also includes separate prototype funding programs offering up to 120,000 euros per project.