Sky’s the Limit Hackathon: 180 Projects Connecting Developers and Esports
Earlier this winter, JetBrains and Cloud9 launched Sky’s the Limit, a global hackathon created to bring together two communities that share the same DNA: developers and esports enthusiasts.
The idea was straightforward – developers like solving complex problems, and esports is full of strategy, data, and performance questions. Put those together, and you get plenty of room to build useful things.
The community response was stronger than we expected. Developers, esports fans, analysts, and creators from around the world joined the challenge to build tools, experiences, and insights inspired by competitive gaming.
If you missed the original announcement, you can read more about the hackathon here.
The Numbers Behind the Hackathon
The hackathon brought in 2,293 registrations from developers and esports enthusiasts worldwide. By the submission deadline, participants had delivered an impressive 180 projects, from AI-powered coaching assistants to new fan engagement experiences.
To support participants during the hackathon, we hosted a series of office hours sessions where mentors from JetBrains and Cloud9 answered questions, discussed ideas, and helped teams refine their projects.
Every participant also received free access to the JetBrains All Products Pack and AI Ultimate for two months, which gave them a chance to try JetBrains’ AI coding agent, Junie, while building their projects.
The hackathon was meant to bring software development and esports closer together, giving participants space to experiment with new ideas using real esports data and modern developer tools.
Winning Projects
Below are the winning projects across the four main hackathon categories.
Category 1: A comprehensive assistant coach: C9 StratOS (Daniel Torres)
C9 StratOS is an assistant coaching platform built to help esports teams analyze matches, refine strategies, and improve performance. The project combines advanced data analysis with clear visualizations that help coaches and analysts identify gameplay patterns more quickly.
Category 2: Automated scouting report generator: Spector (David Weatherall) (David Weatherall)
Spector focuses on one of the most time-consuming parts of competitive esports: opponent scouting. The project analyzes gameplay data from VALORANT and League of Legends to generate structured scouting reports. These reports highlight player tendencies, team strategies, and potential weaknesses, giving teams a faster and more systematic way to prepare for upcoming matches.
Category 3: AI drafting assistant/draft predictor: Cloud9 Draft Assistant (James Landry)
Drafting is one of the most strategic phases in competitive esports, where teams must carefully select characters while anticipating their opponent’s choices. The Cloud9 Draft Assistant uses AI to analyze historical match data and model potential draft scenarios. By predicting likely picks, bans, and strategic outcomes, the tool helps teams create stronger draft strategies and prepare more effectively before the match even begins.
Category 4: Event Game: Junie’s Arcade (Ajito Nelson Lucio da Costa)
Junie’s Arcade is a fan experience inspired by JetBrains’ AI coding agent, Junie. The project combines game mechanics with a fun developer-themed narrative and shows how technology and creativity can come together to create engaging experiences at live esports events.
Bonus Awards
In addition to the main competition categories, several projects stood out for their creativity and contribution to the community.
Best blog post: VLML (blog post, Kenneth Adrian Ubales)
VLML stood out for its clear documentation and engaging explanation of the project’s technical ideas. In the blog post, the author walks readers through the development process, covering architecture decisions, challenges, and lessons learned. By sharing his process so openly, he created a useful resource for anyone who wants to understand both the project and the thinking behind it.
Best video: Synapse (Arvind Vivekanandan, Venkat Nallapaneni, Vigneshaditya Nallapaneni)
This submission impressed the judges with a polished and engaging project presentation. The video clearly explains the idea behind the project and shows how the solution works in practice. By combining storytelling, visuals, and technical explanation, the team created a compelling video that highlights both the creativity and the engineering effort behind the project.
Best Junie feedback: Ascend (Yash Moharir)
The author of Ascend provided especially detailed product feedback during the hackathon. His comments covered real development workflows, usability observations, and suggestions for improving the developer experience. Feedback like this helps JetBrains improve its tools.
Celebrating the Winners at GDC
The winners of the main hackathon categories received, among other prizes, an all-expenses-paid trip to the Game Developers Conference (GDC).
During the conference week, the winners joined the JetBrains and Cloud9 teams in San Francisco and experienced GDC firsthand by attending talks, meeting other developers, and connecting with the wider game development community.
One of the highlights of the week was the JetBrains GameDev Night, where we celebrated the hackathon results with developers, partners, and friends of JetBrains. Two of the winning teams presented their projects live on stage, shared the ideas behind their work, and received a warm response from the audience.
Seeing projects that started as hackathon submissions presented live in front of the community was a special moment, showing how quickly creative ideas can turn into real tools and experiences.
The celebration continued at the JetBrains booth during the conference. One of the winning projects, the event mini-game created during the hackathon, was installed at the booth and quickly became a popular attraction. Hundreds of GDC attendees stopped by to try the game, and many replayed it multiple times to improve their scores.
To make things even more exciting, visitors also had the chance to compete against Cloud9 VALORANT pro players Zellsis and V1c, which turned the activity into a mix of gaming, developer curiosity, and esports fun.
Thank You to the Community
The Sky’s the Limit hackathon was a celebration of creativity, collaboration, and innovation across both the developer and esports worlds.
A huge thank you to:
- Every participant who submitted a project
- The Cloud9 team for their partnership
- GRID for providing esports data
- Everyone who joined our office hours sessions and supported the event
- The creativity and enthusiasm throughout the hackathon were impressive, and we’re excited to continue exploring what software development, AI, and esports can build together!
Because when developers and gamers start building together, the sky truly is the limit.
