Spark Challenge · Project information
Founding Tester Participation Terms
Last updated: 10 October 2026
1. About the programme
Spark Challenge offers open-ended, hands-on challenges for children aged 6–11, with a parent or legal guardian present.
During the Founding Tester phase, families can voluntarily share their play experiences to help explore the ideas behind a separate, future game. Spark Challenge is not that future game.
These terms apply to participation through either the Guide and Challenge Card or a Spark Challenge play pack offered as a Founding Tester Edition.
2. Buying and participating are separate
Buying an edition does not require you to join the programme, submit a report or provide photographs. You may simply use it for play.
Buying an edition or joining the waiting list does not automatically grant Founding Tester status.
These terms do not replace the terms applicable to your purchase or affect your statutory consumer rights.
3. How to become Founding Testers
- The child must attempt all three challenges.
- A parent or legal guardian must observe the play experience.
- The parent or legal guardian must complete and submit the Playtest Report.
Every challenge does not need to be solved. Unfinished attempts, changes of direction and loss of interest are valid observations.
Photographs are optional. A written description is sufficient.
Full preparation instructions and details of how to earn Founding Tester status are provided in the Founding Tester Guide.
4. The adult’s role and safety
The parent or legal guardian must remain present, follow the instructions supplied with the edition, and ensure that the activity and materials are suitable for the child.
For the Guide and Challenge Card, the adult provides and checks the household materials. Any substitutions must also be checked for suitability and safety.
Support and encouragement are welcome. Wherever possible, leave the ideas and decisions to the child. Always intervene when necessary for safety.
Stop or pause if the child wishes to do so, becomes distressed, or uses an item unsafely. There is no requirement to continue against the child’s wishes.
5. Using your feedback
Reports and optional photographs are used to understand how children approach the challenges and to inform the development of a separate, future game.
This is not an academic, diagnostic or psychological assessment. Recognition does not judge the child’s ability or performance.
Submitting a report does not transfer ownership of your photographs or written material. Identifiable reports, photographs and quotations will not be published without separate permission.
Personal information is handled as explained in the Privacy Notice.
6. Recognition and future opportunities
Families meeting the requirements receive Founding Tester recognition and a certificate. With separate parental consent, a chosen name may be included among early contributors. Public recognition is optional.
If the separate future game is released, Founding Testers will receive a discount towards purchasing it. Details of its type and value will be shared later. No fixed discount value, production date or release is guaranteed. Where a future opportunity is limited, Complete Edition participants receive priority, as described in the Guide.
Project news and promotional emails are optional and require a separate choice to receive them. Messages necessary to process your report or provide your certificate are handled separately.
The minimal records needed to administer recognition and future benefits are retained until two years after the separate future game is released. If development is permanently closed without a release, those records are deleted within one year of closure, unless earlier deletion is required or requested. This is a record-retention period, not a promise of a discount’s value or duration.
Founding Tester is a recognition title. It provides no ownership, equity, financial interest or decision-making rights in Spark Challenge, the future game or the project.
7. Voluntary participation and withdrawal
You may stop participating at any time without giving a reason. This does not affect your purchase or consumer rights.
To withdraw permission for the use of your personal information or submitted material, contact us below. The Privacy Notice explains withdrawal and deletion requests.
Withdrawal does not undo processing already lawfully carried out. Findings genuinely anonymised so they can no longer be linked to your family may remain in the project’s analysis.
8. Closing the Founding Tester phase
Any closing date for new submissions will be announced on the project website. Later Spark Challenge editions may be sold solely for play, without Founding Tester participation.
Closing the programme does not cancel recognition already earned or specific commitments already made to participants.
9. Contact
Programme organiser: Spark Challenge – Founding Tester Project (Zsolt Makai)