December 16, 2005
Trip and Grace Enter “The Pit” at Slamdance
The 2006 Slamdance Guerilla Gamemaker Competition Finalists have been announced, and one of them is Façade! Congratulations, Andrew and Michael, on another accolade for this interactive drama.
It looks like several other interesting pieces will be moshing at the festival (January 19-27, 2006 in Salt Lake City), including two games that have been featured on Grand Text Auto: Ian Bogost’s Disaffected! and Aaron Reed’s Whom the Telling Changed (GTxA discussion, download page.) Congratulations to these two as well, and to the other indie game developers who will be bringing their clouds, gems, labyrinths, wildlife, and body parts to encounter Sumerian fires, photoduplication, and marital dissolution at Slamdance.
December 16th, 2005 at 5:23 pm
Thanks for the post, Nick! This looks like a great, diverse group of games. Exciting! We saw Cloud and met the developers when we visited USC last month. I really liked it, I told them it reminded me of the Orisinal games, particularly the balloon-in-the-clouds game.
Actually, I may not make it to the festival, as I’ll be happily pre-occupied — my wife is due to give birth to our first child (this one doesn’t count) in early to mid January! :-) If I end up going to Slamdance, it’ll only be for one day of the weeklong festival, when my mother-in-law is visiting. Regardless, sounds like Michael can make it to Park City.
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We might as well use this space to list out the 2006 Independent Games Festival finalists, to compete in March at GDC, which includes some Slamdance finalists as well:
Seumas McNally Grand Prize: Darwinia, Dofus, Professor Fizzwizzle, Weird Worlds: Return To Infinite Space, Wildlife Tycoon: Venture Africa.
Best Web Browser Game: Dodge That Anvil, Moleculous, Dad ‘N Me.
Innovation In Game Design: Rumble Box, Strange Attractors, Braid, The Witch’s Yarn, Darwinia.
Technical Excellence: Saints & Sinners Bowling, Tribal Trouble, Tube Twist, Darwinia, Crazy Ball.
Innovation In Visual Art: Dofus, Darwinia, Putt Nutz, Glow Worm, Thomas And The Magical Words
Innovation In Audio: Professor Fizzwizzle, Saints & Sinners Bowling, Dodge That Anvil, Glow Worm, Weird Worlds: Return To Infinite Space.
(An early, unfinished version of Façade was an IGF finalist in 2004.)
December 16th, 2005 at 5:44 pm
Indie Game Events + Persuasive Games at Slamdance
It’s the season for independent game exhibitions. First, a call for papers, games, and machinima has been issued for media@terra 06, a festival. Click over to Grand Text Auto for the full call. Submissions for the game exhibition are due…
December 16th, 2005 at 6:53 pm
I’m looking forward to Slamdance! Ian went last year (two years in a row now for him) and had a blast.
December 16th, 2005 at 7:18 pm
Yeah, it was a great experience. Having the general public and filmmakers play our game (and other games) was a very different and generally more rewarding experience than the game/tech type exhibits I’ve done in the past.
December 16th, 2005 at 7:25 pm
Here’s another festival, in Monaco in February: Imagina.
December 19th, 2005 at 2:33 pm
Congratulations on the birth of your child, Andrew.
It seems like theres been an an increase in indie gaming oriented festivals over the past several years, not quite exponential but still significant. I don’t want to fall into blind optimism, but that strikes me as symptomatic of a larger renaissance in interactive entertainment.