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Hello all,
We are going to have a regular meeting space for indie developers and enthusiasts to get together and work on projects. This is for an audience similar to the games Jam from last year – you know, people doing indie dev full-time or part-time, artists interested in making games, professionals happy to make stuff for the fun of it, creatives from other media interested in games. The main thing is to provide a regular location where you know you will find similar minded people making games. Overall it will be a relaxed atmosphere where people will have plenty of chances to interact.
The idea is is to have about one meet up every month or so and on the day pick a topic then design and setup a challenge for the next meetup. You can also choose to Jam or demo a project you are working on or act as an expert for the day on some tool or process. People could work solo or in groups and we will make some effort to try team people up should they wish, particularly any lone wolves or creatives from other fields feeling a bit lost. There won’t be any formal training, lectures or workshops going on – so some degree of self-sufficiency is expected. It is similar in setup to the previous games jam (bring your own laptop, digital tools. Tables, chairs, internet are provided), finer details to come later.
Aphra and myself were speaking to FilmBase in TempleBar, Dublin, who have generously volunteered us some space for Indie developer days, starting on the 19th Feb (also 26th March, 30th of April). FilmBase are tasked with helping indigenous film makers getting started and they are interested in the cross-over of films into games culture, process and concepting; and vice versa. We will be based in one of the training rooms, with good access to the cafe (coffee, tea, brownies, crisps and what not).
There will be limited spaces, approximately 20, with priority for people who will volunteer their time on the day. Tickets will be Free.
So this is where we need your help! (PLEASE!!).
1) If you know of anyone who is interested or doing their own games that might be interested in more community interaction, please point them to this thread.2) "Indie Dev Days" is the current name. Can anyone come up with something better. A bit of wit wouldn’t go a miss. Please reply with ideas!!
3) Volunteers. As mentioned above we’ll keep a few slots kept aside for people who can provably volunteer some skills or tools knowledge. Ideally we’d like to get people happy to help others, should they ask on the following topics: coding, art, audio, story writing. We will also ask for volunteer help on the day – probably means no more than fielding a few questions on a tool you know well. Everyone will be an expert on games design so we don’t need to worry about that XD.
4) Thoughts. Reply in the thread and let us know what you think, interested? put-off by some aspect? going to attend!!
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Hey I’m new to the site, first post here but i’ll definately be interested. I can volunteer to help with the coding aspects :)
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Great idea, I’m very interested in attending. I’d offer to volunteer but I’m a designer. I can provide a bit of assistance in 3ds max, photoshop and maya etc but you’re probably better off with a dedicated artist for the really complex stuff.
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2) "Indie Dev Days" is the current name. Can anyone come up with something better. A bit of wit wouldn’t go a miss. Please reply with ideas!!
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[/quote:79c54a3d5a]I think it’s a fantastic idea and will definitely try to attend and if you’re not inundated with coding volunteers already I’d like to help out.
In terms of names, just off the top of my head and I’m not saying they’re great:
"I came here to make a game, but all I got was this lousy null pointer exception"
"Excuse me, there’s a game in my code"
"I said a hip hop the hippie the hippie to the hip hip hop, ah you don’t stop
the rock it to the bang bang boogie say up jumped the boogie to the rhythm of the boogie, the game jam" -
This sounds great and I’d definitely head along. I’m too much of a generalist to volunteer in terms of any skills but would be willing to help with anything on the day or helping with a blog/site/facebook? for the event.
Can’t wait to see this get off the ground!
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Great stuff John. I’ll get back to you soon if I know if I can help out.
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Cool, thanks for the replies all and offers of help! On the design/editor/coding side we probably mostly need people who can zone in on a particular tool or language, suited to short development cycles – like Unity3d, Flixel/Flashpunk, XNA, Gamemaker, Action Script, JScript or C#. Chasey, Thane, Anthony are you familiar with any of these languages, or anyone familiar with those engines/editors? I can already help out a little on Unity3d, Flixel, XNA or the languages but am not an expert.
On the art side people might use Flash, 3dsmax, Photoshop, Maya, so maybe JohnMonkey you already fill this role – even just help with using art-to-engine exporters could be handy. An expert in Unreal Engine/ Kismet/Unreal Script could be handy too if there are any.
Anthony thanks for the name suggestions, although they’re a tad long :)
JohnnyJohnJohns, thanks for the offer of blogging help – I may take you up on that for the later events, but still need to figure out how to approach all that for now.
Alan, as a resident indie hero it would be awesome to have you there!
P.S. If anyone hasn’t actually made a game of their own in their spare time before it would be really useful just to take a really simple editor / engine (I’m told GameMaker is one) and make something dead simple in an evening. The act of making even an unfun simple game is extremely empowering and good ground work for the dev days.
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Yeah I know C# quite well. I’m okay with XNA and JScript too.
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I’ve worked a little with XNA and C# but would be most comfortable with flash and actionscript
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Great to see the interest.
I will be trying to support the initiative from afar but we are going to organise three of these between Feb and the summer and then see if we continue or not.
I wonder would it be useful to have one ‘postmortem’ at each session where a group who have released a small game talk about it? Just an idea… Maybe just for twenty mins or something…
And thanks again to Filmbase for providing the really cool space.
I hope to drop in virtually to the first one..
Aphra.
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Great initiative Greenbeen, fair play to everyone involved.
I have just released a custom module based on the Dragon Age game and it’s probably not so relevant to this, but would be delighted to volunteer (or attend!) in any capacity whatsoever (I make good tea).
You can check it out on my thread.
http://www.gamedevelopers.ie/forums/viewtopic.php?t=5947
Looking forward to seeing this materialize.
Paul
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Cool, looks like we are well covered for people on the programming end plus some art help should anyone be stuck! Thanks Thane, Chasey, Anthony & JohnMonkey! Consider your places kept :)
Downloaded your mod yesterday Paul, but didn’t get a chance to check it out yet. You should certainly bring it along to the event and show it off. Would you mind giving a quick presentation/postmortem on your concepts, motivation and process for it? Tips for others interested in a similar challenge etc?
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Downloaded your mod yesterday Paul, but didn’t get a chance to check it out yet. You should certainly bring it along to the event and show it off. Would you mind giving a quick presentation/postmortem on your concepts, motivation and process for it? Tips for others interested in a similar challenge etc?[/quote:cdf8acbebe]
I’d be delighted to.
Will keep a check here for times etc.
Looking forward to meeting you all!
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Cool, looks like we are well covered for people on the programming end plus some art help should anyone be stuck! Thanks Thane, Chasey, Anthony & JohnMonkey! Consider your places kept :)
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[/quote:d47a300d53]Cool, looking forward to it!
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2D artist here if snyone would like some help? Games design, level design and developement are my string suit. Flash too… :)
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where do we sign up lol ?
BTW ideas for event name..
Indevents?(IndieDevEvents)
or
Apple press event for new head set ipad? ( will get attention! )
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Fair play GreenBean getting this off the ground!
Looks like there’s plenty of programmers offering to help, which is excellent. I’d be happy to help people out with C++ & iOS and general game engineering stuff. We’re always keeping an eye out for talented programmers so this could be a good way for up and coming stars to showcase their skills.
What about GreenBeanFest? Has a certain ring to it…
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"Everyone will be an expert on games design so we don’t need to worry about that XD."
I know this was meant a bit tongue in cheek, but I really think we should consider getting some high level designer assistance if we can. As a designer I’m always looking for more experienced people to eat their brains and gain their kno- learn from.
Especially helpful would be on the spot critiquing of concepts and planned implementations of design. A good designer will be able to spot early problems in pacing, level design, risk reward paradigms, visual language, mechanics, control schemes etc
It would help keep things moving and mitigate that last 20% of development scramble to make something good out of the mess you’ve just created.
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TinkyArk, Greggason good to have you on board :)
"Indevents" has potential. Any other ideas? Might be worth trying something like "Irish Indie Confab", "Games Gabfest", "Indie Interchange", "Games Palaver" or "The preShindig".
On signing up – we’re still a month away from it happening – so I’ll sort out the tickets in a week or two (going to use EventBrite, it’s handy and free). Just want to reconfirm finer details with FilmBase first and get the name sorted.
JohnMonkey, you may be right – the more design experience around the better. There are a few irish or local good designers who might be of help – Ian Hannigan if he’s home, David Bishop of PopCap, Tadhg Kelly of "What Games Are", Terry Cavanagh and probably a few others.
That blog by Tadhg Kelly goes into good detail about loops, dynamics, pacing, expansion etc. and gives the correct impression that every game is different. But I’m a firm believer that the best thing you can do is try and learn from your efforts, plus read the seminal books out there(Koster, Schell). An indie developer who has finished 5 short thoughtful games in a year probably has more meaningful to say on games design than someone who’s made 2 AAA games in 5 years.
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I’m not that sure about weighing one indie developer who has finished 5 games in one year V an industry designer who has made 2 AAA games in 5 years to be honest.
I kinda fit somewhere in the mid point along that continuum, what with making DS games, and I’m constantly surprised by what people at both ends have to offer but AAA guys tend to be making AAA games for a damn good reason.On that very note we should add Nifty to that list if we can get him over!
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i have to agree..
having a great idea or theme is a brilliant way to start a project, but with out a well thought out design process it usually results in great concept and poor content or the other way around.
i have watched with interest these events before, really looking forward to finally getting involved with this one. :P
http://www.chunkeymonkey.delightfuldigital.com/games.html… Fruit version is the most finished…The games page includes 3 version of a game i built last year. I need to update this site badly but as it isnt in the public domain i havent been to bothered :?
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What about "IndieShindig" as a name? Shorter than my earlier suggestions at least :P
As a possible source of ideas for the each day, you could pinch / mash a few themes from here http://experimentalgameplay.com/
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Great going Greenbean, the event sounds likes it’s really coming together.
I’ll definitely be signing up to attend, not sure how much I have to offer, bit of C# / XNA experience!
A name? How about an acronym, I’m a bit GIDDY about the day (Games Indie Development Day, YES/Yippee).
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I’d love to come over and take a look at your Indie-cent proposals. If the events happen with a decent bit of notice I’m sure I can happen to be about :)
I’ll be over in Dublin for a week from the 26th if anyone wants to meet up for pint or 2.
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im kinda warming to ‘indie Jam’
like this…
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Hairy Robot Jam
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JM the debate about AAA design processes v Indie processes is best left for the days themselves I think :)
Nice games TinyArk (had a go on the computer one), and thanks for the name-image suggestion. Also thanks to Freak_Bruther, ruttlej, Anthony for name suggestions.
Trying to stay away from Jam, this is less formal than most Jams in that you could take on the monthly challenge and/or do team building instead, or just come and demo some work in progress.
Does "Game Craic" (Game Craic Days, the Game Craic event, Indie Game Craic etc) fail to work for anyone? I like it. I would go with "Indie Shindig" too, but it might make people think they’ve got to get pissed and have a dance :)
Nifty would be great to have you attend one of the days if you can, dates are on the first post / title.
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"Game Craic"
…..hee hee dirty.Indie Craic sounds even worse :)
:roll: "where are you spending saturday?"
:lol: "indie craic"love it
….Game Craic sounds good to me.. Also GC as letters offer alot to a designer
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Indie Catalyst
Indie Hook -Up
Games Hook Up
Collabhoration
Collabornation
Time of the Month
Game of the Month
Indie Period
28 Days Later
4 week itch
11100 days later
1C Days LaterI could go on…
We should probably bring some examples of work or whatever as a way of wooing potential collaborators? Huh?
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okies.. so i was looking at the original post..and a space for … etc
and came up with this. Feedback very welcome.
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I like it, I’d say it’s a winner. Could you fit games in there though? I.e. Indie Games Space. The first 3 events are happening in (and courtesy of) FilmBase. So indie to FilmBase means indie films (and indie more often than not to most people means indie music) and it helps to differentiate what this is about.
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sure :) leave it with me.. ill work on it this afternoon ( between real work :lol: )
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also… is it worth setting up a facebook page for this? once we have decided on a title? it will help promo it.
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Cool, looks like the logo is almost there! Just some extra details: Training Room 1 – 12.30pm to 5pm. (Just confirmed that)
Yeah, a Facebook page is a good idea. Makes it a lot handier to talk afterwards – show pictures of work in progress etc. If you want to set one up, please do. I’m going to setup the (free) ticket page tonight so people can allocate a seat for themselves. Both the Facebook url and Ticket url might be worthy additions to the logo.
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grand.. ill work away with the facebook stuff over tomorrow and wednesday. When we can ill the relevant info ill add some info and polish to the design :)
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Looks cool TinyArk!
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Ok, here’s the ticket page http://indiegamesspace.eventbrite.com/.
Please help me out with any mistakes you notice, was up a bit late coding before doing this.
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Facebook page will be completed during the day.
Here is the iFrame Code for anyone wishing to help advertise
<iframe src="http://www.facebook.com/plugins/likebox.php?href=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fplatform&width=292&colorscheme=light&show_faces=true&stream=true&header=true&height=427" scrolling="no" frameborder="0" style="border:none; overflow:hidden; width:292px; height:427px;" allowTransparency="true"></iframe>
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Thanks Aphra, made those changes.
Forgot to mention I put the setting such that tickets will go on sale on Thursday 1am. So any promotion on Fb etc can presume they’re live then.
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Perhaps I’ve gone blind or my morning dose of caffine hasn’t kicked in, but I can’t see a registration link on Eventbrite. Is it up yet or am I just having one of those days?
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See my last post – They go on sale on Thursday :)
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as mentioned on the facebook fanpage
http://www.facebook.com/pages/IndieGameSpace/177419852299177?v=wall
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Well thats what I get for not refreshing a page I’ve left open for half an hour before posting :D
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Tickets are now on sale. Spread the word!
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I have 2 booked. I’ll pop on fb later and update. I’ll bang out some tweets too. Btw facebook likes needed to spread the word :)
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its great to see that ATM there are only 5 tickets left for this event.
Please post ideas for game themes on our Facebook Fan page :)
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I’ve signed up. Not sure how productive I’d be with any sort of challenges, as I normally work to a more… relaxed schedule, but we’ll see how it goes. :)
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Hello, just a quick reminder to everyone, this is on next weekend. I’m mad busy preparing for GDC so don’t have much time for anything else. I’ll check up here regularly though in case anyone has further questions.
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Hello, just a quick reminder to everyone, this is on next weekend. I’m mad busy preparing for GDC so don’t have much time for anything else. I’ll check up here regularly though in case anyone has further questions.[/quote:6100d067bb]
Hey Greenbean!
Thanks very much for the invite to attend, just spotted it – but alas I will not be in Dublin around that time. I’m sure there will be plenty more of these happening – it is an excellent idea and great to see this type of practical gathering getting such enthusiastic support!
A massive well done on putting this together and best of luck to all those taking part!
Ian
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God dammit ! was too late. :x
Guess its for the best , need to work on the my masters anyway. But will keep an eye out for the next one. Might even drop in to see how its going too.
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Hey can someone let me know what tech people are looking to use to I have it installed on the day?[/quote:7e0234c140]
Powerpoint Viewer if you can.
Looking forward to it!
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Hey can someone let me know what tech people are looking to use to I have it installed on the day?[/quote:b12851f9cb]
Powerpoint Viewer if you can.
Looking forward to it![/quote:b12851f9cb] I don’t know if that was a joke… I was talking about development libraries. I don’t have Powerpoint though, I use LibreOffice.[/quote:b12851f9cb]
No, I actually missed the ‘tech’ part and assumed it was general software you were talking about :oops:
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Hope this goes well tomorrow, I look forward to seeing the results.
Any word on the theme, or possible themes?
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Attendees are going to suggest one each plus any from the Facebook page. We’ll draw two from a hat.
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Hello, just a quick reminder to everyone, this is on next weekend. I’m mad busy preparing for GDC so don’t have much time for anything else. I’ll check up here regularly though in case anyone has further questions.[/quote:597736f589]
Hey Greenbean!
Thanks very much for the invite to attend, just spotted it – but alas I will not be in Dublin around that time. I’m sure there will be plenty more of these happening – it is an excellent idea and great to see this type of practical gathering getting such enthusiastic support!
A massive well done on putting this together and best of luck to all those taking part!
Ian[/quote:597736f589]
Ooops, missed this. Ta Ian. It is of course going to be about people attending and having a go. Hopefully you can catch one of the future days.
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Hey folks, I’ve just had something important crop up on me this morning, I’m not going to be able to make the event (yeah, short notice it sucks) Is there any way I can transfere the my ticket, would anyone else be interested in going in my place?
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That’s a pity guys. If anyone is around Dublin and wondering if they should come in without a ticket, I’d say yes, don’t worry there will be plenty of seats.
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Just a quick thanks to John and anyone else involved in setting today up, really enjoyed it!
Look forward to the next one.
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Thanks and well done to everyone for showing up and participating. Special thanks to Paul Conway for giving a great talk and FilmBase for hosting us. Also thanks to Havok for the drinks and t-shirts (they went fast!). Thanks to our volunteers and Aphra and Jamie for helping out. Hope as many people as possible will post some of the stuff they are working here on the forum, just like Sofox! See Facebook page for a few pictures – http://www.facebook.com/album.php?id=177419852299177&aid=35921
Next one is about 5 weeks away (26th March), challenge deadline is 19th March (the Saturday before). Tickets will be available about 2 weeks before.
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Just want to say thanks to John and anyone else who helped organise it, the day was great fun at a great venue!
Also thanks to Paul Conway for his talk, the mod looks amazing.
We’ll post up something once our idea starts taking shape.
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Thanks JJJ. Looking forward to seeing your idea.
For those that were curious the possible themes were:
"Pork Mining"
"Flying"
"Criminal Sports Games"
"Spheres"
"Seven Deadly Sins"
"Love-Making"
"Fish Out Of Water"
"Cheating"
"Religion"
"Face First"
"Recovery"
"Spring (Season)"
"Co-op multiplayer"
"Bats"
"1916 Rising"and of course the chosen themes of "Disease Pandemic" & "Failure".
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For those that were curious the possible themes were:
"Pork Mining"
"Flying"
"Criminal Sports Games"
"Spheres"
"Seven Deadly Sins"
"Love-Making"
"Fish Out Of Water"
"Cheating"
"Religion"
"Face First"
"Recovery"
"Spring (Season)"
"Co-op multiplayer"
"Bats"
"1916 Rising"and of course the chosen themes of "Disease Pandemic" & "Failure".[/quote:7ba716db53]
Would you say these suggestions are representative of the types of people who attended?
What’s the deal with the ‘challenge’?
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The Challenge is to make something (or more carry on making something from the day) in time for the next event. There’s no prize – it’s not a competition, but a deadline of sorts to help people have a finishing point. Ideally we’ll have one or two games to talk about by then.
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I finally got around to making a game… but some zombies snuck their way in!
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Awesome. Nice work Oscan – I played with it a little, like the concept and well done on putting the game up here on the forums :)
Just thought I should point out that: tickets are now available for the second day
So far it looks like this one will be quieter. Perhaps people are frightened to show up without some work complete from the last, but it’s only a challenge – there will be no judgements or postmortems. We’ll just choose a theme and get on with the next challenge. Also we have Digital Sideburns giving a talk which will be worth listening to. So spread the word to anyone who might enjoy the day. Check: this thread for the latest
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I can’t recommend this enough lads, I popped into the last one for a while and there was a great vibe there, really relaxed and friendly. I’m going to try to make this one for the full session, even to get a few hours uninterrupted with my wacom would be worth the trip along!
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