The Montreal mirror (a local paper) just published its annual Best Of Montreal issue were everybody had a few weeks to vote for their favorite dive bar, restaurant, Montreal weirdo, drag queens, drugs, coffee, places to have public sex and LOCAL VIDEOGAME COMPANY. The results are as follow.
1. Ubisoft Montreal
2. EA montreal
3. A2M
4. Gameloft 5. KOKOROMI
!!!
Not surprising the winner of the first-ever best local videogame developer category is Ubisoft Montreal. the gargantuan studio - whose over 1600 employees makes it one of the world’s largest - released assassin’s creed in 2007. EA Montreal, makers of army of two and boogie, place second. The city’s second-largest studio, A2M, came in third, despite releasing games skewed to a younger crowd. Gameloft is the only cellphone game company to crack the list, while indie gaming wasn’t ignored with fifth place going to Kokoromi.
jon: can you play PC games now? me: theoretically, yes. why? jon: do you want a key for everyday shooter on steam? me: oh shit
really?
that’s happening?
hells yes i want one jon: yea it just came out an hour ago me: woah
how come no one is talking about it?
jon: dunno
nobody cares? or it’s too early
spread the news
me: fo sho i will.
About 2 weeks ago i was invited to give a presentation at this big serious professional mini-conference called Interface(s) held and organized by SAT, the venue where we have our GAMMA events. Anyway. In true indie fashion, i was kinda drunk and said a lot of silly things. Watch me blame art for the ills of the industry, give a metaphorical blowjob to Cactus and generally mispronounce almost everything i said. Also, swearwords!
The talk can be viewed online in its entirety right here. Ignore the lengthy french intro, the talk itself is all in english. With a funny accent. You can also watch the other presentations here.
Due to an unfortunate accident we lost the official video that was shot at Gamma256. So if you have or know of any footage taken at the event - games or musical performances - please get in touch.
One of the better consequences of the unprotected lovefest that was IGF is a project based on an inside joke that started when an owl killed a pigeon right in front of everybody at gamma256 and i dont remember any of it and i swear this is all a big conspiracy, of which this game is the latest link. It features contributions from a good dozen TIGers (i did the endgame voiceover!). It also features monocles.
But meanwhile, I needed an excuse to throw a dance party here in Pittsburgh, so I pulled together this two-day multi-event symposium, The Art of Play, as a cover. With the generous help of numerous CMU departments and divisions including the School of Art and the ETC, we’ve invited some art/game superstars from across North America to debate and present. Plus, we’re hosting a first-of-its-kind art game arcade to showcase both independent and (quirky) commercial work. So, come on down (it’s free and open to the public) and take part in the goodness at Carnegie Mellon!
Holy crap, GDC 08 was the best week ever. Every other week ever can just fuck right off. We’re all back home now and getting back to work on Fez, as well as other juicy bits we will unveil in a near-ish future. While you wait, here’s a video of Jason DeGroot, musician and producer on Fez, playing a remixed version of his score at a retro-themed videogame party in Tokyo called Fami-Mode.
jon: can you play PC games now?
About 2 weeks ago i was invited to give a presentation at this big serious professional mini-conference called Interface(s) held and organized by SAT, the venue where we have our GAMMA events. Anyway. In true indie fashion, i was kinda drunk and said a lot of silly things. Watch me blame art for the ills of the industry, give a metaphorical blowjob to Cactus and generally mispronounce almost everything i said. Also, swearwords!
