next »

[raiten]

Hi, has anybody heard anything about this year's Experimental Gameplay Workshop? I submitted a game and have been hoping to get to go but it's like 2 weeks left now, and still no word on whether I'm in or out. Last I heard they'd tell everyone a couple of weeks before, but does this mean they've only notified the people who got selected? Then again Alexander  "Hazard" Bruce told me hasn't heard anything either, and I was pretty sure he'd be selected.

I'm only going to GDC if I get in on this and I'd need to get a $900 plane ticket (not to mention accommodation) if so. That said, if I didn't get in you could argue it doesn't matter but it'd still be nice to know if I'm going to be unavailable for a week in 2 weeks time or not, so if anybody knows more, please tell!

[Zaphos]

fwiw I submitted something and haven't heard back either ...

[increpare]

Their tradition is to notify people at the last minute.  I think they had tried to deal with that this year be pushing the deadline back to january, but it's possible that things just caught up with them.  I'd just send Mr Blow an email in inquire.

[raiten]

I did e-mail him/the workshop a week ago, but no response yet. I get a sense they're assuming everybody is going to GDC anyway, so what's the difference?

[raiten]

Did anybody hear from them yet? Fuck, GDC's in a week.

[Zaphos]

No, but I did notice this question in the braid blog's comments:

#  Gemedet Says:
February 26th, 2010 at 8:37 am

Hey Jon, I noticed the experimental gameplay sessions are marked as canceled. What happened?

edit: and it does look that way: https://www.cmpevents.com/GD10/a.asp?option=C&V=11&SessID=10348

[raiten]

What a shame! Thanks Zaphos, it's nice to know. Wonder what happened?

[Terry]

Oh, really? That's a shame

[simoniker]

Ah, I see word is getting out ahead of our announcement. There will be a public note on Monday, but the EGW organizers - Jon Blow, Chris Hecker, Doug Church, Robin Hunicke - were ultimately unhappy they could do a full session this year with the submitted games. (There will be an EGW next year, but not this year.)

The EGW organizers seem to have been a little 'organizationally challenged', so I apologize to anyone from TIGSource and elsewhere who mailed them and never heard anything at all - Marcus, I saw your previous Tweets on the subject actually.

Anyhow, at quite short notice, Matthew Wegner, Steve Swink and myself are putting together something called 'The Nuovo Sessions' in the same timeslot:

https://www.cmpevents.com/GD10/a.asp?option=C&V=11&SessID=11016

It's planned to be - well, I'll write what I mailed Jon Blow about it: "It's not meant to be an EGW clone, since we are intending to have some of the finalists and honorable mentions (and some like-minded folks) for the IGF Nuovo Award show off some of their titles and also critique other people's - more like a rant/showcase combo."

Due to the short notice, there won't be a submission period for this, it'll be invite only, but it should be something fun to check out anyhow for those attending.

Thanks,
Simon@GDC/IGF

[Zaphos]

Jon Blow, Chris Hecker, Doug Church, and Robin Hunicke think we all suck.

Aw  

(edit: er, thank you very much for the reply though, simon!  _{and apologies for intentionally misquoting you})

[Noyb]

Aw, man. That sucks. I was looking forward to seeing the results, especially as a possible counterpoint to the IGF awards.

I really hope I didn't break their spirits after submitting this for kicks.

[dariusk]

While this makes me sad (EGW is always a highlight of GDC) I totally understand.

In '03, '04, '05 -- EGW was always consistently mind-blowing. Back then there wasn't such an organized indie "scene" online like there is today. So it was kind of revelation to hear about these weird little games once a year.

But now experimental games are a part of everyday life. I read my RSS feeds or I hop on Twitter and probably every three days I find some clever game or another. And THAT IS REALLY GREAT.

It's been hard for EGW to remain relevant, and the last few years of the session have been good but lacked the explosive wonder of the early years.

Anyway, yeah, things have changed. I'm glad to see Robin, Checker, Doug et al are able to see that they need to retool if they're going to remain relevant.

[increpare]

explanation up