[cross posting and extending this from my personal blog because y'know, it was a fun day or two and at Leeds it was great to meet up with a large proportion of the RR folks who all turned out to be absolutely wonderful in the extreme, couple that with some great games and well, it's a winner all round]
There’s a lot to be said for curated events over “we’re showing some stuff that got entered into a competition” and over and above all else, this is why given the choice between Indiecade, The IGF or any of the other miscellaneous events abound I’d choose The Indie Games Arcade at the Eurogamer Expo over the lot of them. It’s not just because I’ve had my work on show there twice (for which I’m incredibly grateful and chuffed to buggery) but because it feels more representative of the rich diversity that comes from Indies.
This years selection, especially, was stellar and a hearty thanks and congratulations to David, Pixel Lab, Sheridans and Eurogamer for putting the show on because y’know, there’s nowhere else I can think of that shows off the stuff that wot we all do and is so accepting of different.
Sure, it may be (in the case of London, not so much Leeds) slightly tucked off the main drag past the grooming booths (Sega had sweets to lure children in, I swear) but thankfully, for the duration of my visit there I rarely caught a point where there wasn’t some folks playing the games. That’s a testament to both the choice and the developers, all of which made games that people would want to play.
In Leeds on Tuesday, which admittedly I was there for far more sociable reasons, watching two guys refuse to budge from Anna Anthropy’s Starcade until they’d played every single game repeatedly was the highlight. I placed Mrs Bob down in front of it on Friday at London and got the same results. That’s a bit special.
RR stalked the corridors of Savile’s Hall. All present and correct came the boys from Ovine, Minion, PlayerOne, TamToucan, TCK, Andy Noble, HappyMonster, Pags and myself. We won’t talk about the confused look on my face at seeing a giant Jim’ll Fix It logo hanging from the ceiling whilst folks slowly explained the Savile part of the halls name to me. Sometimes my own idiocy gets the better of me folks and this was certainly one of those times.
Both myself and the esteemed Tam Toucan punched the shit out of each other in Cletus Clay laughing our way through it in Leeds, Tam swore heartily at Terry Cavanagh’s VVVVV, Joe Danger amazed the lot of us. I got collared by a chap in a Eurogamer T-shirt for a brief session on Increpare’s Happening Game. I’m still shit at Tumbledrop. Squid Harder, Fig8 and Ergon Logos look amazing on a big screen. And this is the thing I can’t possibly stress enough – they were a bunch of really playable games that you couldn’t get from a random set of rules or criteria and I dunno, it just feels more right. And that’s ace.
Post the show a couple of us nipped off to the pub and had a bloody good laugh until it was time for everyone to part. It wasn’t until the pub that I noticed Tam’s T-shirt with “SYNSO IS SCHLOOSHENDOOSH” on it, a joke that likely two other people outside of RR would ever get but a worthy one all the same. We drank, we talked RR things and managed to argue the merits of Stock, Aitkin and Waterman too. In case anyone is wondering, yes, I was the one arguing for them.
A top day out and if you get the opportunity to pop along and meet the RR chaps, I couldn’t recommend it more. They’re all lovely.
Outside of the RR meet-age, somehow no-one else managed to spot me on both occasions. Clearly, until the Show And Yell, my anonymity was strong. That’s probably a bit out the window after my talk, even if it’s just people muttering about that lunatic under their breath. More on that in a bit though.
It was great to see more developers taking their places this year, Joe Danger, Eufloria, Cletus Clay and others all had folks on hand to show the games off. Due to my bizarre affliction where I appear to be a shadow passing through, it wasn’t until the Show & Yell afterwards that I got to greet anyone properly. Disturbingly, aside from Ben of Zombie Cow I managed to avoid everyone whilst sitting in the same room as them. Quite remarkable even by my standards. Perhaps I am just a myth…
And yeah, the Show & Yell went well. Probably better for the technical hitches that killed the plasma screen off. Interesting talks from most people involved and I got to slap Michael Rose on the head, chat to Alex Amsel and Robert Swan briefly, wave at Terry who I wish I’d known was there earlier and meet up with Barrie Ellis and his good wife for a chat for the first time.
Which was handy considering that what I wanted to do above all else was give the guy a shout out for the tireless and brilliant work he does. Which I did. Whilst standing on a chair berating a room full of developers for not including accessibility features in their games. A much deserved round of applause for the man and I hope I didn’t embarrass him *too* much. The rest of the tale of the Show & Yell is probably best left to someone else’s perspective, it was all a bit of a blur for me given I’d been up since 4am with only a few hours sleep and seemed to exist in a semi-comatose state. I’m sure after a lot of the “here’s my game, here’s what I’m doing” having a bearded nut job standing on a chair telling people off must have been quite surreal.
I did have to stifle a snigger at the tumbleweed when I mentioned I wrote War Twat because I fucking hated Everyday Shooter, mind.
All told, good stuff. Mega thanks to David for the opportunity to swear at people in public about something I feel passionately about and thanks to a very drunken Dan Marshall for making my final memory of leaving the place one of laughter and smiles and to D3v from the forums for being him as ever.
” I’m sure after a lot of the “here’s my game, here’s what I’m doing” having a bearded nut job standing on a chair telling people off must have been quite surreal.”
I would have paid good money to see that.