Fare Godmace
Member
What is iDÉAME?
iDÉAME is an event organized by Nintendo Ibérica in association with the Complutense University of Madrid's Master in Game Design that brings some of the most renowed indie studios that have worked on Nintendo's digital stores together to share their knowledge with aspiring game developers. You can check out their games, too, including some games in early stages of development. (Fun fact: Two years ago, everyone could try both La-Mulana and Night Sky for WiiWare.)
But they come here to talk about how they work, not just to promote their games. iDÉAME isn't just another games conference. It's a very valuable experience for those who, like myself, dream every day of becoming a game developer one day. You can just talk to their devs during the conference breaks and ask them about everything, even while you're playing their games!
Since last year, there's also iDÉAME++, a contest where students show their early ideas to a jury composed of some of the devs. That's a great way to get some constructive criticism from a professional, and gain some experience for when you try to pitch a game to a publisher in the future.
What do you mean by "renowed indie developers"
Oh, well, no one in particular. Justt Gaijin Games, Nicalis, Renegade Kid, Two Tribes, Ronimo Games, Shin'en, 5th Cell, RedLynx, Zen Studios and DistractionWare alongside some lesser known studios like Different Cloth (lilt line), Broken Rules (And Yet it Moves), Nabi Studios (Toribash), vBlank Entertainment (Retro City Rampage) or Fishing Cactus (Shifting World) and a bunch of Spanish studios (Over the Top Games, Akaoni Studios, Mercury Steam, Pendulo, Pyro Studios...).
But wait, there's more! It's not just indies around here: Yoshinori Ono, Warren Spector, Yashiro Kimura, Dan O'Leary (n-Space) and Shu Takumi have also come at some point in time.
That's cool and stuff, but why should I care? Do they announce games there?
Well, two Spanish studios (Delirium and Abylight) will announce a new game for the 3DS tomorrow. Nicalis is also revealing an "iDÉAME exclusive", but it may not be a game. Besides that, just small tidbits and vague descriptions on what some of them may do next.
For the wannabe developers, here you'll hear people talking about their past experience, how to finance a game, what kind of education you need to make them, how to advertise a small title when you don't even have a marketing budget or new creation models like F2P or crowdfunding just to name a few recurring subjects.
Each year iDÉAME is about a different theme. This year's is how game ideas from the 80s can save the games industry from its current creative crisis, as evidenced by games like Mutant Mudds or Retro City Rampage.
How long have been this events there? Why I haven't heard about them before?
iDÉAME started four years ago. Since then, there have also been three iDÉAME Maestro editions (just a single conference) and a iDÉAME On Tour which took place in Zaragoza, also in Spain.
As for the later, I guess most people are not interested in this sort of thing. But that's why I'm making a thread this year: I wanted to know if GAF would like to see in translations of some of the conferences and interviews I've made during past editions. I
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What's this year program?
I'd love to show you an English version of this year's program, but I can't seem to find it anywhere in the official website, so I'll make you a quick translation:
- The return to the 80s for further innovation (Magnus Palsson, Jools Watsham, Brian Provinciano)
- How do I get money to make my game? (Jacob Riis, Miguel Montesions, Dan O' Leary)
- Enric Alvarez: The Girl who saved Mercury Steam
- In addition to making games, what do I have to know? (Joost Van Dongen, Pedro González, Tim Symons, Carlos Fernández)
- Creativity about superproductions (Aileen Viray, Tyrone Rodríguez, Guillaume Bouckaert, Collin van Ginkel)
- iDÉAME Exclusive. Tyrone Rodríguez, co-founder of Nicalis
- Master class: Heroes of Ruin
- Specialize to differentiate (Benjamin Neil Sorens, Roberto García Lago, Josué Monchán)
- Crowcreating (Julio Moruno, José Manuel Íñiguez, Francisco Mollá, Tyrone Rodríguez, Collin van Ginkel)
There's also a pretty cool contest of Pullblox custom maps called Pullblox++. Also, if you would like to know something I could try to get some info for you; and if you're there... Come say hi!
Personally, I'm a big fan of iDÉAME. It's pretty cool for Nintendo to do this, specially in a country like Spain where you wouldn't expect to see something like this. It's also been great to finally meet and talk to game developers, so I can rest assured that there are people out there that actually make a living out of game development. I hope someone here is also interested!
(By the way, please excuse the lack of images... I don't know how to make pretty banners for each sections like in some of the OTs here
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