Vidfest 08: PopVox Award Winners Rocketmen Axis of Evil, N+
Nick Waanders Slick Entertainment.
Homegrown gaming gets recognized
At last week's PopVox awards, two local videogame studios were recognized for their efforts in game development in the categories of Best Game for Console/PC, and Best Casual Game. Slick Entertainment, and Metanet Software took away the award for Best Game Console/PC for their title N+, which is available on the XBLA platform, while the Best Casual Game award went to Acronym Games for their Rocketmen: Axis of Evil, which was also released on the XBLA online distribution service.
When you think about the other games in the Best Game Console/PC category which included Queasy Games Everyday Shooter, and Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed, you have to wonder exactly how these smaller lesser known games (N+, Rocketmen) managed to beat out the more established titles that have been around much longer and have garnered more praise from gamers, and critics than all the PopVox award winners combined. PopVox (from vox populi – L. voice of the people) claims to give the power to the people by giving them the chance to determine the winners by casting their votes, but something tells me there's a bit of a hidden agenda behind the scenes. (That, or the entire voting system is screwed up). This is after all, the Vancouver International Digital Festival, presented by none other than New Media BC. So when you have a local event with local submissions, it would be in their best interest to highlight the local industry and it's talent. Right?
I'm not saying the winners aren't deserving of the award, N+, and Rocketmen are good games, but they definitely aren't creme de la creme when stacked up against such blockbuster titles like Assassin's Creed. Now that I think it of, perhaps PopVox should rethink it's categories. Typically downloadable titles on the XBLA or Playstation Network, would be considered 'Casual Games', so a category for 'Best Downloadable Game' would make sense. N+ and Rocketmen would fall under that. Yet there are Casual games that aren't necessarily downloadable, so keeping the "Best Casual Game" category would work too. That way you could avoid mixing big console games, with smaller downloadable titles. N+ beating out Assassin's Creed still makes me laugh.
As I sat in the audience during the award show, I wasn't at all surprised that the awards soon became predictable. "Wow! Another winner from Vancouver!"
To see the other award winners check out popvoxawards
Getting around without bulky paper maps, or the Internet.
Aaron Hilton, developer behind CellMap recently won the award for Best Mobile Application at the 2008 PopVox Awards during last week's Vancouver International Digital Festival. The convenient little cellphone application may not seem all that useful at first glance, but when considering the practical usage without the availability of an internet connection, CellMap becomes a logical tool.
During the award show gala, Hilton had a chance to give me a quick demonstration of CellMap, by transferring the map of Vidfest from his mobile phone to mine using Bluetooth connectivity. Though my phone is an older Motorola L2 Slvr, I was able to load the Java application with no problem, with entire Vidfest package taking up only 191k in data. A map reminiscent of google maps appeared on my screen, which was controlled with the phone's d-pad, though the package also featured a directory of important locations such as Washrooms, to Bank Machines, Parking, Restaurants, and Museums, it also had important event listings from the Vidfest agenda. There is also the ability to zoom-in and out of the map which helps for smaller screens, but button-input was different for older phone models, which Hilton hopes to make a note of in the future. Being that Vidfest took place on Granville Island, a major tourist destination, the map featured all the important locations that tourists would need to know, without carrying a folding paper map, or tourist guide.
CellMap would definitely be useful at theme parks, malls, and festivals where locations are spread over a wide area, wireless internet is unavailable, and where finding or carrying a traditional map becomes difficult. Theme park, or festival staff could simply transfer the map and other relevant information to your cellphone. It should be interesting to see where this takes off. Apple iPhones?
Bigger Venue, not as fun as her previous concert at the Commodore.
Presented by the Georgia Straight, and Live Nation Canada, M.I.A, performed Sunday night to an energetic crowd. This was the second time I had a chance to check out her show, but this time around it wasn't as good. Not because of M.I.A.'s performance, but because of the bigger crowd, that made it difficult to get close to the stage and really into the music. It wasn't as intimate as her previous concert at the Commodore Ballroom. Also I think there were a lot of under-aged kids who were taking up too much room. A concert with Tweens is major suckage.
Overall though, M.I.A. rocked the house, with tracks from all her albums. Here's hoping she comes back to Vancouver, but plays for a smaller crowd.
Vancouver International Digital Festival
Charged up and ready to go!
Last week, the Vancouver International Digital Festival (Vidfest), presented by New Media BC, celebrated it's 5th year as a major local industry event, bringing together creative minds from a wide range of fields, for various talks, and panels educating and inspiring festival attendees.
This time around, the festival overlapped with the Vancouver Game Summit, but rather than being a rehash of what was covered at the summit, Vidfest offered much more than game development, covering web 2.0, interactive design, animation and mobile applications.
I thought the change in venue from the Vancity Theater the previous year, to various locations on Granville Island would cause some confusion for festival goers, but it turns out to have actually worked quite well. Some sessions took place at the Arts Club Theater, while others were at the Revue Stage, Emily Carr theater, and Granville Hotel, all were within short walking distances.
Some sessions that I attended included an awesome blogging discussion called Content.com: The Care and Feeding of Audiences with top bloggers Heather Armstrong (Dooce.com), and Maggy Mason (Mightygirl.com), who gave some important tips, and lessons on maintaining an audience, dealing with readers/commenters, and the importance of branding your site with your unique online identity. The talk was humorous, informative, and definitely worth attending. You could say that I was able to relate in a few ways to the life of a blogger. It definitely inspired me to sharpen my overall blogging.
Another session I had a chance to see was McLuhan 2.0: The message of today's digital media. Now this one didn't really sink in until well after attending it. Dr. Eric McLuhan author of books such as Electric Language, and The Role of Thunder in Finnegan's Wake, went into a deep almost hippie, high-on something talk about metaphysics, and how it relates to communication in this day and age. A few people sitting in front of me silently poked fun at McLuhan for coming off like he was on drugs, with short cryptic answers at times. The host Michael Tippett, provided some questions, and tried keeping up with McLuhan's answers, but obviously got lost at several points of the discussion. You can't blame him though, all this talk about metaphysics, made many scratch their heads. Though as I thought about what was discussed later on that day, it started to make some sense, and really to stimulate my brain. I'm never gonna look at a phone conversation the same ever again.
Switching it up from metaphysics and blogging, to charities, and online Philanthropy Positively Charged: Do-gooding in a digital age, opened my mind to what's out there in terms of having a direct impact on those living in poverty-stricken areas of the world. The panel consisted of Tom Williams (Givemeaning.org), Eric Karjaluto (DesignCanChange.org), Dylan Higgins (Kiva.org), and moderated by Jason Mogus (Communicopia). To see how these folks are using these sites for social change and responsibility was truly inspiring.
Lastly the session on Alternate Reality Games, and the marketing campaign behind the Nine Inch Nails album "Year Zero", was especially interesting featuring Susan Bonds president of 42 Entertainment, and Alex Lieu chief creative office of 42 entertainment. "Let the People Play: The future of interactive Entertainment, highlighted the process, excitement, and organization behind the scenes of the alternate reality game experience.
And speaking of interactive experiences, the screening for Late Fragment, a film in which you can interactively explore each characters stories within the movie was interesting to say the least. The idea of giving the viewer the ability to view the film in a very non-linear fashion is a unique way of exploring a film, but because the audience members were given the remote to control what viewers saw, it felt very jarring. Especially since the cuts from scene to scene never really hooked up. It definitely isn't designed for an entire theater. The use of the interactive narrative film may not be mainstream currently, but it should be exciting where this tool ends up in the future.
Entertainment around the festival. Spidey! I'm totally surprised it never transformed!
In the theme of digital entertainment. Touch-screen paint program.
Overall Vidfest was another great success, in my opinion better than last year's. Though many attendees expressed a certain dislike for the way the program guides were designed -- causing more confusion then a clear program most people expected -- I think the show was excellent. The Popvox Awards were great, I met a few of the nominees, and winners, like folks from A.C.R.O.N.Y.M games creators of the award -winning Rocketmen Axis of Evil, award-winning creator of Cellmap, and Leah from www.giantantmedia.com. Though the food in the dark without much light illuminating it was pretty funny, I think the food was pretty good.
Watch the entire Popvox award show courtesy of Usteam.tv
