Bristol Games Hub/SW Mobile Crossover Event

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Join us at Bristol Games Hub on Wed 16th October from 7pm to 9pm for an amazing event where the communities of game and mobile developers are going to be coming together to share idea, technologies and experience. Jointly organised by Bristol Games Hub and SW Mobile it promised to be a fascinating evening, including:

  • A talk by Natalie Griffith. Natalie runs Press Space, a provider of affordable, bespoke PR and brand-building for indie game developers and technology start-ups, will be giving a talk on the subject of “Demystifying PR”
  • Tomas Rawlings, cofounder of Bristol Games Hub and Auroch Digital will be giving a talk on “How to be an indie games developer”.
  • A 15 minute ‘Demo Camp’ where members of both communities SWMobile can share things they’ve been working on, provide tips on games development and generally shout about what’s interesting to them! Including brief demos of games from Survivalist Games with Shelter and Large Visible Machine with The Battle for Hill 218.

Tickets are free but going fast….

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September 2013 Newsletter

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Bristol Games Hub has moved into its lovely new office, events and meeting space on the top floor of 77 Stokes Croft.  If you haven’t yet visited us, please feel free to come along to our monthly social on the last Thursday of every month from 7:30pm.  So the next one is this Thursday, 26th.
Many thanks to Unity for kindly funding 60 brand new chairs for our events space, which is now up and running.  If you have any ideas for events to support Bristol and the South West’s games development community, please get in touch.
Bristol Games Hub Events
The next Unity meet-up is Wednesday 9th October with Unity’s trainer, Ben Pitt attending to chat to the group about the community’s needs and we’re hoping to address the recent issue of too many jobs, not enough Unity devs at that so please sign up here; https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/event/8451301069
Anti-Social Talk: Chris Roberts of Survivalist Games on ‘Shelter’
At this weeks anti-social we’re happy to welcome Chris Roberts, creator of the excellent indie zombie survival game ‘Shelter’ who will be coming along to talk about his work. Check it out at: http://www.survivalistgames.co.uk/
Bristol Games Hub Life Drawing Classes
We are looking at running a regular life drawing class for the South West games development community so we’d like to gauge interest. The class would run one evening per week from 6:30 to 8:30 at the Bristol Games Hub Event Space. Each session would cost £5, with 2 models doing an hour each and we’d be looking for you to sign up to 4 weeks at a time. If you’re interested in attending these sessions, please send Chris Raadjes an email asap with your details to chris.raadjes at gmail.com. The sooner we know numbers, the sooner we can start.
Auroch Digital Launches Chainsaw Warrior on iOS Today (more platforms in the next couple of weeks)
Auroch Digital is pleased to announce the Games Workshop boardgame we’ve been converting into digital is now out on iOS http://bit.ly/CW00NYios and will be coming to more platforms very soon. We’d really appreciate any reviews, tweets and postings about it.  Here’s a tweet you can chainsaw-n-paste if you want:
Chainsaw Warrior rips into the App Store today! http://bit.ly/CW00NYios RT now as you only have #60mins to save New York!
TEDxBristol
This year’s TEDxBristol is centred around the theme of ‘Failure’. Local speakers with a wide variety of experiences and backgrounds will share their tales of all manner of failures, and how failure has shaped their ideas, outlooks and businesses. Our very own Tomas Rawlings at Auroch Digital will be speaking about failing to get a game into the App Store (Endgame:Syria), and Opposable Games’ Nat Al-Tahhan is this year’s curator & host.
The event will be on Monday 11th November from 10am – 6pm. Nat can organise a discount for group bookings for South West games developers, so let her know if there are a few of you planning to come: nat@opposablegames.com. Links to tickets and further event info can be found at TEDxBristol.com.
PM Studio
Lunchtime Talk: Richard Adams – The illiterate of the 21st century
Friday, 27 September 2013 1:00pm – 2:00pm, Pervasive Media Studio, FREE
Digital polymath and senior academic program manager at Microsoft Studios Richard Adams tells us that “The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn.” Come and find out why he thinks that education needs to radically change to have a chance of being relevant in the 21st Century.
Lunchtime Talk: Magicians in residence
Friday, 4 October 2013 1:00pm – 2:00pm, Pervasive Media Studio, FREE
From finding connections between magicians and makers, to mind-reading robot pets, Kieron Kirkland and Stuart Nolan will share with us some of their ideas and inspiration for their impending residency.
Lunchtime Talk: Designing for touchy subjects
Friday, 11 October 2013 1:00pm – 2:00pm, Pervasive Media Studio
For 18 years Aerian has made some of the biggest and best web products in the world.  Managing Director Paul Goodenough and S’unya Dickman Head of Client Side Technology will be telling us all about their adventures and sharing what is involved from a creative and technical perspective when designing for touchable interfaces.
Objects Sandbox
Exploring Human-Experiences Within the Internet of Things
Objects Sandbox will fund six ground-breaking collaborations between creative companies and academic researchers around human-experiences within the Internet of Things.  Each collaboration will receive £50,000 and the opportunity to work intensively on their idea over three months, starting in March 2014. The scheme has extraordinary advisers from across the world of design, technology and Internet of Things and REACT is anticipating some brilliant competition.
Job Opportunities
 
Opposable Games
Opposable Games are hiring! We are currently looking for a full-time project manager, a full-time Unity developer, and a part-time marketing manager.  For more information see http://opposablegames.com/opposable-are-hiring/
Creative Technologist – £25k, full time
Watershed’s Creative Technologist works on a constant and wide-ranging stream of projects: from remote controlling pico projectors to international sprints, tracking balloons across London to a storytelling jukebox, and combining magicians and technology to tweeting dead people. This role requires the ability to understand and inspire, listen and communicate and then make brilliant ideas happen.
Red7Mobile is looking for experienced Mobile Developers to join our team at Temple Studios. If you have a solid computing background and have built apps and games for iOS, Android, Windows and Web we’re interested in talking to you. Its a vibrant creative environment, and our developers are encouraged to hone their skills across multi-platforms. To find out a more contact matt@red7mobile.com

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Job Opportunity at Play Nicely

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‘Play Nicely are looking for a middle/heavy weight freelance Unity developer to start asap. Please email a portfolio to studio@playnicely.co.uk for details.’

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August 2013 Newsletter

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Anti-Social – Thursday 29th Aug at 7.30pm
Thursday 29th Aug at 7.30pm is the next anti-social.  We’re really happy to say that Ionage (brilliant space RTS) developer Tim Wicksteed will be joining us to talk about his game – don’t miss out!
Opposable Games
Opposable are pleased to announce that the Bottom Knocker Street website is live, with the game to be launched early September.  Bottom Knocker Street is an odd-ball 52 episode kids TV show that starts airing on ITV next weekend.  The extended Opposable team produced a Paperboy / Jetpack Joyride style game featuring the characters of the show, and an accompanying responsive html5 website (www.bottomknockerstreet.com) in a very short timeframe.
Opposable are also looking for beta testers for their OneTouchConnect device connecting technology – more details will appear soon on their website.
Mobile Pie 
Mobile Pie are pleased to announce the launch of their latest game for the BBC – the CBeebies Playtime App! Available on iOS, Google Play and Amazon it’s a must download if you have little ones 🙂 You can read a great write up here: Guardian

Thanks to Nick Dymond and Tom Waterhouse for their help – and of course to the entire Mobile Pie team!
Auroch Digital
Auroch Digital to Release Chainsaw Warrior

We are releasing our Games Workshop title, ‘Chainsaw Warrior’ in the next couple of weeks – you can follow the game’s release on email, twitter and Facebook – http://chainsawwarrior.net – any RTs, likes, ratings and reviews would be very welcome!
Sun and Moon Studios
Dylan from Sun & Moon Studios will be showing a nearly finished version of “The Land of Welsh Tales” at the Hub social on Thursday, a series of five 2d games Sun & Moon made for South Wales police. The games are all based on “Stay Smart” (http://sunandmoonstudios.co.uk/our_work_animation.html#gwent_smart) an animated film S&M made for South Wales Police last year.
Thought Den
Thought Den and the National Portrait Gallery battle to bring 16 Century portraiture to the smartphone and desktop masses! Using HTML5! Wahey!
OK, fine. HTML5 and Javascript are a total pain. We need your help. Hit this Beta version and let us know what you think.
Email any screen grabs of dodginess to testing@thoughtden.co.uk. Thoughts on improvements and extra features also welcome. Hugs for all submissions.
Force Of Habit 

Busy month, here goes!
Dysbiosis – which some of you might remember from Wellcome Trust’s Gamify Your PhD event last year – has been released. You can play the game here http://www.kongregate.com/games/forcehabit/dysbiosis and view the release trailer here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qglzvn-frMg.
We teased everybody with a Toast Time teaser trailer and website update this month. View the trailer here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LOLcUEcHrFU and keep an eye out for the release date being announced shortly. You can see it first by subscribing here https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1HMq5GVWpH6frDAn7qkj1O-mr3koWhKzqcn_5mDjNWHM/viewform
We featured in Develop magazine this month in the “New Studio” section. Check it out, we have big faces. http://www.develop-online.net/digital-edition
We wrote an article for Creative England’s “One Thing I Know” website. It’s about how we haven’t killed each other yet, kind of. http://www.onethingiknow.co.uk/making-your-friend-a-business-partner-and-not-killing-him/
Creative England’s Games Lab

Round 1, The Development Fund, is available for SME’s to apply for Grants between £10,000 and £50,000 to completely develop a new Game IP for commercial release. The Development Fund is open now for applications and the deadline is 16th September.  See here for more info; http://www.creativeengland.co.uk/index.php/portfolio/games/

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Another Job Opportunity (potentially!)

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Greenfly Studios are looking for an artist to start at short notice. The project, not yet confirmed, would last 2-3 months and all art must be completed by October/November time. The style is a cutesy cartoon vector similar to our game ‘Drop That Candy (see dropthatcandy.com ). If interested, and available, please contact Stephen on smorris -at- greenflystudios.com with a link to your portfolio and rates.

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Unity Developer Student Job Opportunity

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From Michael Johnson: European Space Agency funded student Unity developer opportunity – 4th August 2013 application deadline

Hello,
We have an opportunity for a student to be funded to work with us from
home or at our offices in Bristol for the next three months on our Pocket Mission Control application. The funding comes from the European Space Agency Summer of Code in Space program, full details here:
http://kck.st/14XDJr6

This opportunity is one element of a bigger project that we are
currently running to send an Interplanetary CubeSat and Thin-Film
Spacecraft/Landers/Rovers to the moon:
http://kck.st/14zOnAA

Even if it’s not for you we’d be very grateful if you would let your
colleagues and social media contacts know about this opportunity – the
deadline for applications to the European Space Agency is the 4th
August 2013 so there isn’t much time, but it is a quick application
form to fill in. Let me know if you have any questions and perhaps you’ll even pledge to join us on the moon today!

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Games Lab Launch Event – Tuesday 6th August

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Games Lab launches next month with an information session at Creative England offices in Bristol.  The event runs from 6-7.30pm on Tuesday 6th August.  Register attendance here; http://www.eventbrite.co.uk/event/3478808209

 

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BRISTOL GAME DEVELOPERS NEWS 23rd JULY 2013

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It really doesn’t feel like a month since our last newsletter but they say time flies when you’re having fun.

The next Unity group meet-up is Wednesday 14th August from 7-9pm at the Hub. Register attendance here: http://www.eventbrite.co.uk/event/7561758423

Antisocial this Thursday from 7:30pm at the Hub.  Strictly people working in and studying games development at these meet-ups.

Large Visible Machine

Hill 218 gets universal support and async multiplayer
iOS game The Battle for Hill 218, a collaboration between Games Hub residents Large Visible Machine and Opposable Games, was recently updated to include universal support and much-requested async multiplayer. It is now easier than ever to find an online opponent and with some real pros sitting at the top of the leaderboards anyone who gives it a go should be in for a challenge even greater than that of the “unbeatable” hard AI. With the release we’ve also seen some interesting discussions on strategy emerging and anyone who is interested should check out this fan-made guide which proves there is quite a bit of depth to the game despite the very simple ruleset:
http://bit.ly/15PsZJZ

Thought Den

New release from Thought Den in collaboration with Splash & Ripple! Capture The Museum is live team-game for up to 50 players inspired by Risk and Trivial Pursuit. But it takes place throughout the museum. Find out more and watch the lovely promo video at capturethemuseum.com Read an analysis of what the game means for the arts and culture sector here on the Guardian http://gu.com/p/3gt4d

Twice Circled

Ionage is an Android exclusive, space RTS game where you use giant floating space platforms to do battle in a steampunk themed galactic treasure hunt. The game is out on Friday 26th July, for more information and to sign up for a reminder when the game is out head to www.ionage.co.uk.

Auroch Digital

Games Workshop’s 80s Classic Chainsaw Warrior is Back

We have today released the news that we are bringing Games Workshop’s classic, Chainsaw Warrior, to mobile and desktop platforms very soon. The seminal hit board game Chainsaw Warrior, made by Games Workshop back in 1987 is set to return this year in a digital form. The original game was a notable rarity in that it was a solo board game that pitted the player not against others but against the clock. The game saw New York balancing on the precipice of darkness as twisted forces from another reality attempted to rip the city from this world into theirs. Standing between them and the destruction of the city was a lone figure, the brutal and mysterious Chainsaw Warrior. As the eponymous hero, the player had to delve into a zombie infested New York tenement to locate the source of the evil spewing through the spatial rift and destroy it before he was destroyed. Spread the word! http://chainsawwarrior.net and #chainsawwarrior

Jack the Ripper 125

We’re over the moon to have been awarded the commission for the iDocs REACT sandbox, for which we’re making an interactive documentary called JtR125 – as November this year is the 125th anniversary of the last of the Whitechapel murders.  We’ll be working in partnership with the DCRC and University of Middlesex on the project.

Shakespeare’s Globe Games

We’ve also just completed 3 new kids games for Globe Theatre ‘Playground’ and given the interesting fact that two of them are built from the same system as some of our GameTheNews.net games; means Endgame:Syria now has 3 incarnations – Endgame:Syria, Endgame:Eurasia and now Hemmings’ Play Company.  Thanks to Red Panda Audio for working with us on the sound for the Globe games.

“Developed in Bristol, UK.” 

Tomas from Auroch Digital says; “Apple have been making a big thing of their new slogan, ‘Designed by Apple in California‘ and I thought that we could also show pride in the games we make and where they are made?  So for the next release of ours we’re adding to the credits of the game, ‘Developed at Bristol Games Hub, Bristol, UK.’  We’ll also be adding it to any titles we update.  So I’d like to encourage others to add ‘Developed by Your Company in Bristol, UK’. Thanks.”

iNet/Creative England

Very last chance to apply for the vouchers for strategy and innovation.

This is a simple scheme designed to help you get the support you need to move your business forward.

The ‘voucher’ means Creative England will pay £1000 to subsidise the cost of employing an expert to provide advice or support to your company.

http://www.creativeengland.co.uk/index.php/portfolio/business-support/#vouchers

JOB OPPORTUNITIES

Complete Control – based in Bath

Complete Control is hiring a games dev to work on Flash games, HTML 5 and apps. Check out the ‘We’re Hiring’ section on completecontrol.co.uk for full details.

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Bristol Game Developers News 27th June 2013

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In no particular order, here is this month’s developer news;

Tom Melamed
I have no idea who this person is (and I can’t remember who tweeted the link) but I really like the idea of a full 3D model of Bristol in 1820. How cool would it be, to be able to walk down your road almost 200 years ago. If anyone wants to help out then it could be a fun project, I don’t have the required skills.

http://www.bristol-venice-of-the-west.blogspot.co.uk/2013_04_28_archive.html

Slingshot
Award-winning game designers, Slingshot, are marking ‘the year of the zombie’ by announcing the launch of Asylum, the sequel to their smash hit city wide zombie chase game, 2.8 Hours Later.

2.8 Hours Later: Asylum is a terrifying night-time zombie street game for hundreds of players. Four years into the outbreak the infection is at pandemic stage and UK cities are on lock down, isolated by the Government from the zombie-infected badlands around them. When these measures fail, the authorities abandon the city, and the once safe zone becomes a prison, overrun with zombies, vigilantes and scavengers. Can you escape state collapse before you are quarantined or infected?

2.8 Hours Later: Asylum will be in Bristol 6th and 7th September and tickets can be bought via http://2.8hourslater.com/tickets-and-dates

Keep an eye on the Facebook page for latest news and updates: http://www.facebook.com/2.8HoursLater

Auroch Digital
Gamify Your PhD Article Published

The Gamify Your PhD project produced by Auroch Digital and involving a number of South West based developers including Opposable, Force of Habit, Remode and Clockwork Cuckoo, had an article by Vickie Curtis of the Open University about the project published in the journal Science Communication.  The abstract can be found here:
Auroch at Games for Change
Auroch Digital’s Tomas and Debbie were at Games for Change in New York, thanks to the support of Bristol City Council and UKTI were they flew the flag for Bristol developers.  Tomas has written a summary of some of the interesting things that came out of the event on his blog:
And watch this space for some very exciting developments coming from Auroch!
Fayju
Fayju went to Los Angeles in June for the “OUYA park” to show Amazing Frog, meet the OUYA team and other indie devs. OUYA Park was a controversial, car park show outside E3. Hilariously, it was blocked by a big Semi truck and security guard courtesy of the mighty ESA (organiser of E3). Indies fought back and the turn out was huge. In short, it was an Awesome 3 Days and we were so glad to have been invited.

OUYA has now launched and Amazing Frog is available on it  – our Frog based, rag doll, ‘hardcore parkour’, unity based, physics game set in Swindon. If you get to play it, let us know what you think.

For now, aside from a serious amount of updates we are working on Amazing Frog, we are gearing up for Gamescom in August where we intend to launch ‘Cascade” and show a demo of it on Hal’s Oculus Rift.

Also check out our videos at http://www.youtube.com/fayjugames

Will Luton
Will Luton’s book Free-To-Play: Making Money from Games You Give Away is now out, covering everything you need to know on building, running and profiting from F2P game. There’s also a lot there including design and marketing theory that applies to non-F2P games. It’s available to buy at http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0321919017/ref=as_li_tf_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=0321919017&linkCode=as2&tag=will_luton-21

Opportunities

Auroch Digital are looking for a voiceover actor who can do an American accent, for some recording on a current game they’re developing.  If you know someone suitable please get them to contact me asap.  We only need an hour with them in a studio.  The project is under NDA currently though we will be making an official announcement soon.

Opposable Games are hiring a junior artist and part time marketing manager – for more details see
http://opposablegames.com/job-opposablertunities/

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Ian Livingstone Opens Bristol Games Hub

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Games industry legend Ian Livingstone was the guest of honour on Tuesday at the official opening of the new Bristol Games Hub. The newly launched non-profit organisation runs free networking and training events and affordable desk space for many of the cities thriving community of games developers. The event saw over 60 people from Bristol and the South West gather to hear Livingstone talk about his personal experience of video games, the changing face and importance of the industry to the UK at large.

Ian Livingstone

Bristol Games Hub has grown through word of mouth with 23 developers signed up within 3 weeks. “The Directors have been running events and building the community in Bristol for the last 2 years, so it was a natural progression for us to develop a space where devs could also work together” said the Hub’s Director and coordinator Debbie Rawlings. “There is a real buzz for what we’re doing and all of our events, such as our monthly Unity group and the recent demo of the Oculus Rift, have been really well attended. New start-ups, young companies and freelancers need this kind of support to help them focus on creating and marketing their games and products so we wanted to create a vibrant, dynamic space to assist them.” Debbie is a co-founder of the Hub along with fellow Auroch Digital director Tomas Rawlings and Opposable Games’ Ben Trewhella. The Hub is supported by Digital Cultures Research Centre, UWE, The Pervasive Media Studio and Watershed, Creative England and Aquarela Developments.

The Games Hub is home now to 30 local developers and freelancers from new start-ups to more established teams. As well as multi-screen specialists Opposable Games and Endgame:Syria creator Auroch Digital, the Hub is home to Demon Apathy, Force of Habit, Large Visible Machine, ldexterldesign and Lo-Fi Games as well as developers from Qube creators Toxic Games, popular casual game developers Geek Beach and some very talented freelance designers, artists and illustrators.

Bristol Games Hub Logo

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