Last Friday, we celebrated our 8th ever WIP Night! WIP Nights have always been a night for celebrating the game-making process, but also the people who make them! In this one, we had a total of 13 different games from Sydney on showcase, alongside 5 microtalks. Like last time, we collaborated with the wonderful folks at Arts & Cultural Exchange (ACE). Thanks to them, we had a wonderful space to host an incredible night of work-in-progress games!
We first kicked off WIP Night with various talks by local devs, often going into technical processes, or personal stories. Our first speaker was Hari Edwin, the artist for Attack of the Astrals, a turn-based strategy game where you command a trio of heroes and villains against a cosmic army, and every battle is a tactical puzzle. We got some insight into how the game’s beautiful pixel art was created, with plenty of beautiful concept art and art breakdowns to admire!
Later, we had Ben Armstrong talking about Buru and the Old People, a short, narrative-driven adventure game rich in Indigenous storytelling. In the game, you explore vibrant Australian landscapes and yarn with quirky townsfolk, following an emotionally resonant story about the connection between the characters and the land. In his talk, Ben introduced Buru the ibis’ origins and the premise of the game. Learning how the team came to select an ibis as its main character, alongside how they parallel Blakfullas’ experiences of being ostracised for existing on stolen, colonised and gentrified land, made for a memorable talk.
We also had Koji Yajima talk about King Out, a chess game with boxing, requiring you to strategically draft your pieces, and place them on the board so that your King is safe. In his talk, Koji focused on sharing his games’ design process, breaking down how one might combine a board game like chess with boxing. It was fun seeing how two such different competitive activities were blended together!
Next, Arkington Owen shared Wizard Magic with us, a game about an autistic wizard and their ADHD familiar. This bite-sized pixel art RPG is set in the magical city of Blizzaire, where players are encouraged to make friends, attend arcane classes, and think about their role as a small part of a vast, magical world. In his talk. Arkington contrasted his initial vision for the game with the tangents, detours and obsessive rabbit-holes that come from being a developer with autism. As Arkington aptly put it: the only way to really make games is to do it the way you LIKE it!
Lastly, we had Rick Salter from Hojo Studio introduce BraveCart, a narrative turn-based puzzle adventure about an abandoned shopping cart who defies two empires and sparks a revolution. For a game chock full of hilarity, we learnt of the satire’s real-world reference to trolley abandonment as a waste issue in Australia. It was inspiring to see how the game enabled players to have real world impact through donations and an inbuilt trolley tracker!
After listening to these fantastic talks, the attendees broke off to play all of their wonderful games, and more!
Here are all the games from WIP night:
- Attack of the Astrals by Hewer’s Workshop
- Buru and The Old People
- King Out by Koji Yajima
- Wizard Magic by Arkington Owen
- BraveCart by Hojo Studio
- Peeled Eyes by Lamington Games
- Rusthaven by Chaos Theory Games
- Battle Mage Defender by Matt Cabanag
- Monocular Odyssey by Adrian Sugden
- Norman Jones’s Visual Novel by Jessica Hook and Ayesha Earey
- Pizzabreaker by Francesco Verdiani and Thomas Mansfield
- Gutterjacket by Nogoodnik Studio
- Birdwatcher by Noble Steed Games
This time around, we also had a special little reveal! Just for WIP Night, we shared Birdwatcher, a game we’ve been tinkering with for a bit. Birdwatcher is a bird identification and photography game, set on a mysterious island that hides as many secrets as the characters do. You must find clues, decipher runes, meet all the avian residents and figure out what happened to the researcher before you. It was really exciting sharing this with people, and we hope to be able to show more about our little bird game soon!
Thank you again for attending WIP Night, and for being a part of Sydney’s vibrant games development community! We’d also like to extend our thanks to Screen NSW for making it possible for us to organise these events through the Industry Development Program.
Lastly, ACE is running Beyond The Script with Serenade Games on the 28th of March! During the event, participants will learn narrative game design tools such as Ink, Twine and Bitsy, guided by professional game-makers from Serenade Games. Check out the event page here to get involved!
