Results are in! Two months ago, we challenged you to design and build experimental new games for Sifteo Cubes. Of the original 41 games submitted, 6 finalists moved on to Round 2 to further develop each game on an actual set of physical cubes. The finalists were Squaresville, Cube Cafe, Love Conspiracy, Color Ball, Shifted, and Parapluie. One month later, with new game modes, art, and a final layer of polish added to each game, selecting a winner has been difficult. We couldn’t pick just one, so we selected TWO WINNERS that succeeded in two very different ways.
Each of the two winners will receive publishing deals, each with $25,000 funding to finish their games and release on the Sifteo platform. They will also receive direct support from the tech and marketing teams to help get to the finish line. Both winning games will also be featured later this month at the Sifteo booth at GDC, located near the IGF pavillion.
The two winners are -
WINNER (SINGLE PLAYER):
Squaresville, by Frank Force – Sifteo says, “Frank was one of the first entrants to the competition, and entered a total of three games. Squaresville was by far our favorite. With its elegant spatial puzzles built into a large open world, it takes great advantage of the tangible, distributed nature of the Sifteo Cubes. Players rotate cubes to shift the very earth, and realign rooms. This allows them to explore literally every side of the world. Floors become walls and ceilings, bottomless pits become long hallways, and impassible floor spikes become hanging doom. Frank has also displayed great technical prowess in his execution of Squaresville. He wrote a performant open world engine and toolchain to help him produce and display game content. He has also been kind enough to share some of his experience and tools with the community at large via his website, frankforce.com. We’re excited for the chance to work with Frank to flesh out and polish Squaresville. ” Frank has provided a way you can play the game (even without cubes!) in the Sifteo Simulator.
WINNER (MULTI PLAYER):
Parapluie, by One Life Remains – Sifteo says, “We were quite taken with Parapluie, a game that, though playable alone should truly be experienced with friends. Players race bicyclists though minimalist mazes in search of an umbrella (a.k.a parapluie) hidden somewhere in the maze. They then must remember their way back, returning the umbrella to the start / finish line. To move, players swap two cubes back and forth, a simple act made frantic and fun by having to race your opponents. This also means players can only see two small segments of the maze at any one time. The game controls are super satisfying and tap into the magic of tangible play. Deftness and Dexterity become important in a way impossible to achieve with a keyboard, touchscreen, or analog stick. In Round 2, the One Life Remains team added two new game modes to Parapluie, Manic and Sprint, which expand on the games cognitive and dexterous elements. We’re looking forward to what is next for Parapluie and can’t wait to have it on the platform.”
RUNNER UP:
Cube Cafe, by C.C. Chamberlin – Sifteo says, “Ok we really couldn’t stop ourselves and had to call out C.C. Chamberlin and his work on Cube Cafe. C.C. created a polished plate spinning game in the tradition of Diner Dash that we all enjoyed. We’ve been playtesting the EGP games around the office and it has been a real crowd pleaser. The gameplay and art really come together in a solid, well executed package. In round 2 C.C. improved the tutorial system, refined the kitchen layout and mechanics, and covered a bunch of polish points. He’s also been really active in the community, giving others feedback and sharing his experience. It may not have been the most experimental of the finalist games, but we would have been remiss not to have made mention of it. C.C. we’ll be in touch.”
See you next month!
Congrats again to everyone who participated in this especially difficult two month challenge! While we couldn’t select everyone as a winner, the Sifteo folks have indicated they were “blown away by the breadth, and quality of all the finalist games” and hoping to eventually speak with ALL of the finalists about publishing, in some form, on the platform. Updated videos for each of the remaining finalists games below, in no particular order.
See you next month, with a nice classic EGP style competition coming up in the month of April!
A path finding puzzle game. Use hot areas to increase the distance of your steps, while avoiding the cold areas.
Looking forward to seeing what 2013 brings – we’re in talks with developer friends about a new competition, so keep an eye out – it should be a good one!
A trading economy game. Buy flour and bake bread to unlock the town’s various stores and keep the economy going.
Congratulations to everyone who made a game this month. As per my other post, if you have an iOS device then I have a gift code for you for our latest game, Word Mess. Send an email to our contact address and we’ll hook you up!
In addition to running EGP, we here at the Experimental Gameplay Project some times make games. For the most part they start off as little baby ideas that get made into prototypes. Most of these morph into horrible mouth-breathing abominations that we smother mercilessly in their sleep, but every now and then one shows a glimmer of promise and we decide to see it through to completion.
This is one of those times.
Word Mess
Word Mess is a collaboration between myself and original EGP co-founder, Shalin Shodhan, and is our take on the word game genre. Instead of trying to make words from letters in a grid, you search for words in beautifully crafted word clouds. The game is dead simple – touch words to get rid of them, find all of the words before the time is up.
As you play the difficulty gradually ramps up, with later levels introducing shuffle bombs that mess with your board in various ways. Currently we have 3 main modes: Find, Category, and Rhymes, but there are plans to add more with future updates.
You can also compete with your friends in Challenge Mode across Game Center – since this is what all the cool kids do these days, or so I’m told.
Where to get it
Word Mess is currently available for iOS devices and we’re selling it for the princely sum of $.99.
If you’d like to support us without buying it, you can also take the “Like” route on the game’s Facebook page.
5 Free Copies!
Since Shalin and I both started our game development careers with EGP we’re showing some love this month by giving away 5 free copies of the game (a retail value of $4.95!). Anyone who submits a game to the ECONOMY theme will be randomly entered into the drawing.
We're a group of indie game developers, running a friendly competition every month. The rules: Make a game based on the month's theme, and don't spend more than 7 days. New games posted at the end of every month.
Tower of Pixel, by Alan Zucconi
Station Repair Squad 2904, by 0x0961h
Draw Ball, by Brandon (Game Name:Frenzy)
Seizure, by Brandon (Game Name:Frenzy)
We're a group of indie game developers, running a friendly competition every month. The rules: Make a game based on the month's theme, and don't spend more than 7 days. New games posted at the end of every month.