Play - Inspire - Develop with A MAZE. / Johannesburg.
The A MAZE. Pop up Soweto is a one day events, which is inspiring to the youth/ young adults in place. With short talks, hands-on activities like the game development production line simulator and an eye-opening exhibition of african and international independent videogames we will introduce the art of game design, alternative game play and give some insights into game development and the local game community in South Africa. This project is funded by the City of Johannesburg.
As part of the Fak'ugesi Festival we are happy to welcome the Mobile Maker Library curated by Thingking from Capetown and funded by Connect_ZA, British Council, for the whole day at the A MAZE. Pop ups.
"We are very excited about the pop ups! With Play - Inspire - Develop we try to fascinate young adults about game development and the creative use of playful media to strengthen innovation, diversity and ecosystem of games in South Africa. Knowing about tools, different disciplines, schools and communities are the perfect start into the future of getting cool games and interactive stories from out the townships into the world. This shouldn’t be a one timer and hopefully some local initiatives will continue it on a regular basis.” so Thorsten S. Wiedemann, founder and artistic director of A MAZE.
Schedule for Soweto Pop up.
10:00 Open exhibition 11:00 Welcome and intro by Thorsten S. Wiedemann, A MAZE.
11:10 Hypertalks with - Hanli Geyser, Lecturer Game Design at Wits Digital Arts - Nhlanhla 'Lucky' Nkosi, Game design student at Wits - Regina Kgatle, Game designer, activist - Tsitsi Chiumya, Game design student at Wits - Ahmed Elgoni, Game design student at Wits - Marc Nicolsson, Mobile Maker Library
12:00 break/ lunch 13:00 How to create your first game workshop with the game experts Jonatan Van Hove, Anja Venter, Regina Kgatle, Ben Rausch, Richard Pieterse, Robbie Fraser, Lucky Nkosi, Philipp Schäfer 17:00 Playtesting / Exhibition 18:00
Saturday September 5, 2015 10:00am - 6:00pm PDT
EST 19121912 Gumede Street, Rockville, Soweto
Play - Inspire - Develop with A MAZE. / Johannesburg.
The A MAZE. Pop up Alexandra is a one day events, which is inspiring to the youth/ young adults in place. With short talks, hands-on activities like the game development production line simulator and an eye-opening exhibition of african and international independent videogames we will introduce the art of game design, alternative game play and give some insights into game development and the local game community in South Africa. This project is funded by the City of Johannesburg.
As part of the Fak'ugesi Festival we are happy to welcome the Mobile Maker Library curated by Thingking from Capetown and funded by Connect_ZA, British Council, for the whole day at the A MAZE. Pop ups.
"We are very excited about the pop ups! With Play - Inspire - Develop we try to fascinate young adults about game development and the creative use of playful media to strengthen innovation, diversity and ecosystem of games in South Africa. Knowing about tools, different disciplines, schools and communities are the perfect start into the future of getting cool games and interactive stories from out the townships into the world. This shouldn’t be a one timer and hopefully some local initiatives will continue it on a regular basis.” so Thorsten S. Wiedemann, founder and artistic director of A MAZE.
Schedule for Alexandra Pop up
10:00 Open exhibition 11:00 Welcome and intro by Thorsten S. Wiedemann, A MAZE.
11:10 Hypertalks with - Hanli Geyser, Lecturer Game Design at Wits Digital Arts - Nhlanhla 'Lucky' Nkosi, Game design student at Wits - Regina Kgatle, Game designer, activist - Tsitsi Chiumya, Game design student at Wits - Ahmed Elgoni, Game design student at Wits - Marc Nicolsson, Mobile Maker Library
12:00 break/ lunch 13:00 How to create your first game workshop with the game experts Jonatan Van Hove, Anja Venter, Regina Kgatle, Ben Rausch, Richard Pieterse, Robbie Fraser, Lucky Nkosi, Philipp Schäfer 17:00 Playtesting / Exhibition 18:00
Sunday September 6, 2015 10:00am - 6:00pm PDT
3 Square Sports FacilityCnr Rooth Street and 13th Avenue, Alexandra
Play games with the eyes of the curators of A MAZE. and game designers from all over Africa to get more insight into game development per se, learn to reflect on game content in the field of art, culture, education and socio-critical aspects of interaction, game feel and story. We would like you to join the open play session of the extraordinary selection of the ZKM_Gameplay exhibition at the Goethe-Institut in Johannesburg with independent game designers, the director of A MAZE. Thorsten S. Wiedemann and other members of the curatorial team of A MAZE. / Johannesburg. The game designers from Cote d'Ivoire, Kenya, Nigeria and Senegal will also present their very own games in a discussion session at the beginning of the evening.
BoneloafGang Beasts is a silly multiplayer party game with surly gelatinous characters, brutal mêlée fight sequences, and absurdly hazardous environments. Set in the fictional metropolis of Beef City
Team LazerbeamBionic Bliss is a game about navigating the depressing, absurd and (if you make it) funny world of customer service in the year 2312. Take the role of Employee 852 as you play through a day in his life. Deal with disgruntled cybernetic-limb-recipients! Will you help... Read More →
Cukia Kimani, Ben Crooks, University of the WitswatersrandBoxer, is a top down boxing game played using only the analogue sticks -- and without all that boring 'moving' stuff in the way. Boxer strips out all the boredom of boxing and gives you what you really wanted to see in the... Read More →
Blindflug StudiosExperience Cloud Chasers, a randomly generated, steampunky journey about the lifes and hardships of immigration. Welcome to a world of flying islands, cloud harvesters and perilous sands. You follow Francisco and Amelia on their quest of reaching the spire across... Read More →
Team LazerbeamOur aim with this game was to make a cute but moving dating sim involving two icecream-cones and a perfectly snowy day. The artwork is very organic and loose, rendered in a playful digitally painted style. The music centers around recordings of live acoustic guitar... Read More →
Evan Greenwood, Jason SutherlandCriquette is a two button/two player distillation of the popular sport "Cricket". It's been translated into a digital format so that millions of people, who don't have access to specialized sporting equipment and large open spaces, can play cricket... Read More →
Llaura McGeeCURTAIN is an interactive first-person narrative about Kaci & Ally, two women in a Glasgow punk band, which explores the complexities of an emotionally abusive relationship.Through a vivid impressionistic art style players embody Ally to explore the physical spaces of... Read More →
Niki Smit and Owen HarrisDEEP is a meditative and psychoactive VR game that is controlled by breathing. Players don the Oculus Rift and the custom DEEP controller to explore a beautiful and mysterious undersea world. Allow the game to sweep you into its relaxing embrace as it teaches... Read More →
Rodain Joubert, Stefan Van Der Vegte, Jonathan Hau-JoonA game about the cost of violence. In "Desperation", players are encouraged to view violence as ugly, threatening and a last resort -- from beginning to end. The game attempts to step away from the common gaming trope of glorifying... Read More →
Raxterworks, Free LivesTrip the Light Fantastic is a meditative virtual reality game about exploring a vast, ever changing fractal lightscape. Set in a universe of light and sound, it is an abstract experience that uses VR to immerse the player is an experience that is unfamiliar... Read More →
Bubble Head Games, German University in CairoBeats of fury is a musical game where you have to fight against the crazy beats with your glorious music to crash them, it's a unique experience where you will feel every note and every beat in the music!
Steven TuThe Dead Run T-shirt game is a game on a t-shirt, with mechanics directly inspired by the Dead Run mobile game. The t-shirt wearer is the Master of the Dead, and any number of players may play as Zombie Shooters. Kill Zombies - Not Humans! Rules are on the shirt itself... Read More →
Lisa Chen, University of the WitswatersrandThis is an abstract digital game made up of triangles. The player plays as a four sided triangle trying to get through a maze of triangles. The player triangle is made up of four different colours. The maze is made up of the same colour triangles... Read More →
Bracken Hall, University of the WitswatersrandGyre is a puzzle platform game in which the player must traverse a circular level in order to reach the centre, collect the diamond, and win. The player has mostly no direct interaction with the elements in the level but for directing... Read More →
Omar Abdul Rahman, Cairo UniversityIt's a physics puzzle game where you can place launchers by tapping the orbit where you want to add them, and you can delete them by holding the mouse on them and swiping to the center of the orbit they attached to.
Francois van NiekerkLuminare is an inductive logic game about trying to figure out a hidden rule. Rules can start simple with “White groups contain a red symbol,” and progress to “White groups must contain a red triangle or a circle but not both,” or “Black groups have a... Read More →
Ruan Rothmann and Neall AdamsMergazerds is a 2-8 player cooperative-"competitive" Zerd battle simulation. Players in teams of 1-4 each take control of a Zerd, a massive Power Rangers inspired battle robot, to do battle with the opposing team to decide who will be saviour of the city... Read More →
Andrea Hayes, Arnaud De Marginy,University of WitwatersrandNoumenon is an abstract game that allows the player to create and alter a character's personality through the way in which they interact with Rorschach test (ink blot test) within the game. Through recorded dialogue with voice... Read More →
Jonatan Van HoveA pile of sand in the ocean is an interactive piece that you can put together, take apart, and leave or lose a bit of yourself in. Dig through the sand to see what you'll find. Scour the beach for treasure, the desert for shade. Build a sandcastle and wait for the... Read More →
Ben Myres, Cukia Kimani, Sean Goncalves, Luc Wolthers, Adam Linder, University of WitwatersrandA local multiplayer game about Orcs riding raptors, using each other as balls to play polo. All set in the retro-future-past that never was.
Clockwork AcornIn Polygenics you’re breeding creatures with various attributes, to try and breed towards a specific goal. You do this by selecting two creatures to breed, which causes a new generation to spawn.
Alica Contestabile, Sagan Yee, Lindy Wilkins, Nadine Lessio, Jenn WoodalPunk Prism Power is a Magical Girl multiplayer party game with custom peripherals, kick ass moves, and blinky lights.
Peter Cardwell-Gardner, Mark BacklerCreated in 12 hours for #TrafikJam, the winning entry
Error-Prone is cute little game of chaos and carnage made for 26 people to play around one keyboard. The end result illustrates perfectly how self driving cars are vastly superior to their... Read More →
Team LazerbeamPizza quest throws the player into the deep end – a choice of three paths. From there on out, the game tries at every turn to make the player wonder if they've made the wrong choice, if they should maybe turn back. In reality, a happy ending lies at the end of every... Read More →
Is That A HorseSADCAT is a 2D perspective-based platformer in a 3D world that puts you in control of a cat with seasonal affective disorder exploring the emotions that the seasons can bring. SADCAT employs VR in a unique way that is difficult to describe and even more difficult to... Read More →
GlichnapHave you ever wondered which of your friends could protect you with their eyes closed? Find out in Sentree - a cooperative, physical mobile game for 2 or more players about helping each other survive through the night in a dark, unfriendly forest.
Richard PieterseLudum Dare Simulator is an interactive video diary documenting my life over the weekend of the Ludum Dare game jam. The aim was to capture both the strangeness and relatability of life in a dev house and create a little time capsule for myself.
Robin ArnottSoundself is the collision of centuries old meditation technologywith video game trance. Turn off the lights, amp up the volume, and use your voice to fall through an odysessy of light and body.
Aidan Cammell & Raheel Hassim, University of the WitswatersrandAlone Together, is a narrative game that encourages each player to understand the story in their own unique way. The player assumes the role of two characters, seemingly alone in an empty world. As the two characters... Read More →
Francois van NiekerkKill or be killed in a submarine-on-submarine battle. Your torpedoes have a panel you can edit. Make this panel as symmetric as possible to boost the torpedo’s damage and accuracy.
Ryan Mazzolini, Ivo Sissolak, Ben RauschArcade Finger Twister is an arcade-like take on the old family favourite game Twister, and inspired by the mobile hit Fingle. In the game two players compete with one another by jamming their fingers together on an intimate array of arcade-style... Read More →
Tiane Erwee, Raheel Hassim,University of WitwatersrandThe game takes place in a geometric, bouncy and dynamic environment. The colour palette is based on the Karoo, a semi-desert landscape with cloudless skies. The objective of the game is to collect five rings, randomly located on... Read More →
Robin BaumgartenLine Wobbler is a one-dimensional dungeon crawler game with a custom wobble controller made out of a door-stopper spring and a five meter long ultrabright LED strip display.
Wednesday September 9, 2015 6:00pm - Thursday September 10, 2015 1:00am PDT
Roof111 Smit Street
Mandla Maseko is a 27 year old future generation Astronaut, credit to winning the Axe Apollo Space Academy competition that is under the SXC (Space Expedition Corporation). His dream is to do Aeronautical Engineering and qualify as a Mission Specialist. He aspire to be the first... Read More →
Thorsten S. Wiedemann is founder and director of A MAZE.. He produces and curates under this international label festivals, exhibitions and workshops on the intersection of games, games culture, digital arts and playful media. With "A MAZE. / Berlin" and "A MAZE. / Johannesburg" he... Read More →
Wednesday September 9, 2015 7:00pm - 8:00pm PDT
Roof111 Smit Street
BoneloafGang Beasts is a silly multiplayer party game with surly gelatinous characters, brutal mêlée fight sequences, and absurdly hazardous environments. Set in the fictional metropolis of Beef City
Team LazerbeamBionic Bliss is a game about navigating the depressing, absurd and (if you make it) funny world of customer service in the year 2312. Take the role of Employee 852 as you play through a day in his life. Deal with disgruntled cybernetic-limb-recipients! Will you help... Read More →
Cukia Kimani, Ben Crooks, University of the WitswatersrandBoxer, is a top down boxing game played using only the analogue sticks -- and without all that boring 'moving' stuff in the way. Boxer strips out all the boredom of boxing and gives you what you really wanted to see in the... Read More →
Blindflug StudiosExperience Cloud Chasers, a randomly generated, steampunky journey about the lifes and hardships of immigration. Welcome to a world of flying islands, cloud harvesters and perilous sands. You follow Francisco and Amelia on their quest of reaching the spire across... Read More →
Team LazerbeamOur aim with this game was to make a cute but moving dating sim involving two icecream-cones and a perfectly snowy day. The artwork is very organic and loose, rendered in a playful digitally painted style. The music centers around recordings of live acoustic guitar... Read More →
Evan Greenwood, Jason SutherlandCriquette is a two button/two player distillation of the popular sport "Cricket". It's been translated into a digital format so that millions of people, who don't have access to specialized sporting equipment and large open spaces, can play cricket... Read More →
Llaura McGeeCURTAIN is an interactive first-person narrative about Kaci & Ally, two women in a Glasgow punk band, which explores the complexities of an emotionally abusive relationship.Through a vivid impressionistic art style players embody Ally to explore the physical spaces of... Read More →
Niki Smit and Owen HarrisDEEP is a meditative and psychoactive VR game that is controlled by breathing. Players don the Oculus Rift and the custom DEEP controller to explore a beautiful and mysterious undersea world. Allow the game to sweep you into its relaxing embrace as it teaches... Read More →
Rodain Joubert, Stefan Van Der Vegte, Jonathan Hau-JoonA game about the cost of violence. In "Desperation", players are encouraged to view violence as ugly, threatening and a last resort -- from beginning to end. The game attempts to step away from the common gaming trope of glorifying... Read More →
Raxterworks, Free LivesTrip the Light Fantastic is a meditative virtual reality game about exploring a vast, ever changing fractal lightscape. Set in a universe of light and sound, it is an abstract experience that uses VR to immerse the player is an experience that is unfamiliar... Read More →
Bubble Head Games, German University in CairoBeats of fury is a musical game where you have to fight against the crazy beats with your glorious music to crash them, it's a unique experience where you will feel every note and every beat in the music!
Steven TuThe Dead Run T-shirt game is a game on a t-shirt, with mechanics directly inspired by the Dead Run mobile game. The t-shirt wearer is the Master of the Dead, and any number of players may play as Zombie Shooters. Kill Zombies - Not Humans! Rules are on the shirt itself... Read More →
Lisa Chen, University of the WitswatersrandThis is an abstract digital game made up of triangles. The player plays as a four sided triangle trying to get through a maze of triangles. The player triangle is made up of four different colours. The maze is made up of the same colour triangles... Read More →
Bracken Hall, University of the WitswatersrandGyre is a puzzle platform game in which the player must traverse a circular level in order to reach the centre, collect the diamond, and win. The player has mostly no direct interaction with the elements in the level but for directing... Read More →
Omar Abdul Rahman, Cairo UniversityIt's a physics puzzle game where you can place launchers by tapping the orbit where you want to add them, and you can delete them by holding the mouse on them and swiping to the center of the orbit they attached to.
Francois van NiekerkLuminare is an inductive logic game about trying to figure out a hidden rule. Rules can start simple with “White groups contain a red symbol,” and progress to “White groups must contain a red triangle or a circle but not both,” or “Black groups have a... Read More →
Ruan Rothmann and Neall AdamsMergazerds is a 2-8 player cooperative-"competitive" Zerd battle simulation. Players in teams of 1-4 each take control of a Zerd, a massive Power Rangers inspired battle robot, to do battle with the opposing team to decide who will be saviour of the city... Read More →
Andrea Hayes, Arnaud De Marginy,University of WitwatersrandNoumenon is an abstract game that allows the player to create and alter a character's personality through the way in which they interact with Rorschach test (ink blot test) within the game. Through recorded dialogue with voice... Read More →
Jonatan Van HoveA pile of sand in the ocean is an interactive piece that you can put together, take apart, and leave or lose a bit of yourself in. Dig through the sand to see what you'll find. Scour the beach for treasure, the desert for shade. Build a sandcastle and wait for the... Read More →
Ben Myres, Cukia Kimani, Sean Goncalves, Luc Wolthers, Adam Linder, University of WitwatersrandA local multiplayer game about Orcs riding raptors, using each other as balls to play polo. All set in the retro-future-past that never was.
Clockwork AcornIn Polygenics you’re breeding creatures with various attributes, to try and breed towards a specific goal. You do this by selecting two creatures to breed, which causes a new generation to spawn.
Alica Contestabile, Sagan Yee, Lindy Wilkins, Nadine Lessio, Jenn WoodalPunk Prism Power is a Magical Girl multiplayer party game with custom peripherals, kick ass moves, and blinky lights.
Peter Cardwell-Gardner, Mark BacklerCreated in 12 hours for #TrafikJam, the winning entry
Error-Prone is cute little game of chaos and carnage made for 26 people to play around one keyboard. The end result illustrates perfectly how self driving cars are vastly superior to their... Read More →
Team LazerbeamPizza quest throws the player into the deep end – a choice of three paths. From there on out, the game tries at every turn to make the player wonder if they've made the wrong choice, if they should maybe turn back. In reality, a happy ending lies at the end of every... Read More →
Is That A HorseSADCAT is a 2D perspective-based platformer in a 3D world that puts you in control of a cat with seasonal affective disorder exploring the emotions that the seasons can bring. SADCAT employs VR in a unique way that is difficult to describe and even more difficult to... Read More →
GlichnapHave you ever wondered which of your friends could protect you with their eyes closed? Find out in Sentree - a cooperative, physical mobile game for 2 or more players about helping each other survive through the night in a dark, unfriendly forest.
Richard PieterseLudum Dare Simulator is an interactive video diary documenting my life over the weekend of the Ludum Dare game jam. The aim was to capture both the strangeness and relatability of life in a dev house and create a little time capsule for myself.
Robin ArnottSoundself is the collision of centuries old meditation technologywith video game trance. Turn off the lights, amp up the volume, and use your voice to fall through an odysessy of light and body.
Aidan Cammell & Raheel Hassim, University of the WitswatersrandAlone Together, is a narrative game that encourages each player to understand the story in their own unique way. The player assumes the role of two characters, seemingly alone in an empty world. As the two characters... Read More →
Francois van NiekerkKill or be killed in a submarine-on-submarine battle. Your torpedoes have a panel you can edit. Make this panel as symmetric as possible to boost the torpedo’s damage and accuracy.
Ryan Mazzolini, Ivo Sissolak, Ben RauschArcade Finger Twister is an arcade-like take on the old family favourite game Twister, and inspired by the mobile hit Fingle. In the game two players compete with one another by jamming their fingers together on an intimate array of arcade-style... Read More →
Tiane Erwee, Raheel Hassim,University of WitwatersrandThe game takes place in a geometric, bouncy and dynamic environment. The colour palette is based on the Karoo, a semi-desert landscape with cloudless skies. The objective of the game is to collect five rings, randomly located on... Read More →
Robin BaumgartenLine Wobbler is a one-dimensional dungeon crawler game with a custom wobble controller made out of a door-stopper spring and a five meter long ultrabright LED strip display.
Thursday September 10, 2015 10:00am - 9:00pm PDT
Roof111 Smit Street
We’ll use Twine, an open-source tool for developing interactive stories to create games. This workshop requires no previous experience, and is perfect for beginners. Create a “chooseyourownadventure” style narrative, or using HTML5 and CSS, create any kind of game that can run in browser.
Writer and game designer from Toronto, Canada. A member of the PR and Communications Committee for Dames Making Games Toronto. Studies film when she’s not leveling up her programming skills and changing her hair colour.
Thursday September 10, 2015 11:00am - 3:00pm PDT
Room 2111 Smith Street
Using the new networking components of Unity (5.1), we will build together a simple multiplayer VJing application.
Gears to bring: nothing Skills required: Unity + C#, or simple genuine interest on how to design a multiplayer app Expectations after: A practical overview of designing a multiplayer application and of the new networking system of Unity.
Born between Atari2600 and Commodore64, I studied in France, Switzerland and Canada and worked the last 13 years as a software engineer on professional flight simulators graphics engine and games middleware (Kynapse and Autodesk Navigation). I am now Field Engineer for Unity, based... Read More →
Thursday September 10, 2015 1:00pm - 3:00pm PDT
Room 1111 Smith Street
Thorsten S. Wiedemann is founder and director of A MAZE.. He produces and curates under this international label festivals, exhibitions and workshops on the intersection of games, games culture, digital arts and playful media. With "A MAZE. / Berlin" and "A MAZE. / Johannesburg" he... Read More →
Game Designer and the Co-founder, Blindflug Studios
A Game Designer and the Co-founder of Blindflug Studios, an independent Game Development Company from Zürich Switzerland. Blindflug is best known for its nuclear debut “First Strike” which, despite being their first title, made it to the charts worldwide on iOS and Android. Jeremy... Read More →
Thursday September 10, 2015 4:00pm - 6:00pm PDT
Conference Room111 Smith Street
She first realized the power of computer science in grade school when she came across an Encyclopedia Encarta CD. She was amazed by how the CD encapsulated all of the information easily. She started taking computer classes in high school and continued in University of Cape Town where... Read More →
Thursday September 10, 2015 4:00pm - 6:00pm PDT
Conference Room111 Smith Street
4th Game Design Student working on After Robot a board game about taxi’s in South Africa. I am interested in the how games work to bring people together and thus have recently looked at experimental controls to allow people to interact. Did a research project on what the perceived... Read More →
Thursday September 10, 2015 4:00pm - 6:00pm PDT
Conference Room111 Smith Street
Nathan Masyuko is an award winning mobile game producer, who has co-founded two companies in software & game development in Kenya. Nathan has also consulted in the setting up and running of a third company in the same field. He consults widely with various corporate & small businesses... Read More →
Thursday September 10, 2015 4:00pm - 6:00pm PDT
Conference Room111 Smith Street
Born October 21,1986 in Wattwil CH. After his bachelor in gamedesign at the Zurich University of the Arts he co-founded Koboldgames GmbH, where he now works as a creative lead and developer. The company had success with their first game Journey of a Roach and several serious game... Read More →
Thursday September 10, 2015 4:00pm - 6:00pm PDT
Conference Room111 Smith Street
BoneloafGang Beasts is a silly multiplayer party game with surly gelatinous characters, brutal mêlée fight sequences, and absurdly hazardous environments. Set in the fictional metropolis of Beef City
Team LazerbeamBionic Bliss is a game about navigating the depressing, absurd and (if you make it) funny world of customer service in the year 2312. Take the role of Employee 852 as you play through a day in his life. Deal with disgruntled cybernetic-limb-recipients! Will you help... Read More →
Cukia Kimani, Ben Crooks, University of the WitswatersrandBoxer, is a top down boxing game played using only the analogue sticks -- and without all that boring 'moving' stuff in the way. Boxer strips out all the boredom of boxing and gives you what you really wanted to see in the... Read More →
Blindflug StudiosExperience Cloud Chasers, a randomly generated, steampunky journey about the lifes and hardships of immigration. Welcome to a world of flying islands, cloud harvesters and perilous sands. You follow Francisco and Amelia on their quest of reaching the spire across... Read More →
Team LazerbeamOur aim with this game was to make a cute but moving dating sim involving two icecream-cones and a perfectly snowy day. The artwork is very organic and loose, rendered in a playful digitally painted style. The music centers around recordings of live acoustic guitar... Read More →
Evan Greenwood, Jason SutherlandCriquette is a two button/two player distillation of the popular sport "Cricket". It's been translated into a digital format so that millions of people, who don't have access to specialized sporting equipment and large open spaces, can play cricket... Read More →
Llaura McGeeCURTAIN is an interactive first-person narrative about Kaci & Ally, two women in a Glasgow punk band, which explores the complexities of an emotionally abusive relationship.Through a vivid impressionistic art style players embody Ally to explore the physical spaces of... Read More →
Niki Smit and Owen HarrisDEEP is a meditative and psychoactive VR game that is controlled by breathing. Players don the Oculus Rift and the custom DEEP controller to explore a beautiful and mysterious undersea world. Allow the game to sweep you into its relaxing embrace as it teaches... Read More →
Rodain Joubert, Stefan Van Der Vegte, Jonathan Hau-JoonA game about the cost of violence. In "Desperation", players are encouraged to view violence as ugly, threatening and a last resort -- from beginning to end. The game attempts to step away from the common gaming trope of glorifying... Read More →
Raxterworks, Free LivesTrip the Light Fantastic is a meditative virtual reality game about exploring a vast, ever changing fractal lightscape. Set in a universe of light and sound, it is an abstract experience that uses VR to immerse the player is an experience that is unfamiliar... Read More →
Bubble Head Games, German University in CairoBeats of fury is a musical game where you have to fight against the crazy beats with your glorious music to crash them, it's a unique experience where you will feel every note and every beat in the music!
Steven TuThe Dead Run T-shirt game is a game on a t-shirt, with mechanics directly inspired by the Dead Run mobile game. The t-shirt wearer is the Master of the Dead, and any number of players may play as Zombie Shooters. Kill Zombies - Not Humans! Rules are on the shirt itself... Read More →
Lisa Chen, University of the WitswatersrandThis is an abstract digital game made up of triangles. The player plays as a four sided triangle trying to get through a maze of triangles. The player triangle is made up of four different colours. The maze is made up of the same colour triangles... Read More →
Bracken Hall, University of the WitswatersrandGyre is a puzzle platform game in which the player must traverse a circular level in order to reach the centre, collect the diamond, and win. The player has mostly no direct interaction with the elements in the level but for directing... Read More →
Omar Abdul Rahman, Cairo UniversityIt's a physics puzzle game where you can place launchers by tapping the orbit where you want to add them, and you can delete them by holding the mouse on them and swiping to the center of the orbit they attached to.
Francois van NiekerkLuminare is an inductive logic game about trying to figure out a hidden rule. Rules can start simple with “White groups contain a red symbol,” and progress to “White groups must contain a red triangle or a circle but not both,” or “Black groups have a... Read More →
Ruan Rothmann and Neall AdamsMergazerds is a 2-8 player cooperative-"competitive" Zerd battle simulation. Players in teams of 1-4 each take control of a Zerd, a massive Power Rangers inspired battle robot, to do battle with the opposing team to decide who will be saviour of the city... Read More →
Andrea Hayes, Arnaud De Marginy,University of WitwatersrandNoumenon is an abstract game that allows the player to create and alter a character's personality through the way in which they interact with Rorschach test (ink blot test) within the game. Through recorded dialogue with voice... Read More →
Jonatan Van HoveA pile of sand in the ocean is an interactive piece that you can put together, take apart, and leave or lose a bit of yourself in. Dig through the sand to see what you'll find. Scour the beach for treasure, the desert for shade. Build a sandcastle and wait for the... Read More →
Ben Myres, Cukia Kimani, Sean Goncalves, Luc Wolthers, Adam Linder, University of WitwatersrandA local multiplayer game about Orcs riding raptors, using each other as balls to play polo. All set in the retro-future-past that never was.
Clockwork AcornIn Polygenics you’re breeding creatures with various attributes, to try and breed towards a specific goal. You do this by selecting two creatures to breed, which causes a new generation to spawn.
Alica Contestabile, Sagan Yee, Lindy Wilkins, Nadine Lessio, Jenn WoodalPunk Prism Power is a Magical Girl multiplayer party game with custom peripherals, kick ass moves, and blinky lights.
Peter Cardwell-Gardner, Mark BacklerCreated in 12 hours for #TrafikJam, the winning entry
Error-Prone is cute little game of chaos and carnage made for 26 people to play around one keyboard. The end result illustrates perfectly how self driving cars are vastly superior to their... Read More →
Team LazerbeamPizza quest throws the player into the deep end – a choice of three paths. From there on out, the game tries at every turn to make the player wonder if they've made the wrong choice, if they should maybe turn back. In reality, a happy ending lies at the end of every... Read More →
Is That A HorseSADCAT is a 2D perspective-based platformer in a 3D world that puts you in control of a cat with seasonal affective disorder exploring the emotions that the seasons can bring. SADCAT employs VR in a unique way that is difficult to describe and even more difficult to... Read More →
GlichnapHave you ever wondered which of your friends could protect you with their eyes closed? Find out in Sentree - a cooperative, physical mobile game for 2 or more players about helping each other survive through the night in a dark, unfriendly forest.
Richard PieterseLudum Dare Simulator is an interactive video diary documenting my life over the weekend of the Ludum Dare game jam. The aim was to capture both the strangeness and relatability of life in a dev house and create a little time capsule for myself.
Robin ArnottSoundself is the collision of centuries old meditation technologywith video game trance. Turn off the lights, amp up the volume, and use your voice to fall through an odysessy of light and body.
Aidan Cammell & Raheel Hassim, University of the WitswatersrandAlone Together, is a narrative game that encourages each player to understand the story in their own unique way. The player assumes the role of two characters, seemingly alone in an empty world. As the two characters... Read More →
Francois van NiekerkKill or be killed in a submarine-on-submarine battle. Your torpedoes have a panel you can edit. Make this panel as symmetric as possible to boost the torpedo’s damage and accuracy.
Ryan Mazzolini, Ivo Sissolak, Ben RauschArcade Finger Twister is an arcade-like take on the old family favourite game Twister, and inspired by the mobile hit Fingle. In the game two players compete with one another by jamming their fingers together on an intimate array of arcade-style... Read More →
Tiane Erwee, Raheel Hassim,University of WitwatersrandThe game takes place in a geometric, bouncy and dynamic environment. The colour palette is based on the Karoo, a semi-desert landscape with cloudless skies. The objective of the game is to collect five rings, randomly located on... Read More →
Robin BaumgartenLine Wobbler is a one-dimensional dungeon crawler game with a custom wobble controller made out of a door-stopper spring and a five meter long ultrabright LED strip display.
Friday September 11, 2015 10:00am - 9:00pm PDT
Roof111 Smit Street
In this CRI gamelab workshop, you’ll discover and tinker with experimental projects we’ve built in our gamelab mixing game design, biology and DIY controllers. We know you’ve always wanted to steer live protozoa, fork a bacterial genome, and pilot your muscles remotely. Well this is your lucky day! Our workshop is adapted to everyone, even complete novices. By the end, you will have learned some basic biology, electronics, and programming skills, and will be ready to be the next Frankenstein of game design.
Requirements: Interest in biology and/or experimental games
Gears to bring: your own biology games, laptop, smartphones
Skills: biology, game design, electronics, programming
Expectations after: being able to propotype new kind of games, ++ knowledge on scientific games especially biotic games
GameLab Manager at the CRI, he is also runningthe gamelier club afterwork. Long story short, when he finished hisfrench undergrad studies of anthropology and sociology, he went toVancouver as a visitor student in SF University that's where he metstorytelling and transmedia.
Friday September 11, 2015 11:00am - 3:00pm PDT
Room 1111 Smith Street
Gamers are leveraging various types of devices to day from phones, tablets, computers to VR headsets. The world of choice allows us to choose how we engage with games and we are starting to see more instances of games that leverage platforms simultaneously. Examples such as Xbox Smartglass in Dead Rising and Metal Gear Solid’s iDroid application show that these interactions can enhance game play greatly. This session is on how to engineer these options for gamers.
Dave Russell is a Principal Technical Evangelist based in South Africa. He has been working for Microsoft for the past 4 years working with various technologies from Windows Phone and Azure, to Internet of Things and Xbox One.
Friday September 11, 2015 1:00pm - 3:00pm PDT
Room 2111 Smith Street
Dave Russell is a Principal Technical Evangelist based in South Africa. He has been working for Microsoft for the past 4 years working with various technologies from Windows Phone and Azure, to Internet of Things and Xbox One.
Friday September 11, 2015 4:00pm - 6:00pm PDT
Conference Room111 Smith Street
Nathan Gates is an artist based in Johannesburg where he also consults as a creative technologist and lectures part-time in digital arts at the University of The Witwatersrand.
His practice explores the domestication of knowledge at the hands of digital technologies, and the dynamic... Read More →
Friday September 11, 2015 4:00pm - 6:00pm PDT
Conference Room111 Smith Street
designer and co-founder at . Monobanda aims to explore and expand the boundaries of interaction. They focus heavily on researching and developing news forms of meaningful play and artful interaction. Smit regularly gives talks on the importance of free play within games.
Friday September 11, 2015 4:00pm - 6:00pm PDT
Conference Room111 Smith Street
Ben Rausch is a Cape Town-based game developer, animator, illustrator, DJ, VJ, event designer, cat-buddy and marvelous biography writer. By day he works as the co-director of animation & illustration studio Cool Your Jets. He spends his nights and weekends trying to do too many things... Read More →
Friday September 11, 2015 4:00pm - 6:00pm PDT
Conference Room111 Smith Street
BoneloafGang Beasts is a silly multiplayer party game with surly gelatinous characters, brutal mêlée fight sequences, and absurdly hazardous environments. Set in the fictional metropolis of Beef City
Team LazerbeamBionic Bliss is a game about navigating the depressing, absurd and (if you make it) funny world of customer service in the year 2312. Take the role of Employee 852 as you play through a day in his life. Deal with disgruntled cybernetic-limb-recipients! Will you help... Read More →
Cukia Kimani, Ben Crooks, University of the WitswatersrandBoxer, is a top down boxing game played using only the analogue sticks -- and without all that boring 'moving' stuff in the way. Boxer strips out all the boredom of boxing and gives you what you really wanted to see in the... Read More →
Blindflug StudiosExperience Cloud Chasers, a randomly generated, steampunky journey about the lifes and hardships of immigration. Welcome to a world of flying islands, cloud harvesters and perilous sands. You follow Francisco and Amelia on their quest of reaching the spire across... Read More →
Team LazerbeamOur aim with this game was to make a cute but moving dating sim involving two icecream-cones and a perfectly snowy day. The artwork is very organic and loose, rendered in a playful digitally painted style. The music centers around recordings of live acoustic guitar... Read More →
Evan Greenwood, Jason SutherlandCriquette is a two button/two player distillation of the popular sport "Cricket". It's been translated into a digital format so that millions of people, who don't have access to specialized sporting equipment and large open spaces, can play cricket... Read More →
Llaura McGeeCURTAIN is an interactive first-person narrative about Kaci & Ally, two women in a Glasgow punk band, which explores the complexities of an emotionally abusive relationship.Through a vivid impressionistic art style players embody Ally to explore the physical spaces of... Read More →
Niki Smit and Owen HarrisDEEP is a meditative and psychoactive VR game that is controlled by breathing. Players don the Oculus Rift and the custom DEEP controller to explore a beautiful and mysterious undersea world. Allow the game to sweep you into its relaxing embrace as it teaches... Read More →
Rodain Joubert, Stefan Van Der Vegte, Jonathan Hau-JoonA game about the cost of violence. In "Desperation", players are encouraged to view violence as ugly, threatening and a last resort -- from beginning to end. The game attempts to step away from the common gaming trope of glorifying... Read More →
Raxterworks, Free LivesTrip the Light Fantastic is a meditative virtual reality game about exploring a vast, ever changing fractal lightscape. Set in a universe of light and sound, it is an abstract experience that uses VR to immerse the player is an experience that is unfamiliar... Read More →
Bubble Head Games, German University in CairoBeats of fury is a musical game where you have to fight against the crazy beats with your glorious music to crash them, it's a unique experience where you will feel every note and every beat in the music!
Steven TuThe Dead Run T-shirt game is a game on a t-shirt, with mechanics directly inspired by the Dead Run mobile game. The t-shirt wearer is the Master of the Dead, and any number of players may play as Zombie Shooters. Kill Zombies - Not Humans! Rules are on the shirt itself... Read More →
Lisa Chen, University of the WitswatersrandThis is an abstract digital game made up of triangles. The player plays as a four sided triangle trying to get through a maze of triangles. The player triangle is made up of four different colours. The maze is made up of the same colour triangles... Read More →
Bracken Hall, University of the WitswatersrandGyre is a puzzle platform game in which the player must traverse a circular level in order to reach the centre, collect the diamond, and win. The player has mostly no direct interaction with the elements in the level but for directing... Read More →
Omar Abdul Rahman, Cairo UniversityIt's a physics puzzle game where you can place launchers by tapping the orbit where you want to add them, and you can delete them by holding the mouse on them and swiping to the center of the orbit they attached to.
Francois van NiekerkLuminare is an inductive logic game about trying to figure out a hidden rule. Rules can start simple with “White groups contain a red symbol,” and progress to “White groups must contain a red triangle or a circle but not both,” or “Black groups have a... Read More →
Ruan Rothmann and Neall AdamsMergazerds is a 2-8 player cooperative-"competitive" Zerd battle simulation. Players in teams of 1-4 each take control of a Zerd, a massive Power Rangers inspired battle robot, to do battle with the opposing team to decide who will be saviour of the city... Read More →
Andrea Hayes, Arnaud De Marginy,University of WitwatersrandNoumenon is an abstract game that allows the player to create and alter a character's personality through the way in which they interact with Rorschach test (ink blot test) within the game. Through recorded dialogue with voice... Read More →
Jonatan Van HoveA pile of sand in the ocean is an interactive piece that you can put together, take apart, and leave or lose a bit of yourself in. Dig through the sand to see what you'll find. Scour the beach for treasure, the desert for shade. Build a sandcastle and wait for the... Read More →
Ben Myres, Cukia Kimani, Sean Goncalves, Luc Wolthers, Adam Linder, University of WitwatersrandA local multiplayer game about Orcs riding raptors, using each other as balls to play polo. All set in the retro-future-past that never was.
Clockwork AcornIn Polygenics you’re breeding creatures with various attributes, to try and breed towards a specific goal. You do this by selecting two creatures to breed, which causes a new generation to spawn.
Alica Contestabile, Sagan Yee, Lindy Wilkins, Nadine Lessio, Jenn WoodalPunk Prism Power is a Magical Girl multiplayer party game with custom peripherals, kick ass moves, and blinky lights.
Peter Cardwell-Gardner, Mark BacklerCreated in 12 hours for #TrafikJam, the winning entry
Error-Prone is cute little game of chaos and carnage made for 26 people to play around one keyboard. The end result illustrates perfectly how self driving cars are vastly superior to their... Read More →
Team LazerbeamPizza quest throws the player into the deep end – a choice of three paths. From there on out, the game tries at every turn to make the player wonder if they've made the wrong choice, if they should maybe turn back. In reality, a happy ending lies at the end of every... Read More →
Is That A HorseSADCAT is a 2D perspective-based platformer in a 3D world that puts you in control of a cat with seasonal affective disorder exploring the emotions that the seasons can bring. SADCAT employs VR in a unique way that is difficult to describe and even more difficult to... Read More →
GlichnapHave you ever wondered which of your friends could protect you with their eyes closed? Find out in Sentree - a cooperative, physical mobile game for 2 or more players about helping each other survive through the night in a dark, unfriendly forest.
Robin ArnottSoundself is the collision of centuries old meditation technologywith video game trance. Turn off the lights, amp up the volume, and use your voice to fall through an odysessy of light and body.
Aidan Cammell & Raheel Hassim, University of the WitswatersrandAlone Together, is a narrative game that encourages each player to understand the story in their own unique way. The player assumes the role of two characters, seemingly alone in an empty world. As the two characters... Read More →
Francois van NiekerkKill or be killed in a submarine-on-submarine battle. Your torpedoes have a panel you can edit. Make this panel as symmetric as possible to boost the torpedo’s damage and accuracy.
Ryan Mazzolini, Ivo Sissolak, Ben RauschArcade Finger Twister is an arcade-like take on the old family favourite game Twister, and inspired by the mobile hit Fingle. In the game two players compete with one another by jamming their fingers together on an intimate array of arcade-style... Read More →
Tiane Erwee, Raheel Hassim,University of WitwatersrandThe game takes place in a geometric, bouncy and dynamic environment. The colour palette is based on the Karoo, a semi-desert landscape with cloudless skies. The objective of the game is to collect five rings, randomly located on... Read More →
Robin BaumgartenLine Wobbler is a one-dimensional dungeon crawler game with a custom wobble controller made out of a door-stopper spring and a five meter long ultrabright LED strip display.
Saturday September 12, 2015 10:00am - 9:00pm PDT
Roof111 Smit Street
After a short introduction to shaders - “how and why” we will implement one, two, three samples until everyone gets nuts and tries to follow their own ideas. The samples will play with saturation and then move on to a post processing toon shade to a disturbing floating world. Your own projects are very welcome. Probably a good place to talk about the visuals of your game and how to make them unique.
Gears to bring: Laptop with Unity 5
Amount of participants: 2-25
Skills: programming necessary
Expectations after: Rapidly prototype art style using shaders. Enhance your game with post processing.
After studing Media and Informatics in Berlin and Leipzig, Philipp followed his passion to Vienna to specialize in Game Engineering and Physic Simulation. During his Masters he started work on Schein (a dark puzzle platformer) which later become the pilot project for Zeppelin Studio... Read More →
Saturday September 12, 2015 1:00pm - 3:00pm PDT
Room 2111 Smith Street
In 2006 I started learning music by getting Ableton, pirating songs and mashing them up until everything was a terrible garbage mess. My music was bad, but it turned out to be insanely fun. Why don't we try to emulate that feeling and do it together?
Gears to bring: Your laptop, your headphones, your mp3 music library and maybe a demo version of Ableton. Or you could get the thing you're comfortable with and we might figure it out.
Amount of participants: 25
Skills: Beginners interested in learning music software, intermediates can learn some tricks and tips for ableton live
Expectations after: Understanding of limitations in music creation, and maybe a beginning step of a musical career
C418 is probably mostly known for being the composer and sound designer of Minecraft. Through the immense success of the game, he has been able to keep working on Minecraft for over 5 years and created over 5 hours of music. He's also very very silly and sometimes does live shows... Read More →
Saturday September 12, 2015 1:00pm - 3:00pm PDT
Room 1111 Smith Street
Robin Baumgarten (he/him) is an experimental hardware game developer based in Berlin. Coming from an AI and commercial game dev background, he is now building interactive installation art and award-winning experimental custom controller games, such as Line Wobbler and Wobble Gard... Read More →
Saturday September 12, 2015 4:00pm - 6:00pm PDT
Conference Room111 Smith Street
Richard Pieterse is a bionic space walrus from the year 2013. He traveled forward in time, leaving his career as a professional muscle car wrestler, after his best friend and confidant was exploded. He now spends his every waking moment making videogames in an attempt to block out... Read More →
Saturday September 12, 2015 4:00pm - 6:00pm PDT
Conference Room111 Smith Street
Dr Anja “Nanna” Venter-Rausch is a self-proclaimed “Art-stronaut”. She is a visual designer who completed her Master’s degree in Media Studies at the University of Cape Town with a focus on video game culture in marginal settings. In 2018 she was awarded her Ph.D. which... Read More →
Writer and game designer from Toronto, Canada. A member of the PR and Communications Committee for Dames Making Games Toronto. Studies film when she’s not leveling up her programming skills and changing her hair colour.
She first realized the power of computer science in grade school when she came across an Encyclopedia Encarta CD. She was amazed by how the CD encapsulated all of the information easily. She started taking computer classes in high school and continued in University of Cape Town where... Read More →
Richard Pieterse is a bionic space walrus from the year 2013. He traveled forward in time, leaving his career as a professional muscle car wrestler, after his best friend and confidant was exploded. He now spends his every waking moment making videogames in an attempt to block out... Read More →
Saturday September 12, 2015 7:00pm - 8:00pm PDT
Conference Room111 Smith Street
Julian Pritchard the Programmer and Business Guy at Punk Arcade, a South African independent studio currently working on their debut title Phase Edge. Julian has been tinkering with games for almost a decade, and also helping out in the Jo'burg and South African dev scene since... Read More →
Saturday September 12, 2015 7:00pm - 9:00pm PDT
Conference Room111 Smith Street
Creator of the indie game Cadence and co-curator of the experimental video game party Super Friendship Arcade, Peter spends a lot of time looking in and pondering what it means to be a happy game developer.
Writer and game designer from Toronto, Canada. A member of the PR and Communications Committee for Dames Making Games Toronto. Studies film when she’s not leveling up her programming skills and changing her hair colour.
administrative director, Neuch‚tel Fantastic Film Festival (NIFFF)
Born in Geneva, Switzerland, Cyrille Dos Ghali obtained a master's degree in cultural anthropology from the University of Neuch‚tel; his main interest was deconstructing the nature/culture dichotomy. After having worked on several mandates as a scientific consultant for the Ecole... Read More →
Ben Myres is a game designer, curator, and digital artist. He is the co-founder of South African indie studio, Nyamakop; programme manager of A MAZE. / Johannesburg; and co-organiser of [Resting] Glitch Face, a Johannesburg experimental games party.Ben has never played a Zelda... Read More →
Julian Pritchard the Programmer and Business Guy at Punk Arcade, a South African independent studio currently working on their debut title Phase Edge. Julian has been tinkering with games for almost a decade, and also helping out in the Jo'burg and South African dev scene since... Read More →
GameLab Manager at the CRI, he is also runningthe gamelier club afterwork. Long story short, when he finished hisfrench undergrad studies of anthropology and sociology, he went toVancouver as a visitor student in SF University that's where he metstorytelling and transmedia.
Thorsten S. Wiedemann is founder and director of A MAZE.. He produces and curates under this international label festivals, exhibitions and workshops on the intersection of games, games culture, digital arts and playful media. With "A MAZE. / Berlin" and "A MAZE. / Johannesburg" he... Read More →
Saturday September 12, 2015 8:00pm - 9:00pm PDT
Conference Room111 Smith Street