Yeah, no. For real this time. That groundhog said there was going to be early spring, but it’s all a sham! It lied! I can never trust mammals ever again! I can’t believe I fell for the hype!

Oh, the shame! If you ever see a groundhog, please do me a favour and send them to the shame corner!

This is EXACTLY why I trust hedgehogs. They wont lie to me…will they?

Hmmm…this remains to be seen, but either way March is here regardless and there are tons of stuff to do!

Have fun, friends! Cross your fingers and toes for double-digit positive temperatures!

Don’t forget, there’s Google Calendar, in which you can check out all of the events here in one handy, downloadable place!

March 2

Come celebrate Kingdom Hearts III over at Power Up Game Bar! K-K-Kingdom Nights!

Oh look! It’s Game Gallery 4! Play some games, listen to some music. Just chill out, fam~.

Game Gallery 4! Look at that font! I love it!

March 4

Toronto Gaymers is hosting a D&D Adventures! Go forth!

March 5

Art Strategies for the Modern Animation Warrior. Learn about the challenges and rewards of working as an indie!

How Videogames Can Make You A Better Person. Oh?? Well that’s certainly a term to get me interested!

For International Women’s Day the ultra-rad Anita Sarkeesian will be speaking at the ROM for History vs. Women!

March 7

Want to learn how to do Augmented Reality? Check out this workshop! Registration Deadline is March 5!

March 12-14

There’s going to be a Toronto Kids Digital Festival! Get your kids out to touch, experience and play different forms of media! Tickets are up for sale now!

March 13

Going to GDC and want to know how to make the best of it? Check out the iLunch and get your tickets! You may find some hidden GDC tips and secrets!

DMG is hosting an Intro to Arduino workshop! This sounds awesome! (Moved to April 3rd)

Oh, The Horror Of It All! No, really. That’s the name of the event! Check out what’s going on in horror film and literature!

Feed me horror!

March 13 -23

‘Art Cart Showcase is a partnership between Workman Arts and Gifts of Light, which pairs established Workman Arts member artists with CAMH client services to provide peer-to-peer arts programming with professional materials.’ Amazing!

March 14

Rock Band Night! Now you can play Queen songs… with others! You liked that movie, right? Teehee!

Thursday night Magic the Gathering! I’ve never played magic, but if you do, you are in good company!

March 15

Like stickers, prints and zines? Of course you do! Then maybe check out Zine Zone Winter 2019!

March 16

DMG is also hosting Freelance Negotiations for Artists and Contractors. Talking about money is hard. This workshop seems like fun!

Want to go to Another Unspecific After Party? Power Up Game Bar has you covered!

March 23

Not going to GDC? Yeah, same. However, DMG has their DMG GDC Offsite 2019 Edition! No need to go to San Francisco for this one!

March 27

Ever wanted to create a controller for a your body? Hells yeah you do! There’s a workshop for that! Body-Centric Game Controllers at DMG!

WHERE TO HAUNT – SOCIALS

March 5

The first rule of Fight Club–DARN IT! Anyways, here’s Fight Club!

March 18

Game Designers Night at Snakes and Lattes! Play some new table tops and make your maybe?

March 27

Do you create stuff? Well, Glad Day Bookshop is having a Creator Social. Details TBD, but it seems interesting…

March 28

Glad Day Bookshop is having a Network Event! Tell those folks who you are and what you do!

COMING AND GOING ATTRACTIONS

March 18- March 22

Game Developer’s Conference in San Francisco! Bring a sweater! That part of California isn’t as hot as you think!

March 28 – March 31

Penny Arcade Expo in Boston, which still has a few tickets for a few days!

#ICYMI

BRAVERY NETWORK ONLINE!!!

Look at this impressive vinyl!

https://twitter.com/Mr_Tedders/status/1106951021098614787

Real actors in a game? Excuse me? What year is this, 2099???

BREADWINNER – JOBS/GIGS/OPPORTUNITIES/DEADLINES

The Mixer is having a Game Environment Art Challenge! Concept submissions will be held from March 25 to April 7th! Maybe check it out and see what you can make?

Our friends at Get Set Games has a lot of jobs open for ya!

Ubisoft has jobs!

Rockstar has JERBS!!

The folks over at Sonderlust Studios are looking for a Lead Writer, Designer and an Environment Artist! Apply!

Glu has a lot of cool openings!

Are you a Software engineer or Backend engineer looking for work? Uken has your back!

Disclaimer: This is a monthly compilation of various Toronto game news and events in and around the city — many of which are not organized by Hand Eye Society — and is by no means comprehensive. Always check official links for accurate details and credits, and please send any corrections, additions, or submissions for future months to calendar@handeyesociety.com before the month in which the event takes place.

While you’re at it, don’t forget to thank your fire marshall Google Calendar! They’re trapped sliding down an infinity pole, dropping lower and lower without ever hitting steel-toe boots to fire station floor.

WHERE TO JAUNT – TORONTO GAME EVENTS

Wednesday, May 3

Write off your Wednesday evening as a success if you’re at this: Dames Natalie Walschots and Kaitlin Tremblay are back with another installment in their wildly popular interactive fiction + narrative game-making workshop series.

Friday, May 5 to Sunday, May 7

Over 400 of Toronto’s most sleep-deprived pizza-gobbling developers will spend this weekend coding a game from start to finish at TO Jam: What Twelves Below. The theme this year will disappoint you.

For real, that’s the theme.

Sundays: May 7, 14, 21

The kids are all right, if they’re learning how to make Scratch games at this weekly Codezilla workshop.

Tuesday, May 9

King me! Actually, king that Sir Graham kid, he clearly wants it more. The Two-Bit Game Club is holding a King’s Quest discussion group. Made by Roberta Williams, King’s Quest: Quest for the Crown was one of several graphic adventures that pioneered the genre. If you haven’t played the game before, never fear! There are ways…

Saturday, May 13 to Sunday, May 14

The Hand Eye Society’s lovefest with TCAF is back! Comics x Games, a FREE annual celebration of the intersections between comic books and videogames, returns for this year’s Toronto Comic Arts Festival. Come through for tons of local and international games, as well as two panels for your viewing pleasure.

What might be the hypest thing is the return of our Comics x Games jam, which hasn’t run round these parts since 2012. We’ve paired up local artists and developers for jam teams, slapped ‘em a hefty honouranium wad, and asked them to blow our minds. The results will be getting their debuts at TCAF, so be prepared for some cranium splattering.

May 30 to June 3

We’ll come back to this at the end of the month, but just a heads up that the annual Different Games event — held in Brooklyn in previous years — is coming to Toronto as a mini-conference! The arcade exhibit, organized with the help of Little Dada, starts May 30. More details coming soon, but in the meantime, the Different Games Collective seeks sponsorship funding from like-minded companies and individuals who wish to support and attach themselves to a positive, community-oriented project. Contact differentgamesconference@gmail.com to get in touch.

WHERE TO HAUNT – TORONTO GAME SOCIALS

Tuesday, May 2

Leave the Macbething at home for this edition of Dames Making Games’s monthly VR meetup. Aside from the usual snax and virtual reality hangz, Dames Making Games is hosting a talk with software dev Bernie Roehl. Before VR was a millennial household name, Roehl was innovating Canada’s early VR scene. With a background in theatre, he’ll be teaching attendees theatre principles they can apply to their VR projects. (Edit: Unfortunately we didn’t post this quite in time, but DMG lists all their events ahead of time on their front page!)

Monday, May 8

Play Games With Friends is Gamma Space’s monthly, inclusive, free and open to the public game playing event! Come play video, tabletop and social games of all kinds. Bring one with you, or jump into something unfamiliar when you arrive. Ambassadors from the Gamma Space and Dames Making Games community will be present to help you get into the game, and will help organize some of the activities.

Tuesday, May 9

Bonus Stage is back at its regular scheduled Tuesday. Show up for the community’s monthly open mic night, giving five speakers five minutes to rant, rave, or test out some new bars for a possible Gorillaz game collab. (I mean the latter isn’t happening, but I’m hoping by writing this some Secretesque energy is gonna make this a thing.)

Wednesday, May 31

Another Torontaru, on the house! The monthly bar social for everyone interested in indie games is running again. At the Get Well, starts at 8 p.m.  

A BREADWINNER IS YOU – JOBS, GIGS, AND OPPORTUNITIES

For the social media mavens out there, #here’s #something #of #interest: Massive Damage is hiring a community manager. When you apply, don’t forget to also let ‘em know your fave games! They wanna know why you like them and what could make them even better.

If you’re a student developer with a disability, keep this scholarship on your radar. The International Game Developers Association (IGDA) and Microsoft have partnered for a scholarship worth $5,000 USD (That’s $6831.25 in loonies) that’ll go to a student developer who identifies with having a long-term health issue. Apply before June 1.

Aaron Bernstein is looking for a 3D modeller/sculptor, who Aaron can pay or trade for their services. See the Facebook post in our group for more details. (And if you haven’t already, join upppp.)

Submissions are now open for Curious Cabinets, our arcade with Electric Perfume and Spritebox! The deadline is next Wednesday on May 10. Curated games will be exhibited on our Torontron one button machine and a SpriteBox cabinet in July.

MVP

This month’s HES MVP is Jon Remedios, a game developer and designer at Actual Humans. Honestly, they are. Remedios is our May MVP for a very simple reason: until Friday, you can make him drink milk.

You see, Remedios is the creator of Shoot Shoot Mega Pack (SSMP), which you might remember from its dazzling HES Society Ball debut. The 2D multiplayer mayhem is out on Steam and Itch.io and is a Very Good Game you should pick up anyway. But a little incentive never hurt anybody, which is why Remedios is drinking milk for every copy of SSMP sold before Friday, May 5.

As seven percent dairy was soon to be ebbing from his ears, we asked him what other things he had swirling in his system. Turns out, he’s got some sage advice on player engagement.

“Getting people to care about your game is never a given and that can be tough. Try not to worry about it too much. There are many different metrics of success, if you can focus on how you succeeded rather than failed you’ll at least be in a decent headspace,” he says. “I think you’ll be broke as heck*, but… you know.”

(* He said the F word instead of heck ooooooooh. Sagan feel free to keep the blasphemy if you wanna! Sagan’s Edit: I think I’m just going to leave all of this here…)

Three frothy cheers to him!

Thanks for reading the newsletter, kindly brought to you by Hand Eye’s membership. Now’s a great time to join up, since we’ve rolled out student and studio plans for your walletary pleasure.

Keep an eye out for that wayward Club Penguin survivor Google Calendar. This user somehow survived the great Iceberg Purge of 2017, and now listlessly waddles from streetcar to streetcar. Should you meet, you’ll find they’re fond of squeaking events as they are announced.

WHERE TO JAUNT – TORONTO GAME EVENTS

Wednesday, February 1

Long Night with Vish Khanna, a monthly talk show with titular host Vish Khanna, will be doing a succession of free tapings in the city. One such episode is “Why have indie-rock and indie gaming fallen in love?” and stars N++’s Mare Sheppard, Raigan Burns, and Shaun Hatton from Laser Destroyer Team and Megashaun. All are old hands at Hand Eye, so show some love to this FibeTV/Long Winter collab presentation.

Sunday, February 5

Your favourite eclectic emporium Electric Perfume is running a screening of Raktor: Broadcast One, and since this is an Electric Perfume event here’s the mind-blowing part: the movie will be shown in a live/VR theater, happening in Toronto and San Francisco at the same time! Heads-up: audience participation is a must, since this will also be broadcast on Facebook Live, and wear no green!

Monday, February 6

DMG continues the second C# session of their Game Dev Book Club. If you’re learning the language, they hold bi-weekly meetings for programmers of all skill levels.

Thursday, February 9

For aspiring game writers, DMG’s running an Interactive Fiction and Narrative Games Writing workshop. Mentors Kait Tremblay and Natalie Zed (who you might remember was last month’s MVP) will chat about their craft, and help participants get acclimated to interactive fiction tools. As of writing, there’s one spot left. Missed out? Don’t worry, there’s still time to sign up for the second iteration of the workshop, running on Friday, March 17.

Sunday, February 12

It’s time for the second annual FebMoVid, a tribute night to the FMV genre! After how much side-splitting fun the first FebMoVid was,we teamed up with our partner-in-cinematic-crime the Laser Blast Film Society again to hold a special screening of point-and-click terror Phantasmagoria: A Puzzle Of Flesh. Notoriously banned or censored worldwide, A Puzzle of Flesh features gore and sexual freakiness galore, as withdrawn hero Curtis Craig unravels repressed memories, investigates his shady employer, and gets surprisingly fair bisexual representation. Stick around for the show, as well as an exclusive demo of a brand new FMV game made last year for  FANTASTIC FEST’s 2016 in Austin, Texas.

Friday, February 17 to Sunday, February 19

Peterborough is holding its second annual game jam, which will take place at Fleming College’s Kawartha Trades and Technology Centre. Impressive fact: the City of Peterborough declared the weekend an official Thing. Even more impressive fact: last year, an impressive 78 pizza slices were chomped.  

Saturday, February 18 to Sunday, February 19

Wear your gumshoes and chug some hard-boiled flavoured soylent for DMG’s fifth annual FEB FATALE, a noir-themed weekend game jam for Dames. This year’s theme is TRANSGRESSION. You’ll have 48 hours, access to VR headsets, and snacks available to pump out pulpy games, lest you transgress against the jam’s spirit. (On that note, spirit jam sounds ectoplasmically delicious!)

Saturday, February 18 to Sunday, April 23

TIFF’s sixth DigiplaySpace exhibit premieres on Family Day and runs on for two months, which is plenty of time to explore its playful digital creations, including multiplayer game HOKY by Kitty Calis, Jan Willem Nijman, and Eirik Suhrke, and Toronto’s very own Douglas Gregory with Last One Standing!

Monday, February 20

The third C# session of DMG’s Game Dev Book Club. Tag along with the group lesson, or work on your own personal project.

WHERE TO HAUNT – TORONTO GAME SOCIALS

Tuesdays: 7, 14, 21, 28

Sundays: February 5, 12, 19, 26

This isn’t strictly for game developers, but Meetup group Coffee and Code is a productive hangout every Sunday and Tuesday that encourages casual drop-in coding. The group encourages folks to work on their games, projects, or self-directed coding resources. All skill levels and questions welcome. Tuesdays start at 4:30 p.m. and Sundays start at 12:30 p.m., at  Tango Palace Coffee Company.

Tuesday, February 7

Tying in with Final Fantasy’s 30th anniversary, you can get phoenix down at the 2-Bit Gaming Club’s Final Fantasy discussion group. This meeting of metaminds welcomes all, whether you’re an OG fan, have never played it, or just wanna chat about JRPGs and weird hairdos with other human beings. At Electric Perfume, starts at 6 p.m.

Toronto VR Meetup is holding a speaker social with Keith Maske of Red Meat Games. Maske will be chatting about their superhero-themed First Impact: Rise Of A Hero. At Globacore Headquarters, starts at 7 p.m.

Saturday, February 11

Viva the dance dance revolution, the dames are footloosing to Just Dance all night at DMG’s February social. At Gamma Space, starts at 6:30 p.m.  

Afterwards, find your player 2 (or 3, 4, or level 9 CPU, whatevs) at Power Up Bar’s Plug In + Power Up mixer. The bar promises an extensive party game collection, jams by Ben Chin, and special appearances from cosplayers. If you wear traffic apparel (green for single, red for taken, yellow for ???), you get a 50 per cent cover discount. At Power Up Bar, starts at 10 p.m.

Monday, February 13

Kick Monday blues to the curb with monthly public gaming social Play Games With Friends. At Gamma Space, starts at 6:30 p.m.

Tuesday, February 14

Brave the cold for a special Valentine’s edition of Bonus Stage, Toronto’s open mic night for the indie game community. Five speakers get five minutes each to rant about whatever. At Page One, starts at 8 p.m.

Thursday, February 16

Toronto Game Development Meetup Group will be kicking off this season’s talks with a look at Microsoft’s Hololens, an upcoming AR/holographic device. The talk promises to explain how to develop for the Hololens, even without owning one yet. You’ll need to join the group for the meetup’s location, starts at 7 p.m.

#ICYMI

#GOTYs: One More Story Games swept up Toronto Game Devs’ annual Game Of The Year top 10 list, with Hard Vacuum Lullaby in second place and Mandatory Upgrade X Marks the Spot claiming first. Other list-makers include Severed, Kapsul Infinite, and Maize.

#UbisoftIndieWin: Jurassic-sized congrats go to Reptoid Games, the $50,000 winner of Ubisoft’s first Indie Series competition! Big hand to worthy finalists Little Guy Games, Rocket5 Studios, Lightning Rod Games, Tendril, and Caged Element.

#GracefulSwitch: Very cool news, Vertex Pop’s Graceful Explosion Machine will be debuting on the *clack sound* Nintendo Switch! This locally brewed arcade shooter will be launching on other consoles after its Switch premiere this spring.

#AloneWithYou: If you need that perfect Valentine’s gift for the special astronaut in your life, Benjamin Rivers’ Alone With You will be out on Steam by Thursday, February 9.

#CampMakeAGame: We announced that we’ll be running a game creation summer camp called Camp Make-A-Game! If you know an aspiring young game dev who might like to be a Hand Eye scout, keep an eye on us for updates.

COMING AND GOING ATTRACTIONS

Several game creators are donating their work’s proceeds to worthwhile charities including Fez. The perspective-flipping game costs either one obsolete penny or a PWYC donation to the American Civil Liberties Union.

Tiny Titan was the little studio that could after all! Their game Tiny Rails was successfully greenlit on Steam.

There’s a Canada-themed game jam for our nation’s 150th! It is planned to be informally held from February 1 – July 1, 2017. The only rule is that projects must feature Canada, through either setting, story, art, music or gameplay. There is no prize or award, only the spirit of cultural pride to make a project freely available to celebrate Canada’s special year.

PAPER TRAILS – GAMING IN THE MEDIA

Homegrown devs Arielle Grimes and Sophia Park made Forgotten, a gorgeously corrupted twine game. Without spoiling too much of the game’s thoughtful explorations of trauma and physical encoding: you turn your computer on and ruin everything. Killscreen and Wired raved about it, with Wired calling it “the first must-play game of the year.”   

Mobile Syrup asked indie developers to weigh in on the Nintendo Switch, including 13AM Games’ Alex Rushdy, Snowman’s Ryan Cash, Capybara Games’ Nathan Vella, and Drinkbox Studios’ Graham Smith.

IT RISES. Season two of Play Dead, Dork Shelf’s podcast about death in videogames, returns! Host/virtual vampire Gabby DaRienzo, The Score editor and walking anime trope Daniel Rosen, and Counterstrike player (also, Canada’s Smartest Person?!) Stephanie Harvey opine on death’s role in e-sports.

Toronto Game Devs are always bustling, but January was particularly #hustlegoals. They released several videos on their Youtube channel, including playthroughs of Guacamelee, Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime, and N++. Their podcast had TGD chatting with One More Story Games, musing on the Switch; Patreon saw a few updates, including a free copy of Monumental Failure for supporters.  Lastly, they did a round-up of (mostly) Toronto-based games with mental health themes, curated via Twitter DMs from Your Humble Digest Narrator.

MVP

This month’s MVP is Jean Leggett, CEO of Barrie-based One More Story Games (OMSG), occasional stand-up comedian and a finalist in Communitech’s Fierce Founders bootcamp. OMSG’s developed Story Stylus, a interactive storytelling platform, and at the moment, they’re working on a game adaption of Charlaine Harris’s novel Shakespeare’s Landlord. Harris’ other works inspired HBO’s True Blood.  

We caught up with the wordsmith hammering away in her forge behind Medieval Times.

“I love that any story can be told, that we’re seeing more biographical stories coming to life in indie games, stories that AAA studios wouldn’t necessarily be interested in telling because of the market size. The success of That Dragon, Cancer is a prime example of how life and art intertwine and how games can tell stories that make us weep,” she said, while OMSG co-founder Blair Leggett wiped her brow of wordcount sweat and writers’ tears.

“I also love that the indie game scene is inclusive – one of the games I have on the backburner is a biographical game about growing up hard of hearing in a deaf household and feeling torn between the hearing and deaf world,” she said. We think after that she bellowed something about finally crafting an anti-arugula flail fit for Sir Freelancealot.

Best of luck Jean!

A BREADWINNER IS YOU – JOBS, GIGS, AND OPPORTUNITIES

Remember that gay monster dating sim we highlighted last month? The student developers behind Monster Girls Gaynerations: Ghoulfriends For Life were accepted into QGCon, the queerness and games conference, and are fundraising to bring themselves to L.A. in April.

Reptoid Games‘ making a promising move post-Ubisoft win, by hiring a junior programmer.

Strike Lightning Rod Games with your resume; they’re looking for a concept artist/2D specialist. If your attention span’s better than mine, this position calls for someone reliable and able to work from home consistently.

Gallop by Montreal-based Double Stallion Studios, as they’re hiring a freelance 2D VFX animator, as well as a gameplay and systems programmer.

Hand Eye member Arianne Young posted on our Facebook page looking for PHP backend devs. If you’re interested, get in touch.

MY BAD – A New Section For Corrections That You Will Hopefully Never See Again

Correction: Last month we said the students behind Monster Girl Gaynerations were from York University. Complete lie! Fabrication! These brill pupils were from Sheridan College.

!!Hand Eye Announcement!!

Our annual general meeting will be on Saturday, March 11 at Tract 9! Keyword’s annual: this is the one time a year all Hand Eye members can exercise their Voting Rights, look back on what we did in 2016, weigh in on what the organization does in 2017, hang out, nibble on light refreshments, and scheme on your next e-bank heist. Save the date and RSVP!

Staying warm/alive is especially important with the advent of November personal challenges —godspeed, NaNoWriMoers and Movember folks!—and the absolute avalanche of indie game events and socials this month. If you’ve miraculously managed to carve out some spare time, visit your retired buddy Google Calendar. He’s got you pegged for yard snow removal eventually, and instead of paying you he’s giving you fresh Toronto gaming events as they are announced.

WHERE TO JAUNT – TORONTO GAME EVENTS

Friday, November 4

Dames Making Games (who is all over this month’s cal!) will be presenting “Unsettling Settlers: Intervention” for a unique game night and artist talk. Creator Golbloo Amani, in conjunction with South Asian Visual Arts Centre, will be discussing how her game disrupts the colonialist game space — including casting a critical look at beloved board game Settlers of Catan. Following Golboo’s talk, attendees will play the game in groups, then participate in a Q&A and provide feedback for the creator. This event is free and open to the public – please register and bring your friends! Light refreshments will be provided, and transit fare is available on request.

Saturday, November 5 and Sunday, November 6

DMG’s fourth annual No Jam, a newbie-friendly workshop and game jam, is one of the city’s most supportive tech intensives. This self-directive hyper incubator will have game makers developing a board or videogame from start to finish. Done in partnership with mental health film festival Rendevous With Madness, No Jam this year is free for DMG and Workman Arts members. Free breakfast too, so your morning dev fuel’s been taken care of. Pro tip: don’t forget to register!

Saturday, November 5

Before being the very best meant owning a phone with data, Game Boys were where the OG pocket monster experience was at. Pokemon Red and Blue will be the theme at this month’s 2-Bit Gaming Club. What’s special about November’s discussion is its motive. A PWYC recurring event for the past six months, 2-Bit’s Pokemon talk is a special fundraiser edition. To help keep this monthly game criticism meetup free forever, they encourage attendees to donate what they are able to. If it helps your pockets loosen up, Hypergame Storytime will be putting on a live choose-your-own-adventure musical that imagines what it’s like to be a young trainer battling the Elite Four.

Tuesday, November 8

Become the chiptunes maestro you were destined to be after joining InterAccess’ Intro to Game Boy Chiptunes class. No Game Boy necessary, so long as you can run an emulator on your laptop.

Original image by Lorenzo Gritti for NPR 

Saturday, November 12

With our friends at Workman Arts and with the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, we’re doing “GAME/CHANGE,” a videogame panel and showcase at Rendezvous With Madness  Film Festival (RWM)! Our arcade will have games by Mind Games workshop participants, like a monkey-swinging side-scroller or play a mental institution simulator. A panel featuring local game creators from HES and Dames Making Games will explore the intersections between madness and games. Panellists include writer and gamemaker Kait Tremblay, who’s just released her new Canadian monster anthology Those Who Make Us, and Your Humble Calendar Writer. You can grab a ticket at EventBrite. Hand Eye members get into GAME/CHANGE at a $10 discount (this code has been e-mailed to all paid and volunteer members, so if you didn’t get it, please e-mail us at info@handeyesociety.com)!

Also on Saturday: Happy National Girls Learning Code Day! Ubisoft Toronto and Ladies Learning Code are hosting a Scratch game-making workshop for girls ages eight to 13. Using Scratch, a beginner-friendly program, participants will learn programming basics that will be used to code actual games during the workshop. This pay-what-you-want event is BYOL (Bring Your Own Laptop), which goes doubly so if any participant’s guardians want to follow along.

Tuesday, November 15

The Canadian Video Game Awards are in Montreal this year, but that hasn’t stopped Toronto game makers from scooping up tons of nominations. Benjamin Rivers’ Alone With You, DrinkBox’s Severed, Alientrap’s Modbox, and various others will hopefully be scoring big.

Wanna get artistic with Unity3D? Come to Interaccess for Social in the Studio, where futurological researcher Dustin Wilson will introduce Delta City: A procedurally generated digital construct and model control structure for housing post-singularity consciousness. Following the presentation, participants will use the Unity3D game design engine in an attempt to build autonomous simulated universes.

Saturday, November 19

For the first time ever, our writerly festival for interactive fiction WordPlay is taking up residence in London, England! We’ll be showcasing both international and Toronto talent at the London Library. Keep an eye on our social media for live updates from the Big Smoke, four hour time difference be damned.

Saturday, November 19 to Sunday, November 20 (UPDATE: POSTPONED UNTIL DEC. 3)

It’s GBCjam time again! As the second last monthly game jam of the year, cram in all your game ideas for this Saturday intensive/Sunday showcase before December festivities take up your attention.

Friday, November 25

The Regent Park Film Festival will be in full swing from Wednesday, November 23 to Saturday, November 26. While there are no buttons to mash, there’s one movie game enthusiasts can’t miss. “TimeTraveller” is shot entirely in Second Life and follows Hunter, a Mohawk man who goes on a time-warping vision quest. Within cyberspace, director Skawennati Fragnito renders historical First Nations conflicts.

WHERE TO HAUNT – TORONTO GAME SOCIALS

Monday, November 7

Make Games With Friends #8 is on at Gamma Space! Come share your projects, tips, tricks and knowledge with developers of all levels, in disciplines ranging from coding to graphics, sound design to level crafting. Free, monthly, and inclusive.

Wednesdays: November 2, 9, 16, 23, 30

The Ryerson Game Makers Union chugs on with five weekly meetups on Ryerson University campus, for students and anyone interested in dropping by. While folks mostly work on their own projects, lately they’ve been running group game-making tutorials too. Catch them every Wednesday, in room ENG 203 of the George Vari Centre and starting at 6 p.m.

Thursday, November 10

If you’re fond of yellow circles wearing red bows, then this book will make you go waka waka. Ms. Pac-Man gets the noir treatment in PAC’N HEAT, a new anthology with poems and short stories about everybody’s favourite ghost-eating femme fatale. Compiled by the almighty Bearded One A.G. Pasquella, you can snag a copy at PAC’N Heat’s Launch Party, a free festivity at game cafe/bar See-Scape. Given See-Scape’s ridiculously huge game collection, chances are Ms. Pac-Man herself will make a (virtual) appearance. Starts at 7 p.m.

Friday, November 18

Pizza and games made going to school more bearable, and that still rings true for student developers. Games made at schools across Toronto will be crammed into George Brown College for the first Eat, Play, Mingle social of the school year. At George Brown School of Design, starts at 7 p.m.

Saturday, November 19

*DJ Khaled voice* Anotha one — DMG’s last event for the month is a speaker social, starring our pals Kimberly Koronya and Tanya Kan (a previous HES MVP!). Aside from shmoozing, the social works double-time as a VR arcade called “Hyperreal Jam Showcase,” which showcases cutting-edge games made by the Dames in the summer.

Thursday, November 24

The Toronto Game Design And Development Meetup group is holding an industry social with Ubisoft developer Rhys Yorke and web host Stephen Crane, who you may recognize as the shadow king pulling the strings behind info-bastion Toronto Game Devs. At triOS College, starts at 6 p.m.

Friday, November 25 to Saturday, November 26

The east-end is gonna be pumping elite beats, thanks to a special vidya audio edition of the Soundhackers Meetup at Electric Perfume. The first half of “Games In Sound” will be an evening of musical performances from Andrew Shenkman, Dispersion Lab, and Jazzpunk developer Luis Hernandez. After sleeping off the night’s digitally induced rowdiness, Saturday afternoon features panels on audio with one on composing sound for games headed by Hernandez.

Wednesday, November 30

Monthly pub social Torontaru is the place to be if you wanna catch a drink with other indie game locals. We want to take some time and commend an underappreciated Torontaru change: their cute logo re-design! In transit from old to new, it’s lost a good number of tentacles. Drink up in memory of those purple appendages this month! At Get Well, starts at 8 p.m.

Dates to be announced:

Play Games With Friends is MGWF’s play-testing sibling. Play games from various mediums and consoles, or bring your game for casual play-testing. Like MGWF, this event is free, open to the public, and held at Gamma Space.

Game Dialogues is the Hand Eye Society’s monthly speaker series, where we snag some poor soul from Toronto’s indie game community and coerce them to speak about game art and design. In the past, we’ve delved into Resident Evil’s architecture, Russian subway dogs, and other topics. Free/pay-what-you-can and excessively stocked with snacks, be sure to check our Facebook group frequently to find out when this month’s Game Dialogues is happening.

We’re looking to run a Unity Shader workshop either November or December with the always-wonderful Douglas Gregory, so keep an eye out! HES members will get a nice discount.

UPDATE: This workshop will be on Sunday, Nov. 27 and it’s already sold out! Due to popular demand, expect more workshops like this soon.

#ICYMI

#DorsetPark: We miss summer for obvious reasons, including David Fono’s game-making adventures with kids in Dorset Park. He’s graciously given us a blast from the sunny past with a blog post detailing rules for the games by young developers.

#LadyKiller: Christine Love’s erotic visual novel LadyKiller In A Bind came out in early October! Also known as “My Twin Brother Made Me Crossdress As Him And Now I Have To Deal With A Geeky Stalker And A Domme Beauty Who Want Me In A Bind!!,” it’s probably the reason behind all your friends losing sleep and breathing hard when you say you’re tied up at work.

#SocietyBallPics: At long last, we’ve got hundreds of photos from the Society Ball up on a Flickr album. Plenty of  #Throwback material, so you’re welcome for that. Credit goes to photogs Dean Tomlinson and Paul Hillier!

#WheresCuphead: Before Studio MDHR graciously bestowed a Cuphead demo upon the Society Ball, anticipation was high. With their recent announcement that the game’s seeing a mid-2017 delay, we’re gonna be shivering here with Rocky Horror levels of “ANTICI….”

COMING AND GOING ATTRACTIONS

Maize, an upcoming adventure game involving sentient corn and born from a George Brown game incubator, now has a release date. In a YouTube trailer introducing grumpy Russian robot bear Vladdy (pleaseeee be playable), Finish Line Games stated Maize will be out on Steam by December 1. If you can’t wait that long and happen to be in San Fran, Finish Line Games is running an early demo at Day of the Devs.

Big ups to this young dev. Eleven-year-old Kiera Palmer took part in a summer camp by One More Games (the company behind engine Story Stylus), and with their mentorship has made Attack of the Killer Zombie Cats – US Edition. The latter part of the title probably tips you off that a certain orange persona will play a -yuge- role.

Adam Clare is living the best life. Anyone who’s approached by a publisher to write a book about Pokemon Go would be. An OCAD and George Brown game design prof, Clare’s new book The Unofficial Pokémon Go Tracker’s Guide takes global treks all over to catch ‘em all. To rifle through a paperbook or ebook copy, check out Amazon.

Runbow developer’s 13AM Games published the swashbuckling adorableness that is Pirate Pop Plus with Nintendo for the Wii U and 3DS, which means you’ll be overcome with squee scurvy thanks to two consoles.

Local indie dev extraordinaire Alex Bethke has been Tweeting the progress of virtual/augmented reality game Terracosm, which had a great demo at the Ontario Science Centre!

PAPER TRAILS – GAMING IN THE MEDIA

From Ryerson’s community radio Spirit Live, the Game Makers’ Union has started a podcast series called Pixel By Pixel. Tune in on Mondays, from 6 to 7 p.m.  

Dork Shelf’s Michael McNeely wrote a deeply personal and introspective look back on Will O’Neill’s Actual Sunlight. Released three years ago, its themes of depression and isolation still resonated strongly with McNeely, who offers an alternative ending for the game.

Toronto Game Devs made a helpful list of all local developers nominated for the Canadian Video Game Awards, with Severed sweeping nods in nine categories. The crew over there also made four podcast episodes in October.

Okay, not super indie game related, but: in an interview with NOW, R&B trio King revealed that Legend of Zelda’s tunes influenced their sound. Paris Strother even goes on to describe why three Nintendo songs – Sheik’s Tune, any underwater level in Super Mario, and Wave Race 64’s Drake Lake – are masterpieces. Pretty neat proof that video games don’t rot your ears, at least.

The result of the 2015 ROM Jam, Astro-Miners for PC and Mac is now available and got some press in Brutal Gamer and Toronto Game Devs!

MVP

This month’s MVP is Liam Gallagher, a co-founder of 2-Bit Gaming Club. Gallagher says that the club started after he and a friend, who lived in a different city, reminisced on kicking back with each other. From there, the club’s morphed to a recurring game criticism meetup with involvement from every club member. Folks play the games when they’re announced on social media, and can check out 2-Bit’s livestream for more content.

With the funding from the Pokemon edition of their monthly event, they hope to eventually be able to pay contributors, as well as bring the discussion groups to other Canadian cities and write op-eds.

“2-Bit Game Club is about video game co-education, not selling dick pills and mattresses,” he says. “2-Bit Game Club is ad free and will always be ad free. If you like learning about game design and the history of the medium please give at least as generously as dick pill manufacturers”.

You can find 2-Bit at their site, and on Twitter + FaceBook.

A BREADWINNER IS YOU – JOBS, GIGS, AND OPPORTUNITIES

Postopian Games is looking to hire a person who can help us connect with an audience as we are busy creating odd creatures inside of a computer and passing them off as real. This person has an aptitude and appetite for marketing and isn’t scared off by unconscious sacrifices to elder gods. Experience is good but good ideas are gooder! Contact: jim@postopian.games

Capybara Games, the furry brains behind Super Time Force,  is hiring a gameplay programmer. Many technical skills are required to apply, as well as the caveat that the potential hiree be someone who can show they are “always creating.”

Cellar Door Games is looking for a Unity Programmer. They’ve got the usual requirements, and would appreciate if you “actually like our games.”

Always hiring: Ubisoft Toronto, for animators, programmers, and artists. For remote work, the subreddit gamedevclassifieds is steady.

Early GDC 2017 prep ahoy: GBCJam’s Randy Orenstein made a FB group for anyone from Toronto planning to go.

A week ago, Hand Eye Facebook member Tinslevania McGuffin made a group post wondering if anyone would be able to teach them about 3D. In return, McGuffin says they could offer a slew of skills to swap, drawing 2D and physical computing. Get back to ‘em if you’d be down for that exchange! We’re hoping to do a skills swap event towards the end of the year, so if this sounds like something you’d be interested in keep your eyes peeled.

Scholarships for GDC 2017 are starting to become available! Keep your eyes peeled for chances to snag an All-Access pass to one of the biggest industry events of the year.

HAND EYE SOCIETY VOLUNTEER AND MEMBERSHIP NOTICE

We are still hard at work on the Toronto Videogame Database, striving to meet our 1000 entry goal by early next year before the launch goes public! We’re about halfway there so far and have been throwing small pizza parties to help fuel hungry data entry volunteers. However, we could always use more help, so please contact volunteer@handeyesociety.com if you would like to sign up for the TOVGDB mailing list. Big props to Amanda Wong, Chris J. Yuong, Kai Winter and all our volunteers, and also to the OMDC for funding our efforts thus far!

We’ll also be holding a special Volunteer and Members Appreciation Party sometime in late November. We provide the food, drink and music as thanks for supporting us; we couldn’t have done it without you. If you’ve volunteered for us in 2016 or are currently an active paid member, you’ll receive an e-mail notice about this soon! Not a member? Here’s how to join.

Finally, a reminder to all volunteer and paying members that our Annual General Meeting is early next year and you are eligible to vote! As our organization continues to grow, we value your feedback as much as your support in order to make sure our activities continue to serve our mandate and especially the community. In preparation for this meeting, we will be issuing surveys to our newsletter subscribers, Twitter followers, Facebook groupies, workshop participants and of course our membership in order to get a broader sense of what topics should be prioritized for discussion and what we can do to improve in the future. We look forward to hearing your voice at the table!

WHERE TO JAUNT – TORONTO GAME EVENTS

Tuesday, October 4

We Are Wearables is holding a virtual and augmented reality event at MaRS Dicscovery District. Whisper Dungeon by MiaoMiao Games, Blasters of the Universe by Secret Location, and Vega by Quantum Capture are noteworthy game inclusions. Attendees can expect speakers and demos galore, with the anticipated Playstation VR and the world premiere of the Sulon Q sure to draw line-ups.

What’s the yams? If Kendrick hasn’t enlightened you already, you can find out at 2-Bit Game Club’s October meet-up. This month, they’re farming for some discussion on Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town, a Game Boy Advance game that starts off with you taking an L after your elderly farmer buddy bites the dust, and you picking up the slack. Subscribe to their FB page so you don’t miss one!

Thursday, October 13 to Sunday, October 16

Hand Eye Society has curated a selection of games from around the world with the theme of social change and unique narrative themes for the Reelworld Film Festival! Titles such as Never Alone, This War of Mine, That Dragon, Cancer and others will be available to play by festival attendees and school groups who may not have ever encountered games like these before, amidst films about heady topics including the international arms trade, Syrian refugees, and food security. If you would like to help out for a good cause and also have your pick of 2 tickets to one free film screening and the Opening Night Party, please sign up to volunteer using this Google Form! You can see a list of shifts and people who have signed up already on this spreadsheet with contact info removed. Please register by Sunday Oct 9 so we can slot y’all in!

Thursday, October 20 to Friday, October 21

Business-oriented game conference GameON: Ventures is landing on MaRS for two days. A couple local speakers will be sharing biz wisdom, including Techsdale’s Andray Domise, Mark Media’s Jason Loftus (the studio behind Shuyan the Kung Fu Princess), Big Viking Games’ Joseph Gardiner, Game Pill’s Mary Sorrenti, and Interactive Ontario’s Vika Gupta.

Saturday, October 22 to Sunday, October 23

It’s the great GBCJam, Charlie Brown! The monthly one-day game jam at George Brown College is back for its fifth weekend. As always, GBCJam is a low-pressure jam from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. on Saturday, with a showcase of works the following day.

Thursday, October 27 to Friday, October 28

If you’ve ever wanted to learn how to make a game in virtual reality, here’s your chance. Two full-day VR game development workshops are happening at the TAVES Consumer Electronic Show. A beginner-friendly course with no prior development experience required, participants will be working in Unity 3D and taking home free a Google Cardboard headset. Free three-day admission to TAVES is included too.

Saturday, October 29

Everything indie is converging at the Art Gallery of Ontario for Canzine, a free festival for underground culture and zines. While games won’t be exhibited, artsy folks involved with indie game creation will be there, like Jenn Woodall from Punk Prism Power and Skin Tight Bitch Fight. (Full disclosure: Your Humble Digest Writer will be around on a panel or something.)

WHERE TO HAUNT – TORONTO GAME SOCIALS

Wednesdays: October 5, 12, 19, 26

The Ryerson Game Makers Union continues holding weekly get-togethers on Ryerson University campus, for students and anyone interested in dropping by. Their Fall schedule will be every Wednesday, in room ENG 203 of the George Vari Centre and starting at 6 p.m.

Monday, October 17

Make Games With Friends (MGWF) is a monthly event held at Gamma Space, where game-makers can mingle and share their work with each other. Free and open to everyone of all skill levels, expect micro-talks and casual show-and-tells. Starts at 6:30 p.m.

Wednesday, October 26

Haul out the bourbon candies for an All Hallows’ Wasted edition of Torontaru. At the Get Well, starts at 7 p.m.

Monday, October 31

Get spooky scary with the Dames at their VR Halloween Party, which is sure to be a cryptic celebration of cackling, monster mashing, and themed gameplay. At Gamma Space, starts at 7 p.m.

Dates to be announced:

Play Games With Friends is MGWF’s play-testing sibling. Play games from various mediums and consoles, or bring your game for casual play-testing. Like MGWF, this event is free, open to the public, and held at Gamma Space.

Game Dialogues is the Hand Eye Society’s monthly speaker series, where we snag some poor soul from Toronto’s indie game community and coerce them to speak about game art and design. In the past, we’ve delved into Resident Evil’s architecture, Russian subway dogs, and other topics. Free/pay-what-you-can and excessively stocked with snacks, be sure to check our Facebook group frequently to find out when this month’s Game Dialogues is happening.

Also: There might be a Unity shaders workshop on the horizon, so please stay tuned!

#ICYMI

#IndieSeries: Ubisoft Toronto launched Indie Series, an indie game development competition with some major perks, including a cash prize of $50,000.

#HESBall16: Holy heck! Our third annual Hand Eye Society Ball sold out and y’all even got us trending for a night! Thanks for the memories and the ice-cream hangovers, and in INCREDIBLE shout-out to all our volunteers and staff who helped make this such a legendary evening. More photos and video coming atcha after this digest.

#RomGameJam: The annual primordial soup that is ROM’s Dawn of Life simmered and thickened into another glorious game jam. Game makers created some highly evolved specimens over three days, with over 20 games for your playing pleasure up now on ROM’s itch.io tag. Carbon date yourself with cheap thrills from trilobites. Or date Cambrians in a prehistoric otome, if that floats your sediment-laden boat. If you like peeking behind the dev veil, makers logged their progress with #RomGameJam.

#petsofUken: What it says on the tin. Too cute for words so I’ll just spew emojis:

#MakingYourMarketer: You finished making a game. Now what? Marketing is a problem plaguing many game makers, so with Interactive Ontario, we’re holding Building An Audience For Your Game – an event that brings the best of game show-and-tell and marketing experts. We’ll have 10 marketers and 10 game makers combine their expertise for your playing pleasure. Before you get your indie britches in a bunch, we ain’t selling out! Still all about that creative expression. We wanted to fill a gap we’ve noticed in Toronto’s indie game programming, one that will ensure that pixelated magus opus of yours gets the rapt attention it deserves. Applications are closed and this event is only open to registered participants, but interest in this subject is sure to result in more local education around the importance of self-promotion in these trying indie times.

COMING AND GOING ATTRACTIONS

Because it’s 2016, artist Micéal O’Corra is developing a weed-themed platformer called Mediocre Guy. O’Corra plans to release it once cannabis is legalized in Canada, so expect to take a toke of this one for a spring 2017 launch.

You haven’t played Jazzpunk like this before (and of course you’ve played it, if you were a Hand Eye member last year). Everyone’s favourite absurd first-person spy got a director’s cut edition on PlayStation 4. Those who playtested Jazzpunk’s minigame way back at Electric Perfume will be in for a treat, since the Wedding Quake multiplayer lives on in this version.

How did I not know about this?! I recently stumbled upon TO Game Audio Thing, a meetup for videogame audio enthusiasts. They’ve been running for years, with meetups timed sporadically. Their last social was in September at Get Well, so fingers crossed for an October event. You can message @GameAudioThing to get on their very secretive mailing list for meetup times.

Alto’s Adventure can’t stop, won’t stop. The wintery mobile game has a new buzz to it, thanks to a haptic feedback patch.

PAPER TRAILS – GAMING IN THE MEDIA

Physics puzzler Grav Tav got a gravity-defying looksie from Pocket Gamer UK.

Straight outta ROM, kid-friendly space game Astro-Miners premiered during ROMJam’s weekend. It quickly got media love from Toronto Game Devs and Brutal Gamer.

The National Post interviewed Ken Seto of Massive Damage, the studio behind mobile zombie runner Please Stay Calm and the newly released Halcyon 6: Starbase Commander.

Continuing their brilliant Get To Know A Game Dev series, Game Dev Café chatted with composer Felix Arifin, Hand Eye fave and local architect Ksenia Eic. And QA tester/bug whisperer Colin Janowicz (who is technically from Newmarket, but ehhhh, we’ll mention ‘em anyway!). The publication also got auggy at Interactive Ontario’s AR event.

From Toronto Game Devs’ podcast came three episodes, with special guest Rihanna. (I am obviously lying, but they get to work work work work work with her.)

MVP

You get two (okay maybe several) MVPs for the price of one this month. Our first MVP is Dwight Broderick. If you caught him vigilantly guarding doors at our Society Ball, know that he did not let up even once.  He’s been dedicated to helping us out for many initiatives, including trekking with us to Game Curious.

“I’ve met a lot of super amazing people while volunteering. A lot are very focused and passionate at what they do,” Broderick says. “I’m there just trying to be inspired and to find out if I truly love video games and the community that surrounds it. It helps that I’m getting an opportunity to meet you awesome people while I figure that out.”

Well said pal! And a special shoutout to our fearless volunteer coordinator Kai Winter (and a previous MVP!), who was the duct tape that kept Dwight and the rest of us volunteers on task, with many taking initiative to make the party run as smoothly as possible. Heart eyes at all of ya.

Another MVP who saved our collective asses was Get Set Games’ Rob Segal, a TOJam founding member. For truly invaluable sponsorship and unlocking our big screen game exhibition abilities during the Hand Eye Society Ball, we salute Segal!

A BREADWINNER IS YOU – JOBS, GIGS, AND OPPORTUNITIES

Ubisoft’s hiring for several positions, in arts, programming, marketing, and project management. Fun fact: employees get a TTC subsidy!

IndieCade is back in mid-October. The festival also gets Paris pixelated with Indiecade Europe in November.

Game interactive technology company Globacore is looking for 3D artists! You can send a resume and portfolio to dave@globacore.com and/or jobs@globacore.com.

It’s no secret; Secret Location needs a two-month-term Unity developer and a contract shader artist! You can email the usual deets to gaeil@thesecretlocation.com

Stephen Crane from Toronto Game Devs is raising money for charity in November by joining Extra Life, a 24-hour gaming livestream. You can join Crane’s team by signing up for Extra Life under Toronto Game Devs. He’s already 25 per cent of the way to his end goal if you wanna donate.

Centennial College is looking for a part-time program supervisor for their new three-year game development & design program. If you’ve got what it takes to come up with what the next generation of developers need to know, you’ll be designing curriculum starting in November and teaching next fall. To apply, check out their listing.

As previously mentioned, Ubisoft Toronto’s Indie Series competition is accepting interested dev teams. You can apply online until November 18. Best of luck!