The 9th WordPlay Festival takes place Saturday, November 13th & Sunday November 14th 2021 starting at 1pm EST both days!

FREE

Watch on our Twitch Channel

What an incredible time of the year! We’ve been waiting for this one for a very long time. We’re so happy and excited to be able to put together another event for everyone a fan of narrative games alike! This year we’re following the same format of being nice and safe online, so you can enjoy the festival while wearing your pajamas! We want to thank the community, friends of Hand Eye Society, the land we stand on, as well as our sponsors, Hand Eye Society members and staff who have worked tirelessly for the past few months to make this event possible, not only for free, but to also be able to support exhibitors for their work!

Well that’s it from me, look at these games! Play them! Buy them! Support the creators! Get cozy and listen to some talks! We got you! Stay safe and we’ll see you at WordPlay this weekend on our Twitch channel!

Games~

Raptor Boyfriend: A High School Romance

Rocket Adrift

Toronto, Ontario

Twitter | Steam |

Raptor Boyfriend: A High School Romance is a dating sim about a teen girl who moves to a small secret community of cryptids. Romance a magical Fairy, a sensitive Sasquatch and a bold Velociraptor. A satirical 90’s teen drama about trying to find love in your last year of high school.

Milton Summons the Devil

Gus Fuss Games

Brooklyn, NY

Itchio | Twitter |

You are Milton, a nine year old boy. You must search your house for the ritual items scattered everywhere throughout the house so you can summon the devil and kill your gym teacher. Just don’t wake up your parents or anger the devil!

Clam Man 2: Headliner

Marafrass/Team Clam

Canada

Marafrass | Team Clam | Steam

A combatless stand-up comedy RPG where jokes are loot and the boss fights are comedy shows. Under the sea. With fish people.

Frantic Fantic

Zeekayart and Michael

Toronto, Ontario

Twitter | Zeekayart | Website

A hilarious free-to-play creative writing party game where friends furiously write each other’s fanfiction. A round-robin style story game that is played like exquisite corpse but with words instead of pictures!

The Hayseed Knight

Maxi Molina (SandraMJdev)

Spain

Twitter | Steam

Join a ragtag band of misfits as they piece together how Ader, a one-eyed farmboy with seemingly impossible dreams, becomes the most celebrated knight the kingdom of Acazhor has ever known.

Divide Et Impera

Mauro Vanetti & Open Lab

Pavia + Florence, Italy

Mauro | Open Lab | Itchio | Pino | Pietro 

You: A disingenuous political leader keen on using some good old hate speech to further your aims.

Your Goal: Splitting your community in half, by detaching at least 12 people from the interconnected grid of 5×5 people.

Your Weapon: You have to choose hateful contents to post online and a specific target of 3×3 people for each post.

CW: Strong Language

Over Easy: A Diner Heist

Julian K. Jarboe

Salem, Massachusetts, USA

Twitter | Website | Itchio | Play

You and your crew are regulars at the local diner. This evening, the driver of a certain scrapyard truck will make a final pit stop at the diner before hauling away the remains of your neighborhood’s beloved, unique, and weird old landmark. Unless, of course, you and your crew can snatch it back.

Read The Room

Blah Books Studio

Chicago, IL

Devin | Devin’s IG | Jess | Itchio

Doors are locked and Grandma is missing! People are confused and you can read their minds somehow! What’s going on!?

Karen: An Outrage Simulator

Vagabond Dog

Toronto, Ontario

Twitter | Steam

You are Karen – Argue your way through ridiculous scenarios, and get everything you rightfully deserve in this short comedic game about entitlement.

The Fall and Rise of Sadcock-upon-Avon

Orbis Tertius Games

Lincoln, UK & Berlin, Germany

Twitter | Website | Itchio |

In the fiefdom of Sadcock-upon-Avon, strange things are happening. There are rumours of penises not looking or acting as they should…

CW: Sexual Themes

Union Drive

Matajuegos

Buenos Aires, Argentina

Itchio | Studio | Lunafromthemoon | Leno | PfQ | Trailer

Union Drive is a Latin-American visual novel about workplace unionization. You’ll step into the shoes of a young supermarket worker trying to strengthen the union at their place of work and fight against unjust working conditions.

Throughout the game you’ll build strong relationships with your coworkers and get to know their stories, all while learning organization skills used by real-world union organizers.

Internet Court

Oh, a Rock! Studios

Ithaca, NY

Twitter | Website | Paul | Arglefumph

A live-action courtroom comedy, where YOU are the prosecution, defense and the judge! It’s the year 20XX, and crime can happen anywhere—even in cyberspace.

If someone gets caught writing bad fanfiction or unfriending without due cause, they get hyperlinked directly to… The Internet Court. Where the courtroom is virtual, and trials are livestreamed for the whole world to watch.

Insomniac: The Movie: The Game

Insomniac Film Festival, Insomniac: The Movie filmmakers, and Lina Wu

Toronto, Ontario

Insomniac’s Website | Lina’s Website| Insomniac’s IG| Lina’s IG | Itchio

Insomniac: The Movie: The Game was developed as an interactive choose-your-own adventure experience in accompaniment with Insomniac: The Movie, a collaborative quarantine community cinema project.

In addition to watching the film, it’s also a way to explore the cinema, chat with filmmakers, and explore the fantastical horizons of the youth film community even during lockdown.

Quick Fix

Lawrence Le

Ontario, Canada

Twitter | Itchio

A short visual novel with point-and-click elements. What starts off as a simple errand quickly (d)evolves into a tale of fake currencies, goose sleuths, and caffeine abuse. Rub elbows with the oddball inhabitants of Yorkel and outsmart its cruel, coffee-drinking despot to finally secure some decent internet service.

Glom

Nice Games Club

Minneapolis, MN

Website | Twitter | Ellen | Mark | Stephen | Dale Lynn

You have three minutes to come up with a Glom: Re-write the Phrase, while following the Rule, to best meet the Goal… that’s it!

A romp of rewording regular remarks, for wordsmiths of all ages and skill levels. A tabletop party game from the hosts of the gamedev podcast “Nice Games Club.”

Loopy Lore

Guilherme Bandini and Thi My Nguyen

São Paulo, Brazil & Toronto, Ontario

Twitter | Itchio

Loopy Lore is a co-op storytelling game where friends collaborate in telling a story they know nothing about.

Using the cards and their imagination, players take turns as the narrator, giving shape to their tale. To win, they must work together to reach the ending created during setup.

An Airport for Aliens Currently Run by Dogs

Strange Scaffold

El Paso, Texas

Twitter | Steam

An Airport for Aliens Currently Run by Dogs is a first-person open-world comedy adventure game with a very long name. You and your fiancée are the last two human beings left in the universe.

Dogs run airports, along with the rest of society. Deal with alien logic, travel issues, and strange stock photo dogs as you attempt to stay in touch with the person you love, when you both live your lives on the go!

Speakers~

Martin Hanses (he/him)

Itchio

Roleplaying Comedy: Letting the player have the last laugh

In this talk, Martin Hanses goes over his work with the design and philosophy of writing comedy for role-playing games that the player can deliver, rather than be the recipient of.

Based on the work and research done for the stand-up comedy game Clam Man 2, the talk covers a series of techniques and approaches that can be implemented in the writing of most games, with a specific focus on player expression and assuming choice ownership.

Ryan Woodward (he/him)

Itchio | Steam

Cute, Funny, and Sad – Writing on Button City

Button City is a colorful game about a cute fox who tries to save the local arcade in the sky.

In this talk Ryan Woodward goes over how he approached writing for Button City to create a lighthearted comedy experience while also incorporating sad heartfelt moments.

Colton David (he/him)

Oops, All Characters: How to Write a Hundred Different Humans*: A character writing panel

Video games have characters; oftentimes, many characters. From RPG towns full of one-liner
randoms, to visual novels with 30 person main casts, game writers constantly need to fill space
with unique and memorable voices. Sometimes funny, sometimes tragic, oftentimes pointless –
this panel seeks to share practical ways game writers can harness their brain to produce
characters that stick with players. Many, many characters.
The panel will have a light-hearted, conversational bent to it. Attention will be given to writing
funny characters, in keeping with the comedy theme of Wordplay, while also delving into pulling
deeper emotions from.

Carrie Patel (She/Her)
Game Director at Obsidian Entertainment
Carrie has been writing with Obsidian since 2013, writing and co-leading the Pillars of Eternity
franchise, narrative designing The Outer Worlds, and directing an exciting unannounced project.
Aside from her game writing, Carrie is a published author, having released acclaimed
speculative fiction novels: The Buried Life (2015), Cities and Thrones (2015), and more!

Giselle Francis (She/Her)
Writer at Red Thread Games
Giselle is a writer and game designer, currently working on Dustborn, an upcoming title being
developed by Red Thread Games. Previous to that, Giselle has worked on Project Alina, a
puzzle-action RPG for Microfun Inc. As well, Giselle has also done advocacy work and panels
with Latinx in Gaming.

Cobysoft Joe (He/Him, They/Them)
Writer, Artist, and Composer of Dome-King Cabbage
Cobysoft Joe is the one-man band behind Cobysoft Co. a real (but also fictional) gaming
company that makes the award winning Dome-King Cabbage. Dome-King Cabbage is a visual
novel that takes place within the world of a monster collecting RPG. Joe currently lives in the
Midwest of the United States after having spent three years in Japan teaching English. Joe
spends his spare time making 3D images on his computer and playing with his hamster
Thimble.

Jaclyn Seto (She/Her)
Writer at Respawn Entertainment
Starting her career in the medical field, Jaclyn transitioned from physician’s assistant, to writing
on Apex Legends, carrying with her a unique insight into both fields. An avid fan-fiction writer in
her youth, Jaclyn persisted with her passion, graduating from Vancouver Film School’s
screenwriting program in 2019, then working on Project Alina, a puzzle-action RPG for Microfun
Inc.

Marina Kittaka (She/Her)
Co-Director at Analgesic Productions
marinakittaka.com
Currently working on Sephonie.

Melos Han-Tani (He/Him)
Co-Director at Analgesic Productions
@meloshantani (tiktok)
Currently working on Sephonie.

Host & Panel Organizer
Colton David
Writer at Lo-Fi Games
Colton is a writer and narrative designer based out of beautiful Toronto, Canada. For his day
job, he writes with Lo-Fi Games on the sequel to the hit sandbox RPG Kenshi. In his off-time he
develops games with Bad Pet, notably releasing Devil Express in March of 2020. Devil Express
has gone on to be one of the top 10 highest rated adventure games on itch.io! Currently Colton
is working on Anti, a narrative platformer, with his friends at Bad Pet.

It’s back and bigger than ever! The Hand Eye Society has partnered once again with the Toronto Comics Arts Festival (TCAF) and Canzine to announce the return of the Comics x Games festival! This year, due to COVID-19 Comics x Games will be making a return, but with a virtual twist! We can’t wait to be able to showcase the works of more local and international artists at this year’s festival! And without further ado, here are all the amazing games for this year’s festival!

MAY 8TH – 12TH, 2021

ONLINE via Twitch!

SCHEDULE TBD SOON!

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Boy Problems

Boy Problems Productions

It is many years into the future. A wealthy and powerful person (or persons) has claimed a rare and much sought after prize: the “vault” of 200 unreleased (this is real!) songs from renowned Canadian pop artist, CARLY RAE JEPSEN. Hired by an anonymous sponsor, your team of highly trained individuals will raid a well-defended location to retrieve said item. From planning to set-up to execution, you will see this heist through to its completion, whether that be a success or failure. There will many twists and turns along the way, and don’t always trust the specialists by your side.

Time Bandit

Joel Jordon

Time Bandit is a dark life sim where everything you do takes time. Place down a robot to push a box for you, and it will take an actual half an hour to finish. By saving the game and coming back periodically to make progress, you are invited to explore your habits, rituals, and experience of time in general, particularly as it relates to work and exploitation.

Keyword

City From Naught Inc.

Keyword is a near-future cyberpunk 3D detective-thriller game about a private investigator searching for his missing daughter. Players will take on the role of a private investigator and father to an 18-year-old girl, use their observation and deduction skills, coupled with their tech-savviness, hacking around social media accounts and websites in order to unravel the threads surrounding the mystery of the missing daughter.

Questlike: Pocket

Spritewrench Studios

Questlike: Pocket is a mobile, monster-hunting RPG where you battle monsters and craft awesome gear. Get swept up in the Rhythm of the Hunt- Time your attacks to best your fearsome foes and secure your place as the world’s top-ranked Hunter!

Midnight Identity Crisis

Yuen Hoang

“There will always be comfort in knowing that you are comprised of other’s parts- because then, you can never be truly alone.” Midnight Identity Crisis is a multimedia surreal walking simulator, focused on how media, other people, and art influence our identities.

Nell & the Festival of Spooks

Becky Wu | Website

A slice-of-life visual novel about a seemingly ordinary girl named Nell, who has a love for horror. An eclipse transports her to a spooky town where she gets enrolled into a fancy academy!

Saving You From Yourself

Taylor McCue

Play as a therapist and fuck up a perfectly good girl by helping her.

The Hex Perplex

Daniel Narvaez

Welcome to the Hex Perplex! Can you defeat the unstoppable power that lurks among these walls? Master the power of the spell books and vanquish the curse that holds the castle! Use them to fight enemies and alter your terrain! It will surely be a difficult journey!

Bombing!!: A Graffiti Sandbox

Devon Wiersma

Bombing!!: A Graffiti Sandbox is a creative lo-fi sandbox game where every inch of the environment can be painted. Armed with your trusty backpack, a bag full of gear and a selection of tools, take to the streets and fill them with your creations!

GUNPIG: Firepower For Hire

LaPointe Joints

Hop into your teeny tank and blast the Chrysophods…fast, fun, arcade style action! Join alien pest control specialist (and possibly shortest mercenary in the galaxy) Bax Torpini, as he fights to rid Stalwart Academy, a school space station, of a rogue horde of out-of-control robot space monsters!

Pixel Puzzle Makeout League

Rude Ghost

Solve pixel puzzles, date superheroes, and save the day! Dating sim meets puzzle game in this romantic comedy adventure.

START AGAIN: a prologue

insertdisc5

START AGAIN: a prologue is a story driven RPG where you, Siffrin, are stuck in a time loop for no reason you can find. You’re fine though! Hiding your knowledge from your friends is easy! Fighting the same enemies is easy! Dying to the same final boss over and over again is easy! You have to make sure your friends don’t find out about the super fun times you’re having though. They can’t know. They can’t.

Emergent Fates

megaphemeral

Emergent Fates is a Japanese inspired Role Playing Game about finding identity and purpose in a world where your fate has already been decided.

Duskwitch: Heroic Soul

VIVIDBLUE LTD

Duskwitch: Heroic Soul is a fast-paced character action shooter where you play as Rutie, a witch tasked with saving the rest of the world after nearly ending it herself! Using her Broom, she uses soul energy to eliminate Azazoth’s Remnants which are shadows of an ancient evil being that consume human souls. Fight your way through the horde of Remnants and take them out in style!

Garden Story

Picogram

Unify a broken community as the newly-appointed Guardian of The Grove. Traverse a vibrant island to combat invasive Rot, inspire its inhabitants, and rebuild your home. You won’t have to do this alone: fruity friends await, ready to lend a hand!

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In Cold Dark

done \ undone

Three years scouting the distant reaches of the galaxy. You’ve been all on your own, but now it’s time to head back, to SAGI 499: a divided colonial society on the edge of the Sagittarius spiral, and your home. Old friends calling, new faces to meet, political turmoil … and hints of something far stranger. What will you choose?

Shot in the Dark

Possum House Games

Shot in the Dark offers a unique challenge, combining nail biting pixel perfect platforming with precise point and click shooting. But many of the cruel creatures of the night remain hidden in shadow. The bandit will have to be on the lookout for glowing red eyes, shadows moving through the trees, and figures lurking in the night. Because sometimes the only sign of a demon on your trail is the slight movement of the tall grass. And sometimes all you can do is take a shot in the dark.

Facts About the Robot Uprising

Geoffrey Golden, Jordan Robins

Facts About the Robot Uprising is the first new game to be developed for the Tiger 2-XL in more than 25 years. In this trivia challenge, 3-XL (2-XL’s sinister successor) quizzes the audience on why and how robots will enslave humanity. Players who answer 3-XL’s questions correctly get a funny song! Those who don’t will become the first victims of the robot uprising…

flaming/million

Nilson Carroll

A NEW GAME FOUND IN THIS FLAMING DUMPSTER: follow L.C. through a warped glitch campus during the FRATPARADE. destroy the three (3) police surveillance monuments and rid the campus of masculine oppression. use the queer power of glitches and begin to heal this terrible curse put on us all.

The Big Con

Mighty Yell

Flex your inner teenager in The Big Con, an adventure game where you hustle across the country as a teen trying to save your family video store. In classic 90s con movie style, you’ll get to persuade and pilfer your way to greatness using a whack of potential grifts.

Project Snapshot

Dinky Dinos

A casual simulation game where players channel their inner photographer to capture the natural beauty of a remote island for peculiar clients!

Dawn of the Monsters

13AM Games

Dawn of the Monsters is a co-operative kaiju beat-em-up coming in 2021. Players take control of powerful monsters in order to take on the evil “Nephilim”- a horde of creatures that are hellbent on destroying the planet. Liberate four major metropolitan areas- from Toronto to Tokyo in this epic action game.

Shwip

Jamhammer Games

Dominate global leaderboards as you face off against an onslaught of geometric foes. Shwip combines straight up twin-stick arcade action with tight controls, insane pixel destruction and devastating weapons and abilities. Evade, outlast and play with style in four game modes over single and local multiplayer.

Some Like It Hot!

AugEx

Some Like It Hot! is a combination of job simulation and visual novel, where you’ll be crafting complex caffeinated concoctions during the rush hours, and getting to know the regulars during your down time.

Gladiotron

Gavin Ball / Full Circle CS Inc.

Gladiotron is a modern take on Metroidvanias, while not hiding it’s retro inspirations. It is also an online interactive story that follows the adventures of 2 Detroit area high school students as they get wrapped up in a cosmic adventure that will test their faith and resilience as they try to save the galaxy from the intergalactic space demons.

Triversal

Phantom Compass

Triversal is a simply satisfying spatial puzzle game that helps you find your chill. Relaxing and rewarding; Suspend a light orb over the goal by tethering to nearby supports and complete puzzle after puzzle.

Told By Starlight

Ryan Khan

Told by Starlight is a no prep, GM-less tabletop game for 2-6 players. It is about drawing constellations and telling the tales behind them. Using a standard deck of playing cards to generate themes and prompts, you will create an entire mythology, and all the characters within.

Hop Together

Toasty Bread Team

Help bunnies bring carrots up to their friends in this charming little puzzle game.

A Night at Manster Mansion

Onino Zvezdin

Woken in the night by your boss, you must go uncover the murder at the mysterious Manster Mansion belonging to the most ruthless mafia clan in the world. Will you be able to get out unscathed or will you perish like the typical victim of their cruelty?

DepowerBall

Mega Power Games

DepowerBall is a competitive game where the fate of every matchup is influenced by fast-paced gameplay and tactical decision-making. Every match, each player starts with the same set of powers to try and accomplish their task of pleasing the Dragon Queen by feeding her delicious treats! When a player wins a round, he or she will earn the Queen’s favour, but will earn the wrath of the other players as they vote to take away one of the winner’s powers! Adapt to your changing conditions, or get left behind as the other players take advantage of your weakened state!

Recalculating

Blank Slate Games

Think small talk is tough? Imagine if your life depended on it. Recalculating is a soft-thriller visual-novel intended to simulate an uncomfortable position familiar to many women: being in a rideshare vehicle. Navigate your thoughts and choices by launching a ball to select dialogue options that bounce around the screen. In a game with multiple endings and plot twists, can you speak your mind when it really matters? After all, when anxieties heighten, things becomes harder to say… literally.

Bapy

Snotwurm

Adopt and care for an infant demon of your own!

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Our Partners

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Patron Tier Supporter

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Promoter Tier Supporters

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WordPlay is our free festival celebrating the most interesting uses of writing and words in contemporary games. Each year there will be a curated game showcase, talks by creators about the craft, and ways for the public to learn about making games.

The 8th annual WordPlay Festival takes place Saturday, November 21st & 22nd 2020!

Stream starts at 11am EST on Saturday and Sunday!

twitch.tv/handeyesociety

Free!

SCHEDULE

Saturday

Josh Labelle

Xalavier Nelson Jr.

Dhruv Jani

+

Sunday

Kaelan Doyle Myerscough

Sharang Biswas

Kinsey Erickson

Hello everyone! Wordplay is here and we’re so excited to be able to put on this event to feature so many amazing games, speakers and artists and AHH! It’s finally here! This blog will have links to all the information you need to know about the festival this Saturday and Sunday. We will be streaming the event exclusively on our Twitch channel and well as our Discord channel for those who aren’t 

Here are the featured speakers for Saturday and Sunday! This is definitely our best lineup so far and we’re so happy to be able to bring their expertise to you.

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Here are the features games for the festival! Please consider supporting these awesome creators! Follow them, engage with them, tell others about their work! Also, the commissioned games creators who are working on their game and we will share their completed works in a followup blog post! We’re so excited to see what they make!

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Credits

Festival Director
Royel “Rokashi” Edwards

Executive Director(s)
Len Predko & Sagan Yee

Director of Operations
Amanda Wong

Editor/Director of Technology
Jordan Sparks

Animators
Paige Lincecum
Emily Hammersley-Ambroise
Miranda Juncos

Volunteer Coordinator
Aaron Demeter

Volunteers
Riggy El-Shebiny
Elissa Park
Nelson Kim
Denise Gutierrez Maldonado

Special thanks to Ontario Creates. With their support events like WordPlay are possible, so thank you so much!