It can be difficult to digest the entirety of PAX Australia -- there's so many games, panels, people and costumes to see.
To help the digestive process, here's our entire coverage of the event from the minute the doors opened (well, to the queue area anyway) to the minute the doors closed.
It’s the heart and soul of not just PAX Australia, but PAX all around the world. It’s the tabletop and freeplay area, the place where gamers from far and wide come to share their passions, discover new ones and relax in an area far away from the merchandise and corporatised nature of the rest of the exhibition hall.
So why does one half of that, the freeplay area, look so uninviting?
Videogames have a money problem. Or maybe it’s money that has a problem with videogames, I don’t know.
Whatever the case, videogames have been about commerce since day one: remember that story about the first Pong machine? The one where the budding Atari crew leaves the machine in Andy Capps Tavern, only to be called to fix the ‘broken’ machine days later, only to discover that in fact it’s not broken but too full of cash to take any more?
Freeplay has been around for a decade now and has played host to some great speakers over the years but 2015, by all accounts, may have been the best year yet.
As you may already be aware, this year's Freeplay Festival is underway with a number of online panels having already taken place. These panels are being streamed live online and there's more good news: anything you miss is being uploaded onto YouTube!
Melbourne-based games festival Freeplay kicks off tonight.
"So what? I live in Sydney/Perth/Brisbane/Whoopwhoop I can't watch it, right?"
WRONG. This year a vast majority of Freeplay's panels/talks will be streamed online and -- best of all -- they are free. These talks will also be archived on YouTube if you miss out.
Here's an interesting fact: the Melbourne-based Freeplay Independent Games Festival is 10 years old this year. That makes it one of the longest running games festivals in the world. That's pretty cool. This year Freeplay is celebrating its decade anniversary in style.
Freeplay, Melbourne's annual independent games festival, took place over the weekend. Although I didn't make it down there it was, by all accounts, a rousing success with a bevvy of enlightening talks and informative workshops. Congrats to all involved!
What are you doing this evening -- hunkering down with a packet of Burger Rings and My Kitchen Rules? How about you ditch that and head down to Federation Square in Melbourne. There's only going to be a delightful evening of top notch indie games being played on a massive outdoor screen!
The Melbourne Freeplay 2011 games festival did what it does every year: encouraged gamers, developers and writers to think deeper about the medium they love and the issues that surround it. So when a panel titled “The Words We Use”--originally intended to be a forum to discuss games criticism and writing--was derailed to the subject of gender in games writing, it drew attention to an important and contentious issue.
Here, two female game journalists weigh in on some of the ideas raised in an email correspondence about the role of female writers and critics in the games industry.
More encouragement for indie games designers today as Freeplay, the annual independent games festival held in Melbourne, will this year be honouring the best in local indie game development with the Freeplay Awards.
