Indies in Utah

[Coyote]

So out of curiosity, how many people involved in Indie Game Development are currently living / working in Utah?

I know that besides myself, there's Eric Peterson of Cartel Games, the NinjaBee guys, and Russell Carroll of Game Tunnell.

Anyone else?

[Greg Squire]

I'm in Utah as well (Utah Valley more specifically). Also Mike D. Smith on these forums is now in Utah as well.

We should have an indie night sometime.

[cyrus_zuo]

If I'm invited I'm there...but I don't develop

[Coyote]

Of course you are involved (and invited, should we do something) I tried to word that carefully.

Let's see if anyone else weighs in. I coulda sworn there was more of us.

[terin]

If you build it... they will come.

[stay]

I'm always up for an "Indie night" for Utahns. I can even offer to host at the NinjaBee office, which is big enough for maybe a dozen people without being too horribly crowded.

Also, any time a Utah developer wants to have a local Test Fest for their latest game, I bet Jay (Coyote) and I would want to join in.

You'd think there would be more of us here. There are enough professional studios around in Utah Valley and SLC, and I know plenty of those guys are working on a game on the side.

[John Olsen]

Re-activating the thread since I browse through here sort of infrequently.

When the day job isn't resulting in plane trips or extra long hours you could call me an indie. I did most of the code for the launcher on Coyote's Void War game. I was part of the pro scene in Utah for about 7 years, so it's been a nice change of pace to have game development be more of a hobby for the past year and a half.

I'd be happy to show up at a Utah Indie gathering, schedule permitting.

John

[sparkyboy]

Man I just can't wait to get to the states in the next year or 2...

Found the love of my life in CA and its virtually 100 percent certain i'll be living somewhere in the good ole US of A.

Kudos to you all ( and see y'all real soon!!)

All the best

Mark

P.S.

Need to brush up on where each state is situated.

[Greg Squire]

Okay guys, a month has gone by, so if you're all up for it, let's plan a time to do this, before we get too far into the summer and it gets harder to find a time that works with everyone's schedules (summer vacations, etc.). I suspect that a Tues., Wed., or Thur. might work the best for everyone, but I'm just guessing on that. I could do one on any of those days (except, this Thursday is out for me), through the rest of June. (I could also work out something on a Friday or Saturday as well, if that works better for everyone else.) I'm also willing to pitch in a little for food or whatever. Feel free to post here (or PM me) to work out the details.

"If we don't build [plan] it ... no one will come."

EDIT: I also better mention that the 21st of June is out for me as well.

[stay]

I'm out of town June 27-30th, which is most of the week. I think I'm available any other time this month.

I agree, Tues-Thurs would be best.

Do you want us to host? From NinjaBee, there would be at least three of us wanting to attend an after-hours event like this, but possibly more. I'll have to ask around.

[Greg Squire]

Steve, I (and others I'm sure) would be fine with you hosting it at the NinjaBee office. That is probably the best venue to do it in. Hopefully we can find a day and time that works for everyone. I don't know to get a hold of Eric Peterson (I don't think he frequents this board), so could someone (Jay? Steve?) contact him and see if he'd be interested in this as well. Thanks.

[Didier]

Man I just can't wait to get to the states in the next year or 2...

Found the love of my life in CA and its virtually 100 percent certain i'll be living somewhere in the good ole US of A.

Kudos to you all ( and see y'all real soon!!)

All the best

Mark

P.S.

Need to brush up on where each state is situated.

I don't know if it's that easy sparkyboy.
I heard you must have enough money to start living and working in USA otherwise you can't come in (unless it's for a vacation afcorse).

Don't know if that's true but a friend of mine who is a pilot and flies regularly to USA told me this?

Didier

[sparkyboy]

Hi didier,

Well basically from my girlfriend and other americans I've talked to,it isn't cut and dried by any means,i'm not that naieve,but that's why i'm hoping to get something going here in France that I can take with me.

If programming is a no-go,i'm also capable of building and selling PC's(did that one many years ago )I certainly aint going there to flip-burgers

But as my girl said,and everyone knows,its not WHAT you know but WHO you know,and as her ex is an accountant with many many clients,it would be a snip to have a job to go to if I weren't able to do it myself at first. She herself is involved in organising corporate parties!

So really I don't foresee any probs getting a Green card!


All the best


Mark

[Didier]

Lucky you!

Au revoir

Didier

[sparkyboy]

Merci bien didier.T'es tres gentille/gentile



All the best


Mark.

[Greg Squire]

Okay it looking like either the 22nd or 23rd as the last possible dates to do an "Indie Night" in June. If that doesn't work with the rest, then we may have to push this into July. My schedule in July is fairly open right now (the 16th might be out for me).

[cyrus_zuo]

22nd or 23rd should work for me. 21st doesn't work...but it sounds like that isn't an option anyway

cool!

[Coyote]

I'll be there. Probably a couple more of the Rampant Games crew, too (those who are relatively local and don't work nights, at least).

[Mike D Smith]

I'll be there and I'll bring some friends from the Utah demo scene (also interested in indie games). We ought to talk a bit about Pilgrimage 2005 - the Utah demo party on Sept 16th and 17th.

[Coyote]

I should note that I will only be available if it's on the 22nd.

I have tickets to the early screening of Serenity on the 23rd - don't wanna miss that!

[Greg Squire]

Okay looks like the 22nd it is! Does 7pm work for everyone. I know some will be traveling from Salt Lake and Davis Counties, so hopefully that will be enough time for everone to get off work and travel down to Pleasant Grove.

[Coyote]

Works well for me!

Sent the message out to some other RG folks (at least the ones who don't work nights), still waiting on input from them. But I think we have a plan.

Thanks for running with this, Greg!

[Mike D Smith]

I'm there, and I'm bringing the latest on Caster (my game). Be ready to give some critical feedback.

[stay]

Here's the location, for any Utards lurking without commenting:

NinjaBee / Wahoo Studios
405 S. 100 E. Suite 13
Pleasant Grove, UT
(behind the Purple Turtle, in the chiropractor building)

PM me if you need a phone number or more details...

[Greg Squire]

Just posting a final reminder about Indie Night (7pm at NinjaBee's Offices). Hope to see everyone there tonight!

[stay]

I just wanted to say thank you to everyone who showed up. I thought it was a pretty valuable experience, and it was great to meet some interesting people I didn't know before.

Thanks again to Greg for pushing to get this happening, and extra thanks to Eric Petersen who bought all the junk food and left before I could give him a cut of money people handed us for pizza.

Let's do it again in the not-too-distant future!

[Coyote]

I think this would make a great quarterly activity or something along those lines. I had a GREAT time, and found it to be very valuable on many levels. We got to meet new people, make contacts, take a look at what each other was doing, catch up on gaming gossip, get introduced to new tools and concepts, provide feedback for works in progress, play games, and consume mass quantities of junk food & pizza.

Then Russell Carroll had to go and ruin it by kicking my butt at Super Sprint.

[Greg Squire]

I too would like to thank everyone that came last night. I thought it was a great success in many different ways. It was nice to be able to finally meet you all in person. Making this a quarterly (or event sounds great to me! (That would put the next one around the September time frame )

Also a special thanks to Steve and the rest of Ninja Bee for hosting the event, and to Eric for providing the munchies

[Mike D Smith]

I think quarterly is a good idea. That will just give me enough time to get my game ready for the next round of feedback. Also, a lot of guys I know that couldn't make it last night are hoping to be able to next time.

It was great to actually meet all the great people doing stuff you've been admiring for so long.

I'd say Utah is pretty strong in the indie world and looks to be getting stronger!

[cyrus_zuo]

Then Russell Carroll had to go and ruin it by kicking my butt at Super Sprint.

I own you!!

Good thing Steve didn't make it to the machine...

Had a great time as well and am behind doing it quarterly...hope to see many of those games shown in the next six months...except for Jay's...will wait until next year...or so...for that .