IGF 2006 Results

[chanon]

Best Web Browser Game
Finalists were:
Dodge That Anvil, Moleculous, Dad 'N Me.
And the Winner is ... Dan 'N Me!

Innovation In Audio
Finalists were:
Professor Fizzwizzle, Saints & Sinners Bowling, Dodge That Anvil, Glow Worm, Weird Worlds: Return To Infinite Space.
And the Winner is ... Weird Worlds: Return To Infinite Space!

Innovation In Visual Art
Finalists were:
Dofus, Darwinia, Putt Nutz, Glow Worm, Tommy And The Magical Words
And the Winner is ... Darwinia!

Innovation In Game Design
Finalists were:
Rumble Box, Strange Attractors, Braid, The Witch's Yarn, Darwinia.
And the Winner is ... Braid!

Technical Excellence
Finalists were:
Saints & Sinners Bowling, Tribal Trouble, Tube Twist, Darwinia, Crazy Ball.
And the Winner is ... Darwinia!

Audience Award
All finalists were eligible
And the Winner is ... French strategy-MMO Dofus! (with over 2,000 votes)

Special $5,000 AdultSwim.com Award
All finalists were eligible (I think)
And the Winner is ... RabidLab, developer of Dodge That Anvil!.

And now for the BIG prize....

Seumas McNally Grand Prize
Finalists were:
Darwinia, Dofus, Professor Fizzwizzle, Weird Worlds: Return To Infinite Space, Wildlife Tycoon: Venture Africa.
And the Winner is ... Darwinia!

(Gamasutra news item at: http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=8643)

[soniCron]

Hmmm... The judges really identify themselves with so many awards to Darwinia. Neat game, but I just can't agree it should have won so many awards. I'd have stuck them with the Innovation in Visual Art award, but that's probably it.

[chanon]

Congratulations to the winners!

A little sad that not many of the regulars here that were finalists got awards. Only Dodge That Anvil I think ... so good luck next year guys!

I won't comment about Darwinia .. but I found it a little funny (and then feel that it is obvious) that an MMO got the Audience Award

[PoV]

Coolness. And here comes IGF.com success story...

2006 - Multi award winner Darwinia recieves online distribution deal through Valve's Steam.



Yeah, I kinda think the wording in the success stories there sounds as if they're taking more credit than they deserve.

Ah well, at least there's still the Moondance compilation.

[DrWilloughby]

GDC was an absolute blast. I think all the nominees had an incredible time and probably pulled together all sorts of opportunities and inspiration for continued work.

That and my table got so rowdy at the awards show that we were getting evil looks from Tim Shafer for our heckling. That's it, I can die now.

[Sirrus]

IGF was good to see - first time there...
Grats to Darwinia, but I was hoping to see more IndieGamers to win some awards.

(Good to finally play your game Andy!)

[PoV]

Originally Posted by Sirrus

(Good to finally play your game Andy!)

You see, if you just downloaded it, you could have save the few hundred bucks to fly down.

[Drake]

This was my first GDC as well, and it was a really great experience to say the least. My mind was so scattered that I somehow failed to meet some of the IndieGamers at the show, but my neighbors in the IGF pavilion were Mousechief and Grubby Games, and I really enjoyed chatting with all of them throughout the week.

It was nice to go home with a prize (I got to make a goofy speech in front of industry luminaries! ), but the best part was definitely the meeting of people, putting faces to names and so forth. I really do feel more connected to the whole industry now (not a feeling I get at E3), and I hope to be able to attend next year. Good times.

[AnthemAudio]

Sounded like fun, couldn't get away. Soulkeeper didn't win for Best UT Mod like everyone and their mother predicted. But we'll be at E3 shopping around. Different monster altogether that E3 is, but it should be fun as usual.

Tony

[Ryan Clark]

Yes, even though we didn't win, we still had a blast. Meeting all of the other indie devs was a ton of fun. We lucked out having our booth next to Rabidlab and the Digital Eel guys.

Hope to see everyone there again next year

[Sirrus]

Originally Posted by Drake

This was my first GDC as well, and it was a really great experience to say the least. My mind was so scattered that I somehow failed to meet some of the IndieGamers at the show, but my neighbors in the IGF pavilion were Mousechief and Grubby Games, and I really enjoyed chatting with all of them throughout the week.

It was nice to go home with a prize (I got to make a goofy speech in front of industry luminaries! ), but the best part was definitely the meeting of people, putting faces to names and so forth. I really do feel more connected to the whole industry now (not a feeling I get at E3), and I hope to be able to attend next year. Good times.

Your speech was good!

Mike - yea, but it was worth it!

Ryan - Slacker, I came by the IGF booths at around 6:30 or so and half of you were gone!

[Musenik]

I have to agree. Being a finalist was worth more than all but the top prize. I feel like so many opportunities opened up, I won't be able to know which will be the best ones. Fortunately, I have enough experience with the GCD to know that a lot of hot air fills that great hall...

[Ryan Clark]

Originally Posted by Sirrus

Ryan - Slacker, I came by the IGF booths at around 6:30 or so and half of you were gone!

Which day was that?

[mooktown]

did anybody take any piccies?

[arcadetown]

The IGF had so many cool games this year but just like last year most of the games <> dowloadable games. There was Prof Fizz, Tribal Trouble, Wildlife Tycoon, Weird Worlds, and a few others. But overall over 50% didn't seem to understand downloadable games even existed. Hope some come to understand that. To me "indie" and direct accessibility to users via shareware/downloadable model go hand in hand.

p.s. DanNMe rules!! Action based casual games could take such a big fat hint from this freeware game.

[Sirrus]

Originally Posted by mooktown

did anybody take any piccies?

I'll post up some...unfortunately didn't get any of the IGF...

Ryan - I think it was on Thursday...I just got off booth duty so I'm assuming most people headed out already...

[Sillysoft]

Gamedev posted an IGF article with pictures of the booths, including many of the people behind the games. It's pretty interesting seeing all the varied teams.

http://www.gamedev.net/columns/event...icle.asp?id=99

[soniCron]

Originally Posted by Sillysoft

Gamedev posted an IGF article with pictures of the booths, including many of the people behind the games. It's pretty interesting seeing all the varied teams.

I can't say I expected anyone to look like they do, but everyone does suit their game in some way. (The "cool" guys have the "cool" games, etc.) Very interesting! Thanks for the link, Dustin!

[PoV]

Originally Posted by soniCron

I can't say I expected anyone to look like they do, but everyone does suit their game in some way. (The "cool" guys have the "cool" games, etc.) Very interesting! Thanks for the link, Dustin!

Yeah, and the Weird Worlds guys do look like Nasa engineers, or the type that hang out in Roswell digging for Aliens.

[Tr00jg]

Do you know what I dont like about these things, although these games deserve it, is the fact that there gazillion indie games out there. What if some unknown guy created a spectacular but has never been seen by the masses. To be in the top 10, it requires your game to at least appear on some ad somewhere, or appear on a portal. You get my drift?

[soniCron]

Originally Posted by Tr00jg

What if some unknown guy created a spectacular but has never been seen by the masses. To be in the top 10, it requires your game to at least appear on some ad somewhere, or appear on a portal.

That's not true. Venture Africa, Dodge That Anvil, Braid, etc. weren't publicly released at the time of the submission deadline, and many weren't released until just recently. If some unknown guy didn't get his game in the festival, it's because he failed to submit it. Popular opinion only matters for the audience award. (And why submit your game to a games festival to win the audience award when the public's dollars speak so much more vibrantly? )

[terin]

Dofus won the audience award because its an MMO... and hence has a very active community they could persuade to vote. There were only a couple thousand votes total...

But I don't think any ad money was used to convince people to vote for Dofus :-P That's just nonsense.

-Joe

[Sean Doherty]

Originally Posted by Sillysoft

Gamedev posted an IGF article with pictures of the booths, including many of the people behind the games. It's pretty interesting seeing all the varied teams.

Dustin,

You are correct, there were a lot of cool people looking after the booths this year.

Actually, I think everyone had a pretty good time. Although, it was pretty tiering (time zone changes and all).

[DrWilloughby]

Originally Posted by Sirrus

(Good to finally play your game Andy!)

Thanks dude, it was fun meeting everyone... at least while I was actually at the booth. Dan Paladin is an old friend of mine, so it was fun being next to the DadnMe booth, that is until he got food poisoning and left me lonely.

Hopefully I'll see ya'll next year!

Oh, and the only guys who had any remote guise of cool were the Darwinia fellas... maybe that's their secret. Gotta work on my coolness stat for next year.