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Tuesday, November 13, 2007

GameSetIndie: Kongregate's Plans, Noitu Love's Sequel

- Over at big sister site Gamasutra today, we posted a couple of items that would be of interest to you indie-centric harridans hanging around at GSW. And I will tell you what they are!

Firstly, we posted 'Q&A: Kongregate Announces Indie Funding, Talks Innovation', revealing that "social flash gaming portal Kongregate has announced five development studios funded from $20,000 to $100,000 to create original, larger-scale Flash games exclusive to the site."

Needless to say, this is pretty interesting for the Flash game scene - which we recently profiled from a money-making perspective on Gamasutra. And what's further interesting to me is that the game titles they've funded all sound alternative and non-cookie-cutter - though the proof will be in the playing, of course.

For the record, they are: Dinowaurs, by Intuition Games (and previously mentioned on GSW); Remnants of Skystone from Flipline Studios; Lila Dreams, by Creatrix Games; Zening, from developer Michael King, and Argue (About Everything) from development duo Adam Schroeder and Roger Bankus - and descriptions are in the Q&A.

Also, we're continuing the 'Road To The IGF' mini-interview feature set on Gama, and the latest is 'Road To The IGF: Konjak's Throwback Noitu Love 2', in which "...we talk to Joakim Sandberg of Konjak, developer of the action beat-em-up Noitu Love 2, inspired heavily by classic Treasure and Konami titles." Lest you forget, here's a preview of a boss battle in the game, which shows how one guy can create something really special, in an extremely and happily retro type fashion.

Comments

I think the biggest thing that has been accomplished through Kongregate's Premium Developer Program is that a game developer can overcome the chicken-and-egg problem of trying to get funding to work on a game when the developer hasn't shipped any titles yet. It's a huge barrier in the industry that has been knocked down in one big swoop.

Big thanks for the plug, Simon. :) I hope to see you at the next IGS again.

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