Available here
Hi there folks! So just over a week ago now my fellow budgie Kayleigh and I attended an event being held in Edinburgh's Mash house called Games Are For Everyone (GAFE). The event consisted of a handful of games (including Glitchspace) in a relaxed environment (including a drink or two) and an unexpected surprise (16 piece orchestra, which was awesome might I add).
This event was unlike any I've personally attended before and felt more like a games night round at a friends rather than an exhibition which I found broke down the barrier you can sometimes face between audience and developer. The people were friendly, the atmosphere was wonderful and the time flew by so fast that we were saddened when the lights came on for the bar to resume its normal evening purpose.
GAFE was the first time we'd really brought Alpha 2.0 out to the public and considering how much change the game has undergone in the past few months I know at least I was a little nervous about showing it, thankfully the reception to the updated Glitchspace was resoundingly positive and it was a relief to see people having a genuinely good time playing it and even watching other people play it. At one point in the evening it became a group task solving the puzzles with people watching it on the screen giving helpful instructions to the perplexed player in the hot seat.
It was an incredibly enjoyable event for the both of us, but it was also really useful. We treated the evening as a mini play-testing session taking turns making notes on the current players actions and frustrations or talking to the people watching about initial impressions and aesthetics. The information we collected has been quickly whittled into a hit list of issues to fix and improvements to make in time for our official public release of Alpha 2.0!
Thank you to all the people who played Glitchspace at GAFE and also to Andrew Dyce for organising and inviting us! We had an amazing time so invite us to the next one!
That's all from me for now!
Robin