Indie Prize Winners at Casual Connect Europe Announced!

Indie Prize Winners at Casual Connect Europe Announced!

With Casual Connect Europe in Amsterdam, Netherlands all wrapped up and the Indie Prize winners selected, it\'s time to officially announce who won. Out of the 200 Indie Prize applicants, only 120 were admitted to the conference and only a mere 11 walked away with an award. The competition was fierce and there was some debating amongst the judges, however, it all worked out fantastically. In total, the prizes for winners are worth over $500,000 and included the following: Unity licenses, 5K in Google Cloud Services, Photon Cloud services, headsets from Plantronics, various devices from Amazon, free advertisements from us, free highlights from BlogsRelease, and plenty more. Lastly, the two Best In Show winners also receive $1,000 stipends from Casual Connect which can be used towards the trip to Casual Connect Asia in Singapore in May. But without any further to do, here\'s the list of winners along with their respective category.

• Best Art - Lumino City by State of Play Games


• Best Audio - Amphora by Moondrop


• Best Narrative - Herald by Wispfire


• Best Game Design - LA Cops by Modern Dream


• Most Promising Game in Development - Guild of Dungeoneering by Gambrinous


• Best PC Game - Guns, Gore and Cannoli by Crazy Monkey Studios


• Best Multiplayer Game - Move or Die by Those Awesome Guys


• Best Mobile Game - First Strike HD by Blindflug Studios


• Director\'s Choice Award - Shadow Puppeteer by Sarepta Studio


• Best in Show: Critic\'s Choice Award - Party Hard by Pinokl Games


• Best in Show: Audience Choice Award - Replay: VHS is Not Dead by Neko Entertainment

The games were judged by critics -- Henry Oh from CNN, Zoya Street from Gamesbrief, Dan Oravasaari from PlayStation LifeStyle, Aaron Whitfield from PocketFullOfApps, Rai Sewgobind from Eye For Games, Jurjen Tiersma from Power Unlimited, André Bernhardt from Indie Advisor. On the other hand, the prize judges included Nick Berry from Facebook, Christopher Hamilton from Rovio, Oscar Clark from Unity, Candy Yang from Aarki, Aaron Walz from Walz Music, Jamison Selby from b Spot, and over a dozen more people or organizations.

Announcing Our Coverage of Casual Connect Europe!

Announcing Our Coverage of Casual Connect Europe!

With Casual Connect Belgrade in the books, it\'s time to turn our focus on the next big event. Taking place at the Beurs Van Berlage in Amsterdam, Netherlands, Casual Connect Europe will take place from February 4th through the 6th. Almost three times the size of Casual Connect Belgrade, this event will be home to 2,000 professional attendees, 170 speakers, and 120 Indie Prize teams. Out of the 120 Indie Prize teams, only a select handful will walk home with one of the much coveted awards. That said, there\'s a lot more at stake and the competition will be fierce this time around. That only means one thing though -- we get to play a lot of fantastic games from numerous indie developers that deserve a chance at making it big. Those interested can check out the official Indie Prize website for the Amsterdam event here. Just like our coverage of Casual Connect Belgrade and San Francisco, we\'ll be doing regular reporting of the event with pictures, interviews, updates, round ups, and much more. I\'ll also be down on the Indie Prize floor judging some of the games, so be on the lookout for me and be sure to say hello as well. With Causal Connect Europe being roughly one and a half months away there are plenty of updates that we\'ll share with you as the event approaches, so be sure to stay on the look out.

Indie Prize Showcase at Casual Connect Belgrade 2014 [Video]

Indie Prize Showcase at Casual Connect Belgrade 2014 [Video]

Casual Connect Eastern Europe 2014 in Belgrade Comes to a Close

Casual Connect Eastern Europe 2014 in Belgrade Comes to a Close

The Casual Games Association, a world-wide organization for the video games industry that hosts the Casual Connect conferences, has finally ended after a fun and eventful successful show at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Belgrade. Those that missed our coverage last week can check out the full archive here along with photos here and here. Earlier in the year we attended Casual Connect USA which took place in San Francisco. The full archive of our coverage for that event can be seen here. Here\'s some highlights from the Causal Connect Belgrade event:

• This conference marks the first time Casual Connect Eastern Europe has been held in Serbia.


• Over 1,000 professionals from 51 countries in attendance.


• Over 400 developers in attendance, with 24 countries represented in the Indie Prize Showcase.


• More than 60 lectures from companies including Nordeus, Eipix, Mad Head Games, Creative Mobile, Facebook, Seriously, Wooga, HeroCraft, Fun 2 Robots Ltd., as well as Unity who provided a full Developer Day.

Lectures at Casual Connect Belgrade included a wide range of topics like industry insights, the indie experience, and game development across platforms from mobile, PC, console, as well as web. Select Speakers

1. Mirko Topalski, Eipix


2. Vladimir Funtikov, Creative Mobile


3. Bob Slinn, Facebook


4. Leonid Eletskikh, App Annie


5. Nick Berry, Facebook


6. Connor O’Sullivan, Nordeus


7. Katya Nemova, Wargaming


8. Vladimir Zivkovic, Eipix


9. Alina Brazdeikene, Signus Labs


10. Jaroslav Stacevic, Nordcurrent

For the full list of speakers, be sure to check out the official Casual Connect Eastern Europe website here. Additionally, some of the videos from the conference can be seen at Gamesauce.org. Looking towards the future, Casual Connect turns their focus their next conference -- Casual Connect Europe in Amsterdam on February 4th -- 6th, 2015. Similar companies like Unity, Gamepoint, Glu Mobile, Playtika, and others will attend which we\'ve seen previously at the San Francisco and Belgrade event. A full list of speakers can be seen here. Last but certainly not least, PocketFullOfApps also hopes to attend the event and be apart of a panel for a change of pace. While we\'ll still do our typical coverage with photos and recaps, taking part in a panel discussion would be a lot of fun. The Indie Prize winners will also get a nice prize from us as well just like previous conferences.

Announcing our Coverage of Casual Connect Eastern Europe and Indie Prize Next Week

Announcing our Coverage of Casual Connect Eastern Europe and Indie Prize Next Week

Well folks, after months of preparation the time has finally come. In just a couple hours from now, Casual Connect Eastern Europe is going to be kicked off with a lot in store for us to talk about. Just like the conference in San Francisco earlier this year, Indie Prize has joined in which allows us to check out many awesome indie developer games. We\'ll also be judging some of the Indie Prize games, so be sure to watch out for us on the show room floor. As for coverage of the event, we\'ll be talking about which games we played, some of the speeches and panels, taking pictures, as well as doing daily recaps. If you check out the Indie Prize website, PocketFullOfApps is co-sponsoring the event along side Intel, Amazon, Photon, and a couple other companies. For those who want just short and quick updates should follow us on Twitter where we\'ll keep you updated on a lot of the little things. Last but certainly not least, we highly recommend checking out our coverage of Causal Connect USA which can be seen here.

Indie Prize Showcase Games Announced for Casual Connect Eastern Europe

Indie Prize Showcase Games Announced for Casual Connect Eastern Europe

Indie Prize, a scholarship program for indie developers created by the Casual Games Association, has recently announced the games accepted for the Indie Prize Showcase at Casual Connect Eastern Europe which takes place from November 10th – 12th, 2014. A total of 42 games from 24 countries will be competing for the Indie Prize Award […]

Casual Games Association Hosts Casual Connect Conference in Serbia This November [Follow Up]

Casual Games Association Hosts Casual Connect Conference in Serbia This November [Follow Up]

Just like we covered back in mid-September, Casual Connect is heading out to Serbia next month and we\'ll be joining them on the trip to report on this fantastic event. That being said, we wanted to do a quick follow up article along with more information which we have received. As we said earlier, Casual Connect Eastern Europe will be held in Belgrade, Serbia on from November 10th to the 12th by the Casual Games Association. In an effort to support needs of various developers, the Casual Games Association is also providing a special discount and travel assistance program for developers interested in attending the conference. To qualify, the developer must be from one of the specified countries, have 20 or less team members and have a game project in development or a portfolio of previously released games. For those interested, applications for this program are due October 15 and can be submitted online by clicking here. For those that may now know, Casual Connect is a professional conference created to support the mass market game community by gathering the top developers, publishers, distributors and others involved in related industries for networking opportunities as well as insightful lectures from numerous industry members. As of right now, over 75 speakers will cover a variety of topics, including emerging trends and game development. Conference attendees can also attend Unity Day on November 12th which includes five sessions about the upcoming engine technology, cloud-based services, and gameplay sharing. In addition to lectures, attendees can also look forward to the games displayed in the Indie Prize Showcase and the IDEA Showcase. Over 40 developers from many different countries will be presenting their games at the conference for people to play and look at. Participating developers will be judged for a number of various awards to be announced during the conference. With that being said, PocketFullOfApps\' very own Aaron Whitfield will also be a judge at Casual Connect. Apart from that, developers can also demo their newest work at the International Design, Entertain, and Amaze (IDEA) Showcase which will be taking place at Casual Connect Belgrade. This showcase was created to provide the opportunity for established developers to find international partners for publishing, user acquisition, game performance monitoring, as well as logistical support. Want to attend in November? The event will take place at the Crowne Plaza Belgrade and online registration can be completed here.

Casual Connect: Indie Prize Awards Ceremony and City Hall Party [Photos]

Casual Connect: Indie Prize Awards Ceremony and City Hall Party [Photos]

Unlike MacWorld earlier this year where we were able to take our own photos, unfortunately with Casual Connect we didn\'t have time to take photos. Fear not though, thankfully the folks at Causal Connect had a dedicated photographer for the event this year and we have permission to republish the photos. With the conference taking place over a span of three days and there being a couple different after parties, you can safely expect to see more photos as this week progresses. To kick things off, we\'ve selected a small handful of our favorite photos from the Indie Prize Awards Ceremony and City Hall Party which you can see above. For those that haven\'t seen the entire list of winners for the Indie Prize can check out our article here. Anyhow, those interested can see the full photo album on Casual Connect\'s Facebook page.

Casual Connect: Day Two Roundup, Winners of the Indie Prize Awards

Casual Connect: Day Two Roundup, Winners of the Indie Prize Awards

After many hours of playing games, deliberation amongst the judges, and a couple hours of anticipation, the final results for the Indie Prize awards are finally in. Starting at 8PM PST yesterday, the Indie Prize Awards Ceremony kicked off and the room was full of energy and excitement. Out of nearly 100 games this year at Casual Connect, only a mere 12 walked away with an award. The awards were broken down into 10 different categories each with two nominees and one winner, the Critic\'s Choice Award, and the Audience Choice Award. So without any further to do, be sure to check out the full list below of the winners, categories and nominees by clicking the following link.

Casual Connect USA: Day One Roundup

Casual Connect USA: Day One Roundup

Well folks, the first day of Casual Connect is officially in the bag and so far the conference has gotten off to the great start. In addition to Coin Congress which starts tomorrow, Indie Prize and Casual Connect have teamed for indie developers to show off their latest and greatest game for iOS, Mac, PC, Android, or Linux. For a good portion of the first day we spent our time browsing around the Indie Prize area, getting demos from different developers, and chatting with attendees. While we don\'t have the exact numbers, according to the official website there are over 90 game development teams from 20+ different countries from around the world. Due to the limited time that was available and the judging process we weren\'t able to play every singe game there, however, we were able to still play a good amount of the games. Kicking things off we met up with the folks from The Tap Lab who were demoing Big Foot Hunter which is set to land on iOS sometime here soon. From there, a Canada based development studio by the name of Phantom Compass gave us a a quick demo of Rollers of the Realm . At the core of the game it combines classic arcade pinball with the character-driven adventure aspect of fantasy role-playing games to give a really unique gameplay experience. Moving forward, Rocket 5 Studios, another Canadian game development studio, brought their upcoming iOS title dubbed The Phantom P.I. Mission Apparition . If all goes according as planned, we are told that The Phantom P.I. Mission Apparition will be live on the App Store as soon as this Thursday for $3.99. While mingling just outside of Indie Prize and checking out all the different vendors, we just so happened to stumble upon Pig Eat Ball from a local Indiana resident, Nathan Fouts. Simply put, Pig Eat Ball is a game about flying space pigs that eat tennis balls. Players are tasked with having to eat a certain amount of tennis balls to complete a level while avoiding asteroids. You\'ll have to be careful though -- bumping into the player\'s or AI\'s pigs will cause your pig to slow down. Whoever is the first one to reach the required number of tennis balls wins the game. Even though we\'d like to take the time to talk about each individual game that we saw today, it would take too long. So with that said, if you click the following link, there\'s a full list a long with information on the lectures for day one.