The Best CIS Igers with Devgamm Minsk 2018

For a year, Devgamm has not been cheating on himself: when you go to him, you know in advance what awaits you there, what kind of faces will be shared by experience from the stage, who will show games, and who will only drink free beer at parties. And in 2018 in Minsk, everything went according to the standard program. Which, however, is even good: like all the previous ones, this Devgamm turned out to be a real holiday dedicated to video games and their development.

What is it?

For those who hear about Devgamm, a small introductory: we are talking about one of the largest game conferences in the CIS, where developers from various countries show their games, meet, call each other to work and share experience. Almost every gamer-from an ordinary player to a serious producer-will find something for himself there.

Someone, for example, spends almost all the time at lectures, where guys from various companies, from CD Projekt Red to 11 Bit Studios , tell their success stories and share experience earned by mistakes. This year in Minsk one could listen to the history of creation Dendy From her "parent". Hear the opinion of Anton Logvinov about the state of the God Odds sister sites industry. Talk to a team Dead Cells About marketing their project. As with the developer Frostpunk – About narrative. "Simple mortals" such opportunities, you see, fall out of the time.

A round table about the future of the domestic gaming industry turned out to be not the most informative, but certainly one of the most interesting

Another part of the visitors prefers to hang on the "showcase"-a platform where both indie studios and the company are more serious. With large market players, you can discuss the prospects of cooperation or ask for work, and with developers – talk about the difficulties of creating their projects and touch these same projects. You never know: suddenly this game a year later or even for several months will become a multimillion -dollar hit?

Indi-game of different colors and sizes, as always, was a huge number

Finally, one more (and for someone is the most important) component of Devgamm is the entertainment. In the course of the conference, you can perform a quest to compete for valuable prizes like the top consoles, or you can completely skip the official part and come only to the end – to be at one of the parties. Often it is there that most of the beneficial dating developer for any developer is started and the most interesting bikes are told.

Well, what certainly no one will miss is the awarding ceremony and the traditional Game Roast (former Game Lynch), an event, along which several experts are bright, funny and not embarrassed in expressions to fluffs (and not very) Games. Well, the developers are sitting opposite them and waiting for their turn to defend themselves. The loser drinks in the dispute, and this is exactly the show regularly collects crowds: many people want to look at ridiculous lawlessness.

The notorious Game Lynch looks something like this ..

But the main thing is that every year remains unchanged – this is the atmosphere of friendliness and universal love for games. It doesn’t matter who you are a developer, journalist, volunteer or just a onlook – anyone can pull aside, for example, the same Viktor Sabyuk (creator of “Dandy”) and talk about life or about games. Every year this magic is repeated over and over again invariably.

However, for gambling, the key component of the event was, of course, the games themselves. And in 2018, the domestic (and not only) indie developers had something to please.

"Black Book"

Surely many have already heard about the game The Mooseman (she was “a person”), which at one time won a lot of attention thanks to a gloomy style and an unusual presentation.

This time the same developers brought a completely new project called "Black Book". And he largely resembles the previous one: all the same emphasis on mythology and oppressive atmosphere. Another thing is that a new game dedicated to the Cherdynsky legends looks more interesting: folk music sounds in the headphones, the actor of voice acting is a curious reprimand-to match the peasants of the nineteenth century-and the story tells about the young sorceress. The girl has to learn how to control her strength and pass the initiation, and along the way, of course, to fight with a variety of mythical creatures: from devils to goblin.

Despite the attractiveness of the topic, games in Russian mythology are still rare

Developers describe their project as RPG, but with procedural generation and "elements of compiling a deck". Players have to travel around the world, fight with magical creatures, choose replicas in dialogs and engage in well: each spell, apparently, will correspond to a separate card in the deck.

Which will come out of this, is not yet very clear. In terms of the combat system, the game resembles a cross between JRPG with a card game, and the battles themselves are not so deep, moreover, a lot in the project is not yet ready and will change repeatedly. But the Black Book I already want to love in absentia for an unusual topic, music and style. It looks and sounds just fantastic, and over time, presumably, it will only become better.

Save Koch

Another game that leaves a pleasant impression is also tied to the narrative. Save Koch proposes to take on the role of a kind of godfather – the head of the mafia, who finds out that he is going to kill him within a few days. The problem must be solved, only now the style of the protagonist’s work in this project is different from what we are used to seeing in most criminal militants. In Save Koch, players have to deal with troubles a little differently: talking on the phone and distributing instructions from a safe asylum. In general, masterfully delegating the powers.

The hero Save Koch solves all problems with words and competent management, as is supposed to be a real leader

All that is in the bunker is a TV, a phone and a tablet with a map, so that almost the entire gameplay is tied to dialogs, choice in text quests and management, when it is necessary to choose a point on the city map and send someone from your assistants- figure out. This Save Koch is a little reminded This is the Police.

But the main thing is that the project distinguishes (besides the fact that the main character is still for the mafia), these are alive characters: anthropomorphic pigs, zebras, dogs and so on speaking animals in ironed costumes. This is done in such a caricature, but memorable style that you fall in love with a cartoon story literally at first glance.

Summer Catchers

The game called Summer Catchers is not brought to Minsk for the first time. She was shown at Devgamm back in 2015, and since then, according to the sensations, there have not changed so much, although the project still clings to.

The story is the same: a little girl on a wooden typewriter decides to escape from her winter forest in search of summer. Along the way, she will have to overcome many obstacles and get acquainted with a bunch of characters like a talker-rosewood wolf. All this, of course, is equipped with talented pixel art and magnificent music, which takes the prize for the best sound on Devgamm Awards for the second time.

Pixel art, of course, looks poorer than luxurious promotions of the game, but even such a picture in dynamics looks very pleasant

The gameplay, however, is relatively simple: the machine goes by itself, and the player only needs to activate various gadgets in time with the most propeller that allows you to take off, or a bumper that lies obstacles on the way of a girl.

The variety is achieved at the expense of a rich set of worlds, obstacles, bosses, additional mini-games, as well as quests. Moreover, they also promise a full-fledged narrative: after all, Summer Catchers is a routine, so you should wait for a series of interesting places, characters and events. After the already mentioned wolf-brush, for example, you can find a beaver with a UKULEL. With all them, according to the creators of the game, you can talk and even make a correspondence.

Despite the long -term stagnation in development, now the project seems to be more close to the release, so you can see how good the game is, it will be possible very soon. Fairytale Summer Catchers definitely should wait!

Swag and Sorcery

The SWAG and Sorcery is already worth the quality stamp: the project issues TinyBuild , which, if not always, then at least often gets directly into the apple. This time they brought to the conference a role -playing game, where, it seems, they shoved everything that could. In Swag and Sorcery, players will have to rebuild their own small village, help with pretty pixel heroes to fight monsters, look for resources and create with their help swords and other good, as well as decorate heroes in fashionable (and not so) clothes. Those who are not enough and this will have to perform quests and open new technologies and spells.

There is so many mechanics in SWAG and Sorcery that it is easier to list those in it

In general, a kind of universal eater of the time for those who are tired of AAA and three -dimensional graphics loom. The development of the creators of the indie Punch Club And Graveyard Keeper , So the project will probably turn out what you need. He looked almost more convincing than all other games presented on the showcase – at least on the first day of the exhibition.

To large AAA levels "Witcher" The developers from the CIS, of course, have not yet grown up – and they will not grow soon. But we have enough pleasant and potentially successful indie games, and every year there are more and more at exhibitions. Well, and Devgamm herself who gives young developers a convenient chance to show themselves – I want to believe that the fuse of the organizers will only grow further.