Playtopia is an annual indie games and immersive arts festival that recently took place over three days in the Castle of Good Hope, converting a historical site that was created to keep people out into a safe space to bring people together.
There was a wide variety of indie games to play, ranging from released titles you can purchase on Steam and elsewhere, to artsy, experimental gems that push the boundaries of what defines a game.
A personal favourite of mine was Line Wobbler, which is nothing more than an LED strip hooked up to a spring for input, powered by Arduino and magic. Other unusual games included HORSE, a horse-riding simulator where you control a horse by bouncing on an exercise ball and steering with actual reins (fingers crossed for Red Dead Redemption 2 integration), and Guitar Wizards, a duelling game where opponents wield Guitar Hero guitars and battle over LED strips. There was also a text-based choose-your-own-adventure that sent info to a receipt printer as you made choices, so that, at the end of it, you had a printed short story to take home. Attendees were also treated to several VR experiences, and it’s great to see the indie community embracing the new medium and using it to create art and games that would be impossible to experience any other way.
The highlight of Playtopia for me, and of game jams in general, was the selection of multiplayer games exhibited by Super Friendship Arcade. Playing multiplayer games at these gatherings captures the feeling we all used to get as children when it was okay to walk up to other random kids and start playing together. That instant camaraderie or friendly rivalry. It’s so rare to experience this as an adult but get a bunch of strangers on a couch playing Genital Jousting or Frog Smashers together and you can feel the social boundaries dissolve in peals of laughter.
For visitors interested in game development, there were opportunities to talk to the developers of the games on display. It’s impossible not to come away from these conversations without learning something and feeling inspired. And throughout the festival, there were presentations from people in the industry, both local and international. This year, Playtopia partnered with Make Games Africa to provide even more talks. These covered a wide range of topics, from lectures focusing on the technical aspects of game development, to the business side of it, as well as talks on bringing diversity to game development, and highlighting Africa-based indie studios.
As the sky got dark, the musicians come out. The line-up included electronica and punk rock, and this is one of the few dance floors on which you might see me break out some moves. Though, if dancing really wasn’t your thing, the games and art installations remained open till the party ends.
There is so much negativity surrounding the gaming industry these days. It seems like every week there’s a famous streamer dropping racist expletives, or yet another studio embroiled in a scandal about sexism or mistreatment of employees. But that’s not what gaming should be about, and it’s not what gaming is about to me. Seeing such a diverse and inclusive group of gamers and developers all coming together to geek out over games for a weekend gave me tremendous hope for the future.