EVENT: PROFESSOR NOLAN'S NEW PRESENTATION AND PAPER

Professor Kieran Nolan (GAME AESTHETICS) shares his slides from a recent talk about the JAMMA arcade platform as used by bootleggers, artists, and indie game designers. He also shares a short paper titled 'Indie Game and Media Art Exhibition Spaces as Interface Layers’, which explores the human computer interface of his experimental indie game Control was augmented through five different exhibitions across both new media art and indie game spaces. Interface elements considered include the tangible control input type, the style of visual display used, as well as the situated space of the game installation itself. The paper was presented at CHI PLAY '17.

EVENT: PROFESSOR AURIEA HARVEY INTERVIEWED BY NYU GAME CENTER

Two faculty members, Auriea Harvey and Pietro Righi Riva, will soon fly to New York to showcase their latest game in the prestigious No Quarter exhibition curated by Robert Yang and hosted by the NYU Game Center. This week, Yang chatted with Harvey about game design, innovation, and art. You can read the interview by clicking the image below. 

EVENT: PROFESSOR SHEPPARD'S GAME N++ NOW AVAILABLE FOR XBOX ONE

N is making its return to Xbox. N++ launches today on Xbox Live! Professor Mare Sheppard, co-founder of Canadian indie studio Metanet Software, who teaches GAME CONTEXTS in our Program, is releasing the revamped version of the award-winning platform game:

This is the long-awaited sequel to the legendary N+, rewritten from scratch to be bigger, better, and more beautiful in every way. N++ is a fast-paced, momentum-based platformer about darting around obstacles, narrowly evading enemies and collecting gold in a beautiful minimalist landscape. N++ is all about using your momentum to complete levels and get high scores, but in this sci-fi world, there’s a slew of inadvertently homicidal enemy robots trying to prevent you from completing your goal. Through the hand-crafted (NOT procedurally generated) levels, you’ll experience platforming at its most intense. Using only your fluid movement, you need to ‘solve’ each level and get to the exit. (Major Nelson)

EVENT: A DELUGE OF INDIE GAMES AT THE MILAN GAMES WEEK 2017

Indie games took a center stage at the latest Milan Game Week (September 29 - October 1, 2017). The show's attendance was close to 150,000. Among the 56 titles on display was Professor Pietro Righi Riva's narrative road trip extravaganza Wheels of Aurelia. The key message is that, in 2017, "game design" and "Made in Italy" are not two mutually exclusive ideas. Check the video below for a detailed overview of recent indie productions developed by Italian studios. Your project could be the next hit.

KIERAN NOLAN JOINS THE FACULTY

We are delighted to announce that Kieran Nolan has joined the faculty and he will be teaching GAME AESTHETICS.

Kieran Nolan is an artist-researcher, indie-game designer, and academic. He is a lecturer with the Department of Creative Arts, Media and Music at Dundalk Institute of Technology, where he is Programme Director of the BA in Media Arts and Technologies and the BA (Hons) in Communications and Creative Multimedia, and co-organiser of the Picteilín Creative Media and Games Studies Conference. Kieran is also a PhD candidate in Digital Arts and Humanities with the Graphics Vision and Visualisation group at Trinity College, Dublin. His PhD research explores the aesthetic, material and connective properties of the arcade videogame interface. Kieran’s research work has been published at conferences and exhibitions worldwide, including Vector Game Art and New Media Festival (Toronto), The Science Gallery (Dublin), Eurogamer Expo (London), Future and Reality of Gaming/F.R.O.G. (Vienna), International Symposium of Electronic Art /ISEA (Belfast, Hong Kong), ZIL Cultural Centre (Moscow), the A MAZE. International Independent Video Games Festival (Berlin), METEOR (Tokyo), MAKE (Cork), Transmediale (Berlin), Art.CHI (Seoul), Game On! El arte en juego (Buenos Aires), and Playing The Game (Milan).

Among his games are Arcade Operator (2017)

And Control (2015)

Read more about Kieran Nolan's games and project here. 

EVENTO: IULM MASTER DAY (21 SETTEMBRE 2017, 12-13)

Presentazione ufficiale del Master Universitario di Primo Livello in Game Design alla IULM il 21 settembre 2017 dalle ore 12 alle ore 13 in Aula 154 (IULM 1) con Matteo Bittanti e numerosi docenti. Vi aspettiamo! Cliccate qui per il programma completo. 

On September 21, 2017, the M.A. in Game Design at IULM University will unveil its full program. Don't miss this opportunity to meet the professors! The presentation takes place in Room 154 of IULM's Main Bulding on September 21, 2017 between noon and 13. Click here for the full program (in Italian).

WE ARE MÜESLI JOIN THE FACULTY

We are delighted to announce that Claudia Molinari and Matteo Pozzi also known as We Are Müesli will be teaching Game Writing in the upcoming academic year. As you may know, the duo has produced several award winning independent games in the past ten years, including Venti Mesi, The Great Palermo, Once Upon a Tile, and Cave! Cave! Deus videt! that have been exhibited at SXSW, Indiecade, the Global Game Jam, and many more places around the world.

You will be able to meet Claudia and Matteo on September 21, 2017 at IULM, during the next Master's Day.

Claudia Molinari is a graphic designer, illustrator and art director. After studying anthropology, photography and media, art direction and graphic, trend and concept design in Cambridge, Brighton, London and Milan, Claudia began her professional career in 2004 working for several graphic studios in Italy and abroad, including A+G, Lumen and A+A. Before entering the game design industry, Claudia worked for five years as visual designer with the Italian service design company Logotel (2009-2014). In 2011, she launched We Are Müesli with Matteo Pozzi, an independent game studio focusing on award-winning narrative games. Claudia is also a teacher, lecturer, and speaker on topics related to art and narrative in game design. Her personal achievements include a D&AD Commendation (2008), an Italian Young Creativity Award (2008) and two Spot School Awards (2008) as well as taking part in AIAP Millennials: the new scene of Italian graphic design (2015).   

Born in Monza, Italy in 1980, Matteo Pozzi began his career as a game journalist in the early 2000s while pursuing a B.A. in Journalism, Publishing, and Multimedia Communication in Milan. Co-founder of indie studio We Are Müesli, Matteo has also been working as a freelance screenwriter since 2006, mainly on sitcoms for Disney Channel Italy but also on different TV genres and ongoing productions, short formats, and branded content for several clients and channels. He also collaborated with the Italian service design company Logotel from 2008 to 2014 as a copywriter on communication projects and chief editor of Weconomy, an editorial platform about collaborative innovation and sharing economy. As a content editor, he took part in three collective exhibitions for the Milan Design Week (Making Together in 2012, (In)visible Design in 2013 and award-winning Timescapes in 2014) and contributed to the launch of Made in Lambrate (2014).

MEDIA COVERAGE: BUSINESS INSIDER

Su Business Insider, Candido Romano fornisce una panoramica dell'offerta in game design in Italia, spiegando com'è possibile trasformare una passione in professione.

Leggi l'articolo completo.

CALL FOR ARTWORKS: GAME ON! EL ARTE EN JUEGO 5TH EDITION (AUGUST 30, 2017)

Our Argentinian friends are currently working on the upcoming edition of one of Latin American best Game Art festivals, the Game on! El arte en juego in Buenos Aires, Argentina. This renowned event will feature, once again, an international section entirely devoted to art games, experimental games, non-games, serious games. This is exactly the kind of shows we encourage our students to submit their projects. And this is also where some of our professors, including Matteo Bittanti, have exhibited their work in the past. 

Applications for art games, experimental video games, non-games (including machinima, installations, interactive experiences, etc.) and serious games can be sent to the festival organizers by August 30, 2017.

Click here to begin the application process.

Game on! El arte en juego explores the connections and interactions between games, art and technology. Now in its fifth edition, the exhibition has been hosted in Buenos Aires' main cultural centers. Additionally, it has had a presence at various technology and arts festivals across many venues in Argentina. Focusing on the national videogame and new media arts scene, it also features a special section for international video games that explore the boundaries of art and games itself. The fifth edition of Game on! El arte en juego will be held at the C3 (Science Cultural Center) Buenos Aires, Argentina in December 2017.

LINK: Game on! El arte en juego

FACEBOOK: Game on! El arte en juego

EVENTO: GAME LOCALIZATION IN ITALIA (20 OTTOBRE 2017, IULM, MILANO)

Titolo: Le professioni del videogioco: la game localization in Italia.

Data: Venerdì 20 ottobre 2017.

Luogo: Aula dei 146, IULM 6, Via Carlo Bo, 7 20143 Milano.

Durata: 2 ore, dalle ore 10 alle ore 12.

Evento gratuito e aperto al pubblico.

Scopo e obiettivi dell’evento

L’espressione game localization identifica il processo di traduzione dei contenuti audio, video e testuali di un videogioco in differenti lingue nonché la sua complessa ricontestualizzazione culturale, espressiva ed artistica. Mercato in costante crescita da una decade a questa parte, la game localization ha trovato a Milano uno dei suoi poli internazionali. Per fare il punto della situazione su un comparto dell’industria videoludica talvolta sottovalutata dai mass media, l’università IULM ospita una tavola rotonda a cui parteciperanno i relatori delle più importanti società del settore. Uno degli obiettivi dell’incontro è illustrare i possibili percorsi formativi del localizzatore di videogiochi, discutendo, nello specifico:

• L’evoluzione del mercato della game localization nell’ultima decade.

• Presentazione delle aziende leader a livello nazionale e internazionale nonché delle possibili carriere.

• Struttura, ruoli e funzioni di un team di localizzazione;

• Iter di un progetto tipico di game localization, dal contatto con lo sviluppatore/publisher fino alla consegna del lavoro;

• Gli ostacoli che s’incontrano nel processo di localizzazione di un videogioco;

• Requisiti fondamentali nella ricerca di traduttori e revisori nelle società di localizzazione.

La tavola rotonda è aperta al pubblico e agli studenti della IULM, in particolare ai frequentanti della Facoltà di Interpretariato, Traduzione e Studi Linguistici e Culturali, agli operatori del settore, alla stampa specializzata e a chiunque abbia un interesse verso il videogioco. La tavola rotonda fornirà informazioni utili per intraprendere un percorso lavorativo nel settore della game localization. L'evento è moderato da Matteo Bittanti e presentato dal Master in Game Design della IULM. 

Speakers

Elena Cesana

In qualità di Regional HR Manager – Southern Europe di Keywords Studios, Elena gestisce il personale degli uffici di Milano, Roma, Barcellona, Madrid e Parigi della più grande società di game localization al mondo.

Marco Locatelli

Linguista e responsabile formazione di Binari Sonori, società del gruppo Keywords Studios con sede a Milano, Marco è da sempre appassionato di game localization, come dimostra la sua tesi di laurea sulla localizzazione di World of Warcraft.

Daniele Pastina

Con un’esperienza quasi decennale nel settore, Daniele è Localization Project Manager in Sillabit, società del gruppo Keywords Studios responsabile della localizzazione di recenti successi videoludici come Overwatch e Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare.

Simone Crosignani

Dopo un’esperienza giornalistica pluridecennale, Simone Crosignani ha lavorato nel settore marketing (Sony Computer Entertainment Europe), prima di unirsi a Keywords Studios, una delle principali aziende impegnate nella game localization. Dal 2016 lavora con Jinglebell.

EVENT: AURIEA HARVEY & PIETRO RIGHI RIVA AT THE NO QUARTER EXHIBITION IN NEW YORK

Two Professors from our Program will be presenting their latest projects at the prestigious No Quarter Exhibition in New York, alongside Alexander "Droqen" Martin and Kitty Horrorshow.

Now in its 8th year and curated by game designer (and new NYU Game Center faculty) Robert Yang, the No Quarter Exhibition celebrates ground-breaking visions and unique voices in game design.

The event will take place on November 3rd 2017 at Starr Space Gallery in Bushwick, Brooklyn. As Robert Yang wrote:

for the first time in the history of No Quarter, we are temporarily suppressing our vocal and insufferable belief in our city’s exceptionalism: this year, we are commissioning only artists based outside of New York City. We believe a wider diversity of backgrounds and identities can only enrich our understanding of art and community… oh, and it helps us make better games too.

Click here to know more about the No Quarter Exhibition

EVENT: IULM MASTER DAY (15 giugno 2017)

Vieni a scoprire il Master di Primo Livello in Game Design alla IULM di Milano il 15 giugno 2017! La presentazione - che sarà trasmessa in streaming sul canale YouTube di IULM - si svolgerà presso l'Aula Seminari dalle ore 16 alle 17, situata nel corpo centrale (IULM 1).

Ecco l'indirizzo:

Università IULM

Via Carlo Bo, 1

20143 Milano

Fermata metropolitana: Romolo MM2

Vi aspettiamo!

Di seguito, la presentazione completa: