Norwich Game Expo 2013

Yesterday I was in Norwich all day showcasing a game to the public for the Norwich Game Expo 2013. This was the first time I have ever showcased a game at a public event, so naturally I was very excited and it was an awesome opportunity for me.

Setting up

 

The game I showcased was something I made in 24 hours for a game jam early this year for Game Hack 2013 with Sam Amantea-Collins.The game is called Scrappy Chappies, I wont go into too much detail as I plan to do a full postmortem on the game relatively soon so I'll leave a gameplay video for those who are interested.

You can also download the game for FREE here: link

I was given a table in the corner of the expo to myself where I had my monitor and keyboard set up with Scrappy Chappies running from my laptop. On both sides of my monitor I had help cards showing the controls for players 1 & 2 in case people were confused - and a card explaining how to reset the score on top.

I noticed that a lot of people were quite shy and would just watch at first - if I didn't ask people 'would you like to play?' then they wouldn't. So I was pretty much on my feet all day, telling people all the details about the game and myself. The game seemed fairly accessible to a wide variety of different people which was nice. Both girls and boys young and old played and enjoyed it, one girl said she couldn't wait to download it and play her little brother at it which was really wonderful to hear.

These guys played over 200 rounds!

The feedback I received on the game was very positive, everyone who played it laughed or had a big grin on their face which was really encouraging. No one seemed to have trouble with the controls and a couple of people came back to play more than once! Players also seemed to stick around and play for a really long time I don't think anyone played for any less than 10 minutes, which was really cool to watch.

The press even took a couple of photos of people playing the game which was exciting. The game is quite photogenic as players are sharing a keyboard and were often laughing with the game. Doing this gave me a lot of confidence in my ability to make games, I was blown away by the amount of people who played the game, and the day far exceeded my expectations as the game got far more attention and positivity than I could have imagined.