Gain Exp. At Tonight’s Social

Hello! By now you should all be aware of tonight’s Hand Eye Society Social (details here, but: Unit Bar, 1198 Queen West, doors 7 p.m., presentation 8 p.m.). In an entirely unsanctioned by the event hosts (Capy/Superbrothers) kind of way, I just want to note that I’ll have a few copies of issue minus one of my video game ‘zine, exp., in my bag with me if anyone wants a copy. It’s a mere $5 for 32 pages of fairly unusual video game writing, with articles including Punch Out!! (A failed poem), Metal Gear Ac!d (An absurdly complex DIY boardgame for one), and Red Faction Guerrilla (A dream of a spaceship).

The issue I’ll have with me is the second edition of the issue I sold at Canzine (next to the Torontron, see here) and completely failed to announce at the time, so if you already own a copy, huzzah! and you don’t have to bother picking it up again (unless all the original spelling mistakes and grammatical errors annoy you.)

Anyway, if you see me around and want a copy, just ask (I am the dude next to the magazines in the previously-linked coverage). And if you want one but aren’t coming to the social (for shame!) you can buy online here. Thanks!

PAX East Roadtrip 2010

Since a bunch of us are going to PAX East in Boston this year, why not all go together and make it an epic roadtrip? Fast food, car farts and interminable boredom await… not to mention car-to-car WiFi gaming battles!

The plan is to stop in Rochester and check out NCHEG, the National Center for the History of Electronic Games (ncheg.org), nerd out, grab dinner and possibly drink too much. The next morning we’ll finish the drive and be at PAX for the weekend before returning Sunday.

If that sounds interesting, fill out the survey below. It’s just to see if people are down, no commitment at this point… if there’s enough people we’ll plan it out. And if you have ideas or questions, post up a comment.

Survey: http://www.surveygizmo.com/s/237061/pax-east-roadtrip-2010

first social of 2010 is… Thursday Feb 11th***

To the distinguished membership of the Hand Eye Society: apologies for this double-post (reason: it’s complicated), please note that the corrected date for this event is Thursday, February 11th 2010. ***

For the fifth Hand Eye Society Social, the first of 2010, we are preparing a brief audiovisual presentation intended to thrill & amuse. Hosted by Mr. Nathan Vella of Toronto’s own Capy, a studio that has recently released a couple of thingamjigs for Sony & Nintendo’s machines, the presentation will include glimpses at two types of blinking lights offered by two dudes with beards:

Firstly, Mr. Kris Piotrowski, born in Poland & raised in Cuban Missile Ssauga, a former Ryerson film student and currently creative director at one of them independent videogame studios located here in Toronto, will be presenting for the first time a (hopefully) crazybananas Wiiware project called ‘Heartbeat’, while attempting to explain some learnings from its roundabout design process.

Secondly, Mr. Craig D. Adams, born on Canada’s west coast & living in Toronto since the turn of this 21st century, will be presenting a three-way collaborative project named ‘Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP’, described as a brave experiment in I/O cinema for Apple’s touchtronic machines featuring 1) the remarkable pixel artwork of Superbrothers, an ambiguously pluralized & irritatingly cryptic art & design organization known for the occasional published pixel illustration & a few DIY videogame efforts at ToJam & with the AGI plus 2) the soulful soundz of Toronto’s Jim Guthrie, the Juno nominated recording artist known for using a PSone as a drum machine & sequencer to make marvelous music 3) the engineering capabilities & videogame design prowess of the fine & noble folks at Capy.

These two projects, still deep in development and up until now all but unseen, will be making what is effectively their world premiere at this free presentation and social event at Unit Bar on Queen West in Toronto on February 11th. Doors will open & beers will be available from 19:00 EST and the half-hour presentation itself will begin at 20:00 EST (otherwise known as eight o’clock in the evening).

Afterwards the entire Heartbeat & S:S&S EP teams, including Mr.Jim Guthrie, will be on-hand for chit-chat, poutine or what-have-you.

*** It has been reported by members of the Hand Eye Society that, due to a rare bug with Safari, Mozilla & all internet browsers other than Netscape Explorer v1.7, the date of the next social was incorrectly displayed in a recently published post & in the promotional images on handeyesociety.com & everywhere else on the internet too.

The correct date for the next social is in fact Thursday February 11th 2010. For real. The 11th. ELEVEN. TEN PLUS ONE. (NOT THE FOURTH). We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this confusion may have caused.

DS Gaming Night Tonight

Oh hai!

So a while ago my friend Scott (the voice actor from Night of The Cephalopods), and I used to throw regular DS nights in bars, then we all got busy and things got put on the back burner. But we decided to start it up again for 2010.

We’ll be having a DS night tonight (Wednesday the 13th), from 7pm until around 1am at The Central over at 603 Markham Street.

More details can be found on Facebook

Feel free to drop in and play a round!

Social #5: The World Premiere of Something Cool

At:
the Unit Bar
1198 Queen St W.
MAP
the unlabelled bar next to the pawnshop, which is next to the Gladstone

On:
November 26th, 2009.
7PM

Let’s:
Smash talk the trash and video games what?

Seriously:
Pekko Koskinen,
from FINLAND, designer of two IGF award winning games Dragonfly Variations and Spawns of Deflebub, as well as co-creator of TOJam game Flowers of Error

and Shawn McGrath,
from EVERYWHERE, creator of Chain3 for iPhone, as well as ToJam favourites Xiq and A Game About Bouncing

Together they secretly collaborate on an unannounced project, Dyad, making this social the WORLD PREMIERE of their new game.  Watch a demonstration of the game and then a break down of design concepts showing an evolution from THIS to THIS.  Afterwards, ask Pekko how he choregraped a dance using shoot-em-up game rules, and ask Shawn about how awesome it was to have Tetsuya Mizuguchi (producer of Rez, Lumines, Space Channel 5) play his game.

As coleslaw, or corn-bread, but ultimately depending on blood sugar levels, Jon Mak (Everyday Shooter guy) may present old, abandoned prototypes of games he and Shawhan (I Am Robot and Proud guy) worked on.

COME and BRING ALL FRIENDS.