Stars align. The moon eclipses. A goat (on a pole?) is born with two heads. It’s happening again… The fourth annual Hand Eye Society Ball returns on Saturday, September 22th!

After a year-long hiatus, Toronto’s fanciest video game party is back. A one-night celebration of the best in contemporary games and playful media, the Ball has been held at venues like the AGO and the Masonic Temple to sold-out crowds and fond memories: Solving cat puzzles with strangers, dancing to the Pokemon theme song in your most grown-up attire, or casting your vote in the mysterious Red Room to determine the fate of the world. This year, we take the fun to 918 Bathurst, a former Buddhist temple turned arts and culture sanctuary in Toronto’s Annex Neighbourhood.

Check out our recaps of the 2015 and 2016 events with photos and video for a glimpse of past parties. Ticket sales and other details will be announced first on our blog and monthly newsletter, so subscribe, follow us on Twitter and Facebook, and stay tuned! In the meantime, here are all the ways you can get involved…

Sponsor the Party

Do you run or work for a company that would like to increase its profile or give back to the community? We have a lot of exciting new ideas planned for 2019, and are raising funds with the future in mind! Your sponsorship will help enormously by making the HES Ball the best it can be, while also contributing towards our operations and community-building activities long after the party is over.

There are many ways to help out, from Studio Sponsorships to larger contributions that will help us cover things like venue and equipment rentals, food and drink, artist fees, and potentially even commissioned site-specific games. Shoot us an e-mail at ball@handeyesociety.com to start a conversation! We’re also keen to chat about in-kind sponsorships — donated/discounted alcohol/food or other services you may have to offer.

Sponsoring this event does not prohibit you from submitting your game for possible inclusion (see below), but it does not merit special consideration.

Submit Games

Each year for the Ball, we curate a new selection of local and international games designed to astound and delight. If you know of a game that you think would be suitable to the event — easy to pick up, short rounds, and games that are as much fun to watch as to play — please submit using the form below!

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Your submission can be a game you made, a game you love, or a game you’ve heard of but isn’t out yet (such as the crowd-favourite Cuphead in 2016). You might also choose to submit a custom build of your game that’s more suited to the party atmosphere of the event (adding an occult touch to the tabletop in Douglas Gregory’s Last One Standing), design an experimental way of playing an old favourite (Donut County‘s custom hole-based controller by Australian game designer Louis Roots), or a site-specific interactive piece (Annual General Mischief, pictured up top).

All selected games will receive a minimum $80 CAD artist’s fee.

What are we looking for?

For an idea of what we’ve selected in the past, check out announcements from previous Balls: 2015 A / 2015 B /  2016 A / 2016 B. As you can see, there’s a wide variety including cooperative and competitive multiplayer, surreal one-player experiences, VR, AR, physical movement-based games, and even interactive performances with a digital component — so please don’t hesitate to suggest anything!

Get Involved

Putting on a show like the Ball is quite the operation and involves a lot of moving parts, so we depend on the generous hard work of our volunteers to help things run smoothly. Some of the positions we’ll be looking to fill include:

• marketing and social media
• poster and flyer distribution
• tech assistant
• audio/visual documentation
• people with theatre/performance experience
• bartenders
• general volunteering (coat check, ticket and game attendants, line managers, etc.)
• acting experience — you never know!!

All positions include a free ticket to the event, and more involved roles include membership to the Hand Eye Society. If any of these appeal to you, please email our Volunteer Coordinator at volunteer@handeyesociety.com with specifics or fill out this handy form and check off “Hand Eye Society Ball” under the initiatives section. We’ll be in touch!

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Thanks to Dean Tomlinson and Paul Hillier for the HES Ball 2016 photography, and to Little Dada, Alanna Predko and Anthony Swan for the Red Room interactive performance as seen in the top image!