Happy holidays Hand Eye hooligans! If you don’t want to be one of the unlucky few Krampus chucks coals at, hobnob some eggnog at these socials and events. And if you get side-tracked, catch up with your bedraggled co-worker Google Calendar at the office holiday party. They’ll probably have some hot gossip about that jerk Jerry and will let you know about events when they are announced.

WHERE TO JAUNT – TORONTO GAME EVENTS

Saturday, December 5 to Sunday, December 6

Bit Bazaar is not at Bento Miso for the first time in probably forever. Bizarre, I know. Instead, enjoy the videogame arts market and zine fair at the Mattamy Athletic Centre (MAC) — or the Maple Leaf Gardens to you old-school patriots — this winter. Fifteen loonies per day, but you’ll get a crash course in the hottest indie games this cold season and can take part in Canadian Videogame Award festivities.

Bit Bazaar is part of Fanfest, which is kind of a big deal. Attendees will get to try Canadian and International games before their releases at the MAC, as well as take part in a few tournaments.

Sunday, December 6

Rounding out the weekend at the MAC is the sixth annual Canadian Videogame Awards. Many of our faves are up as finalists, from Metanet’s N++ to 13AM Games’ Runbow.

Saturday, December 12

We’re in for a Long Winter in Toronto. The infamous all-ages, pay-what-you-can inter-arts celebration will feature Fate Tectonics and Runbow, as well as Gardenarium maker Paloma Dawkins.

Wednesday, December 16

Get glitchy with Dames Making Games at their Shadytoy workshop. You’ll learn how to add glitch post-effects. Shadertoy’s website is really mesmerizing in an early Windows screensaver kind of way, heads-up if you love staring at both repetitively moving art and gloriously simple code. (No programming expertise necessary for this workshop too!)

Sunday, December 27

Grab your frenemy and head to Hotbox Cafe for Iceman Games’ Smash Doubles tournament. And if you’re inclined, whip out your Hand Eye Society card and get some discount games before the year ends.

WHERE TO HAUNT – SOCIALS AND MEETUPS

Tuesday, December 1

Try to stay calm, but TorontoVR will be play-testing Oculus Touch controllers at Globacore Headquarters. Starts at 5 p.m., but you might want to get there early. Virtual reality waits for nobody.  

Remember what I said about staying calm? Unreal Engine Toronto is doing a meetup inside of the TorontoVR meetup. Meetupception. Try not to DiCaprio squint too much when you’re there.

Saturday, December 12

Toronto Gaymers has a jolly case of Festivus, their holiday shindig at the Glad Day Bookshop. Starts at 7 pm.

Thursday, December 17

The Toronto Unity Developers are having a meetup at Uken Games, doors open at 6:30 p.m. Open demos, so feel free to bring your games.

The International Game Developers’ Association chapter at George Brown College will be holding a social with Finishline Games about starting out as an indie developer. Time and place TBA.

Wednesday, December 30

Last Torontaru monthly meetup of the year, so make it count. The Get Well, starting at 7 p.m.

#ICYMI

#Eaudezap – A couple Hand Eyers (Handeyians? Handeyed?) and I were zooming along when we passed Electric Perfume by. This recently opened arcade moonlights as an art gallery and part-times as an event venue, so their schedule’s packed with pop-ups; including pop-up laser dodging sessions, as people are wont to do in their free time. Would be wise to keep an eye out (but not too far, those lasers have no mercy.)

#EatPlayMingle – Or #StopDropRoll; apparently this year’s party and panel at George Brown College was so good attendance might have reached fire safety hazard levels.

#Wordplay – Writerly games dominated the reference library for another year. Check out our photos and recap of the day, or lurk in our Twitter for the livetweeting.

PAPER TRAILS – GAMING IN THE MEDIA

Former theScore e-sports editor Matt Demers did a Reddit AMA on working in the industry. Really great insight, plus his honesty about being a media professional is always refreshing. Ookpixels delivers yet another killer long-form, this time on the hard sell — games that make players scratch their heads when they come across them.

iPhone game Wonderland: A Solvitur Ambulando Mystery by our own Jim Munroe is like a playable podcast that will convince you walking around Toronto in this weather is worth it. Wonderland celebrated its launch party last month and has since gotten coverage from Boing Boing and Gamezebo.

MVP

This month’s MVP has gotta be you. We know you’ve been low-key about it, but you’ve been a tremendous source of support and community. Thanks for attending events like Wordplay or Society Ball. Thanks for volunteering for programs like Game Curious and hanging out with the next generation of game developers. Thanks for hitting up our pop-up arcades. Thanks for playing our games of the month and bearing through their accompanying essays. Thanks for creating the events that we get to hype up and writing the think pieces that make us hit pause. Thanks for mentioning us in your tweets. Thanks for being there, Toronto indie game community. Cheers to this year, and cheers to 2016.

A BREADWINNER IS YOU – JOBS, GIGS & OPPORTUNITIES

Wonderland’s looking to hire somebody to port iOS-based Wonderland, written in Swift, to Android. Email jim@nomediakings.org for details.

A Parisian game developer is organizing distance Jam, an international game-making jam from Dec. 12 to 20 that will take place entirely online. Jammers will have a chance to showcase their games at iG4mer at Paris in late January. Jammers must form teams of at least two and be a minimum of 100 kilometres apart.

Toronto Fringe Festival has launched crowdfunder Fund What You Can for all indie arts projects. Over $230,000 has been raised so far for 230 projects and they’ve got free workshops for campaigners.  fwyc@fringetoronto.com  

Sheridan students are looking for internships! Here’s their pitch: Would you like to hire a Sheridan Game Design student? Sheridan College Bachelor of Game Design is the only degree of its kind in Canada. The program is aimed at producing graduates who are skilled at game art and design as well as basic knowledge of programming and scripting. Course range from introductory and generalist studies of cinematography and sound design to more advanced studies in story, character development, game mechanics and AI.  Students have ample opportunity to prototype physical and digital games both as a component of their course work and also in Sprint weeks where immersive, game development for real-world companies are played out. The third year students are seeking a co-op for the January to April period. With 5 semesters of learning behind them, these coop students are prepared to take on the challenge of a range of jobs such as play testing, modelling, animating and documenting among many others. For small to medium size companies, our students will be asset because they possess a breadth of skills that can be applied to a range of tasks. For large companies, targeted jobs will be approaches with professionalism and depth of knowledge honed over three years of study. Contact Alice O’Carroll alice.ocarroll@sheridancollege.ca 905-845-9430, ext. 2756

Monthly digests are brought to you by the Hand Eye Society, a videogame arts and literacy organization based in Toronto. If you want to support round-ups like these and get in on more perks, become a Hand Eye member for the low price of your time, if you volunteer for 10 hours with us, or your money, with 7 bucks a month.   

if you want to see your game/event/initiative featured, let us know at calendar@handeyesociety.com, @handeyesociety or @gollydrat on Twitter! 8)