Thursday Night is Community Night

but the show's getting pretty stale, so screw that. Let's watch someone talk about the indie gaming community instead.

Things to take note of before watching:

• Independent game developers take pride in calling themselves indie. Indie is equivalent to "DIY LO-FI FO LYFE!!1!" (mmMMm, HELLZ YEA).
• SNES = Super Nintendo Entertainment System. It's a gaming console from back in the 90s.
• Farmville is the definitive "social game" by Zynga and can be played on Facebook. The term "social gaming" has taken on a very negative and dirty connotation with indies. These games are viewed as lacking in actual gameplay, and instead, hide away unlockable items and content behind how many friends you've invited or how long you've played both of which generate ad revenue. The mass appeal though is that players can then customize and dress up their avatars or their farms or their pets with this unlockable content and then share it with their friends or anyone else on the internet.
• Sleep is Death is an interactive storytelling game by Jason Rohrer. It requires two computers, two copies of the game, and a network connection between them. Player A plays the "storyteller" who has complete control over the characters, scenes, and areas that Player B interacts with. Player B explores this world and communicates with the in-game characters by typing (to PlayerA). Player A then responds or takes an action or changes the scene entirely, and then it's Player B's turn again to explore and take an action. Both players work together to push the story in whatever they want. Think of it is as improvisational theater as gameplay. (BUY AND PLAY THIS GAME ALREADY)

TIGJam Talks (uncut) - Timothy Fitz from IndieGame: The Movie on Vimeo.

This is a clip taken from IndieGame: The Movie which is a documentary that is supposed to be released sometime this year. They have a bunch of clips, talks, and interviews on both youtube and vimeo that you guys should definitely check out.