The Brazilian games industry has taken to the streets of San Francisco for 2019’s Game Developers Conference to showcase their passion and ingenuity for the world to see.

Brazil Games has assembled a troupe of 120 talented industry professionals from over 47 different video game businesses to represent their country’s prowess in the digital arts. Brazil Games GDC 2019 highlight reel demonstrates the diversity and expertise of the coalition.

Brazil Games, a partnership between Brazilian Game Companies Association, ABRAGAMES, and Apex-Brasil (Brazilian Trade and Investment Promotion Agency), was created with the goal to promote the Brazilian gaming industry and enable its worldwide success. They have formed a vast network of video game businesses specialized in a wide spectrum of disciplines including software and external development for consoles, mobile, PC, VR, Liveops, PR/marketing, transmedia, audio and indie game design. Brazil Games reaches its peak every year in June when Sao Paulo becomes the heart of the Indie Game scene in Latin America during the BIG festival, Brazil’s Independent Game Festival, held this year from June 22 to June 30, 2019

The Brazilian delegation is bound to heat up the show floor alongside a setlist packed with awesome games. Two of the games in Brazil’s lineup, Relic Hunters Legend (Rogue Snail) and DeMagnete VR (BitCake Studio), have already won awards as GDC’s Best In Play Finalists. A third game, Areia (GILP Studio), earned a spot in Best In Play’s Honorable Mention category. Additionally, two more Brazilian games, Trial of Titans (Oktagon Games) and Talaka (Flux Games), have been selected to take part in GDC Pitch, a chance for games to present themselves to the international game community for investors and publishers to help them achieve their potential.

The delegation has also taken theInternational Mobile Gaming Awardsby storm. No less than six games have each been nominated to receive an award at this year’s gathering. These games: Dandara (Long Hat House), Lila’s Tale (Skullfish Studios), Looney Tunes World Of Mayhem (Aquiris Game Studio), Tetragon (Cafundo creative studio), Hoppia Tale (Ludic Side Game Studio), and Until Dead (Monomyto Game Studio) are all running for IMGA’s prestigious awards.

Crystal League

Finally, two more games are being considered for recognition at the Game Connection America Awards. Crystal League (Flipstar Studios) has been nominated for the “Best Social Game” category while Spaceline Crew (Cofeenauts) has been nominated for both “Best Casual Game” and “Most Promising IP”.

“The recognition our studios and developers are receiving is absolutely indicative of the investment we put in our products, our country, and each other. We are extremely happy to be able to share the success of our companies with the world and create strong, lasting relationships with the international gaming community”, says Eliana Russi, Brazil Games executive director.

Thirteen companies from the Brazilian Games delegation will be present at GDC Play this year. As mentioned, many of them have been nominated for awards and a few have already won theirs.

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The National Association of Software and Services Companies today announced that India’s premier games development conference, the NASSCOM Game Developer Conference 2015 will take place from November 5th – 7th, 2015 in Pune, India at The Westin.

Featuring over 1300 industry delegates, 70 speakers, 50 games, an Expo promoting Indian video games and a dedicated day for workshops, the three day conference showcases the creative talent and upcoming industry trends in interactive entertainment in India. NGDC has also opened their Call for Speakers and early bird registrations for the conference.

“The NASSCOM Game Developer Conference 2015 in Pune, is this year’s most important Indian gathering of indie and games development studios”, said Rajesh Rao, Chairman of that NASSCOM Gaming Forum, “We are incredibly excited to announce that the NASSCOM Game Developer Conference 2015 will return on November 5th – 7th, with a truly international and domestic speaker line-up, a home-grown games expo and delegates from games developers throughout India and beyond”.

The 2015 speaking agenda will feature two days of dedicated tracks focused on Indies, Game Design, Publishing/Advertising, Game Art and Technology.

Previous speakers at NGDC 2015 have included Ed Fries, Yoichi Wada, Trip Hawkins, Rami Ismail and Ian Livingstone. Those interested in becoming a speaker at NGDC 2015 can now submit their presentation proposals for review.

Speakers will receive a free pass to the show and excellent exposure at India’s premier games development conference. Speaker submissions for NGDC 2015 will be open until 31st July 2015. Those interested can begin the submission process by visiting here.

The NGDC 2015 Expo will give Indian developers and publishers, the opportunity to showcase their games throughout the conference on the expo floor and is increasing its size to promote 50 plus Indian games. The NGF 2015 Awards will also recognise achievements in Indian games development and encourage the creation of building original IP in India. To submit a game for the Expo visit here.

The post Calling Indie Developers to NASSCOM 2015 appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

EA Australia hosted an E3 2015 replay at the Standard Bowl in King’s Cross last night to promote their upcoming games for 2015 and into 2016.

Attendees were treated to a special screening of the press conference, including a special introduction from the Australian EA CEO, and from the Matilda’s, one of whom will be on the cover of FIFA 2016 with Lionel Messi.

Read on below for some of the biggest highlights of their press conference.

First up Mass Effect is back. EA showed the newest entry into the franchise, Mass Effect: Andromeda in a brief clip to attendees, receiving a hearty response from the audience. Not much is known about the newest game in the series, but it looks to be more of what gamers have loved from the series. For once the term “epic” seems appropriate at E3.

EA’s flagship car game, Need for Speed is getting a reboot. After the disappointing Need for Speed: Rivals the series is stepping back, taking stock and moving in a new direction.

The reboot is focusing more on the urban car culture elements of previous entries, specifically about customising cars, and racing with friends in style against the law. The game’s video looked impressive and if the graphical fidelity of the demonstration can be maintained across consoles it will be a worthy entry into the increasingly-crowded car racing genre.

An extremely nervous Swedish man announced Unravel, a side scrolling platformer that looks to have similarities to Nintendo’s upcoming Yoshi’s Wooly World. Unravel seems to have more complex, physics-based puzzles though and perhaps a more mature theme to the story and gameplay, so it’s a game I’m extremely interested in checking out.

In one of the more exciting announcements of the night another reboot, that of Mirror’s Edge; Mirror’s Edge Catalyst was announced. More of an origin story for protagonist Faith, it looks to incorporate the same parkour mechanics of its predecessor without the gun violence that always felt a bit unfaithful to the main character’s persona.

In a sequel that nobody expected and perhaps nobody was really asking for, a follow-up to last year’s underplayed Plants vs Zombies: Garden Warfare has been announced: Plants vs Zombies: Garden Warfare 2. If you’ve ever wondered what was happening on the Zombie side of Plants vs Zombies then this is the game for you. Instead of the focus being on the plants,

Before the official FIFA 16 announcement there was a lengthy and awkward conversation with football legend Pele, which was a shame because FIFA 16 seems to bring with it some real enhancements, least of all is the inclusion of women in teams for the first time in the franchise’s history. This game will be bought and played by millions and the inexorable advanced in technology in this sort of game are always welcome.

Star Wars Battlefront finished up the presentation and was undoubtedly the highlight of the night. Despite the complaints on the internet about what isn’t in the game compared to its predecessors what was in the trailer was tense, fast paced and extremely good looking.

It was good to see the game introduced by a woman, breaking up the monotony of pale white men. Again, this was pre-rendered footage of pre-release code, so take everything you saw with a grain of salt.

But if EA can truly deliver what they promise with this game it will be a highlight of the entire year’s gaming calendar.

So the E3 conference is what you expected it would be. Sequels, reboots, attempts at pressing the same nostalgia buttons that Nintendo has hammered at for the last ten years.

With some of the biggest game series in its vaults now, EA looks to continue mining them for years to come. Nevertheless, quirky games such as Unravel, though admittedly an indie game simply published by EA, demonstrate the company is looking outside its comfortable AAA staples.

EA’s a bit like a Mazda 3, safe, reliable and everywhere.

The post EA Australia’s E3 Press Conference appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

For those of you unaware, Besthesda had its first ever conference at E3 this year.

Fortunately, they started with quite some flare. As many fans have been waiting for it, Bethesda finally showcased some serious Doom gameplay and it was spectacular.

The gameplay looked very solid with many weapons shown off resulting in a great amount of gore and disembowelment of a large array of enemies. The visuals were stunning and the world shown was just as impressive blending an interesting combination of science fiction and supernatural themes.

There were also a few other aspects showcased including the arena style multiplayer, similar to Halo. The bigger and more unique idea they were putting forward in this regards was SnapMap which is a game and Level editor. In SnapMap players can easily create and modify their own playing fields and game modes. The small section shown appeared easy to use while allowing a good amount of modification.

Bethesda announced this bad boy to be released early 2016 world wide. Their overall showing of Doom was impressive and somewhat surprisingly for me was easily the highlight of their event.

BattleCry Studios showcased their first ever game, named, would you believe, BATTLECRY.

This third person team based multiplayer action game is a new IP for Bethesda. Unfortunately the small snippet of the game shown off did not exactly leave us blown away. The combat looked lacking and there was nothing else about the game that looked particularly exciting. The game is still in development however so there is still time for that to change. If you are interested in giving the game a go, a worldwide Beta will take place this year.

One prediction I had for Bethesda’s E3 was Dishonoured 2 and as luck would have it, it was officially announced. (Win for Jude).

An intriguing cut-scene introduced the game showing events fifteen years on from the first Dishonoured. The world is thrown back into chaos by troublesome men. One new aspect was the choice of playing as one of two characters. Each character has their own unique gadgets, abilities and weapons.

Staying on a similar note Dishonoured Definitive Edition was also announced including all current DLC for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. The game is set for release in August 2015 and if you haven’t played the game previously, I would definitely recommend you pick it up this time around.

Another prediction I had going was new content for The Elder Scrolls Online, which was shown, to my excitement. With the launch of The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited on the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 it only made sense to be providing more content for new players.

Some DLC mentioned included ‘Fallen Tamriel Capital’ and a ‘Realm of Orcs’. While we didn’t get to see too much of this upcoming content, as a fan of ESO, I’m excited to get my hands on it.

While we were hoping for a slightly bigger title release from the Elder Scrolls series we were happily surprised with a strategy card game instead, The Elder Scrolls: Legends. Not much was shown but the idea is welcomed. The Elder Scrolls: Legends will available on PC and iOS although hopefully more platforms will be announced soon.

Lastly, Bethesda’s most well covered title of the conference, Fallout 4. The initial showcase revealed a lot of concept art displaying the large amount of work and detail that went into the planning of this game and also offered glimpses of what to expect.

They also showed off parts of the intro sequence which showcased some interesting features of the game including the ability to choose a male or female character, a detailed character customisation screen, your dog companion, Pip-Boy (the in-game gadget that basically acts as the Menu) and the combat system.

While I wasn’t the biggest fan of the combat system in Fallout 3, I was somewhat optimistic about what they showed off. It also gave some glimpses about the story.

Bethesda also showcased more detailed sections of the game focusing on customisation and crafting.

Throughout the world there are several areas featured where you are able to build and customise your own town. This was involved building, demolishing and customising house’s rooms as well as providing food and protection for your people.

The level of detail of this aspect of the game seemed very extensive while remaining simple. The feature will not be mandatory but it is something that Bethesda seemed quite proud of and definitely something that appeals to me. Likewise the customisation of weaponary as well was another focus showing the almost ridiculous number of combinations and level of customisation available in game.

Fallout 4 is due for release on the 10th of November, 2015 which should have many fans already clearing out their current Christmas plans.

Another Fallout game was also announce called Fallout Shelter.

While the game is a free to play mobile game, something that would normally lose my attention immediately, it actually looked very interesting. The game revolves around looking after a group of people in a vault, drawing on influences from many games, most notably for me XCOM. The game launched at the end of the conference for iOS. No word was given about an Android or Windows Phone release.

Bethesda managed to show us some really impressive games, unfortunately not too many surprises as such, but an exciting line up all the same. From Doom to Fallout 4 we have good amount of things to look forward to from Bethesda in the near future.

Stay with us while we have more exclusive E3 2015 coverage coming!

The post Bethesda E3 Conference 2015 appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

Shane the Gamer’s Grant and Jude Cheetham are now stateside getting ready to give you all the inside information directly from E3 in LA.

As they prepare for what is likely to be an epic few days of hot new announcements, Grant and Jude have taken some time out to give us their predictions on what the major publishers are going to reveal at their respective upcoming E3 press conferences.

The E3 pre-show events start with an exclusive Bethesda press conference on Sunday 15th June(12:00 Noon AEST / June 15 – 2:00pm NZST). While Bethesda doesn’t own very many franchises compared to some of the other big publishers, the high quality of the ones they do own more than makes up for it.

Fallout 4 has just been announced so some gameplay footage or a lengthy teaser trailer would be expected.  Their upcoming Doom title has also been confirmed to make an appearance. As they have decided to hold a whole conference this year you can expect that they will have many more titles to shown off.

Grant’s Bethesda predictions: 

• NewDishonoured announced
• Skyrim coming to new generation consoles
• New Skyrim spin-off announced in development by a different developer

Jude’s Bethesda predictions: 

• Major ESO Expansion/DLC announced
• Dishonoured 2 announced for next year
• Morrowindremake/reboot

On Monday 16th of June (2:30am AEST / 4:30am NZST) Microsoft will be kicking things off at the Microsoft media briefing. Microsoft is potentially in one of the worst positions for E3 this year. This is not because they don’t have games to show but rather have already revealed a large amount so it will be hard to fit in a lot of surprises. On their previously-announced-but-still-coming list is Fable: Legends, Scalebound, Halo 5: Guardians, Tomb Raider, Crackdown, Quantum Break, Forza 6, Gears of War and Phantom Dust.

It would be expected that most of these games will be shown off in some form during their conference.

One possibly very exciting or disappointing thing to expect this year is Rare’s new game which will be revealed. With Kinect in the forgotten basket and reviving old IP the current rage, Rare’s new game has the potential to get many old fans excited or leave them in tears.

A Gears of War remaster is all but confirmed due to a number of leaks and rumours. It would be expected that this game, if it does exist, will be there. Showing off the new entry in the series, in development by Black Tusk, may be a bit of a stretch as it could be too early in development.

Another area of focus for Microsoft not prevalent at previous E3’s is PC. With Windows 10 coming up and various statements from them about how they are more committed to PC gaming, don’t be surprised to hear PC and Windows 10 mentioned at various stages.

Grant’s Microsoft predictions: 

• Rare announces a new BanjoKazooie (and I cry due to excitement)
• Old Rare IP will be revived by someone other than Rare
• Rise of Nations announced for PC.

Jude’s Microsoft predictions: 

• HD Remake/remaster of Conkers Bad Fur Day
• Fable 1-3 collection announced
• New Battletoads by Rare

EA Games’ conference is also on Monday 16th of June (6:00am AEST / June 16 – 8:00am NZST). One of the more recent exciting developments at EA was the rights to develop Star Wars games. Last year we saw the first glimpse of that with the reveal of a new Star Wars: Battlefront game.

Hordes of fans have been waiting for this sequel for a very long time and it is due for release later this year. This year expect to see more of Battlefront and possibly more Star Wars instalments with BioWare and Visceral Games both confirmed to be working on a StarWars titles.

Another highly anticipated EA game, Mass Effect 4, is also due to have some footage shown off. Mirrors Edge 2 should also make an appearance. Lastly we can be sure that the yearly sports releases will be another huge focus for EA.

Grant’s EA Games predictions: 

• Mass Effect 1-3 remaster on new generation consoles
• Star Wars RPG announced in development byBioWare, fans go wild.
• New Crysis game

Jude‘s EA Games predictions:

• Knights of the Old Republic III by BioWare
• Dead Space 4 announced
• Plants v. Zombies RPG

Again, on Monday 16th of June(8:00am AEST / June 16 – 10:00am NZST), Ubisoft will be revealing their slate of games to the world at their press conference.

Ubisoft, as a developer and publisher have a lot of titles under their belt. They don’t always hit the mark but they have come out with a few beauties, Far Cry 3 and Assassins Creed: Black Flag for instance. Currently we should look forward to seeing more news on Good and Evil 2, Tom Clancy’s The Division and another Tom Clancy title Rainbow Six: Siege.

We can’t overlook the obvious as Assassins Creed Syndicate is also sure to make an appearance.

Grant’s Ubisoft predictions: 

1. Assassin’s Creed 1-3 released for new gen consoles
2. New Prince of Persia game
3. Child of Light 2

Jude’s Ubisoftpredictions: 

1. Driver title announced for next gen consoles
2. Watch Dogs 2Announced
3. New Trials game announced

The E3 pre-show excitement continues with Sony’s Conference later on Monday 16th of June (11:00am AEST / June 16 – 1:00pm NZST).

Sony’s current holiday 2015 line-up is lacking some big blockbusters due to Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End getting pushed back. Fret not though as they have a few studios with cards still left up their sleeves. I expect to see some big announcements this year from Sony from their first party studios.

Project Morpheus, Sony’s Virtual Reality headset, is due for release soon and Sony will be sure to try and sell it to us. Expect to see lots of references to Project Morpheus throughout their conference.

There are of course already a few announced titles we will likely see including Gran Turismo 7, Persona 5, Until Dawn, No Mans Sky and my personal favourite, the re-imagining of the original Ratchet and Clank for PlayStation 4.

I also have my fingers crossed for some news on The Last Guardian which has been in development since 2007. Despite many nefarious rumours about the cancellation of this game Sony, earlier this year, confirmed it is still in development.

Grant’s Sony predictions: 

1. No major first party dev will be announced as working on a Project Morpheus game
2. New Jak & Daxter game on PS4
3. The Last Guardian announced for release in 2015

Jude’s Sony predictions:

1. New God of War Title announced
2. Resistance 4 teaser trailer
3. Last Guardian Release date announced

Nintendo will be spilling the beans early on Tuesday 17th of June (2:00am AEST / June 17 – 4:00am NZST). It’s really hard to know what to expect from Nintendo. They generally play their own game ignoring logical steps and what other people are doing around them. This is very much reflected in the fact that they don’t do a conference, instead they opt for their online stream ‘Nintendo Direct’. They have a new Star Fox, Zelda and Fire Emblem game coming up which they will be sure to showcase.

Grant’s Nintendo predictions: 

1. New Pokemon Wii U game
2. New Metroid Wii U game
3. New Zelda game for 3DS

Jude’s Nintendo predictions: 

1. Pokémon Z announced for release this year
2. Pokemon game announced for Wii U
3. New Professor Layton Title announced

Straight after Nintendo, on Tuesday 17th of June, Square Enix will be holding their E3 Conference (3:00am AEST / June 17 – 5:00am NZST).

Square Enix are responsible for a wide variety of games all of which I am happy to say I generally love. We can look forward to more coverage of Kingdom Hearts 3 and possible gameplay footage from Final Fantasy XV.

They do have a good size list of already announced games to show off; Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, Just Cause 3, Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness, Hitman 6 and the next Tomb Raider instalment being among some of the others.

Grant’s Square Enix predictions: 

1. Old Final Fantasy game remastered for new consoles
2. Final Fantasy XV coming to PC
3. New Thief game announced

Jude’s Square Enix predictions: 

1. New JRPG IP for 3DS
2. New Tomb Raider spin off announced
3. Kingdoms Hearts 1-3 Remaster on new gen consoles

Well, that’s all from Grant and Jude until next week when they will be reporting back direct from E3 2015 in Los Angeles. Be sure to check back.

The post Our Predictions for E3 2015 appeared first on Shane the Gamer.