Okay. So you’ve wrapped your head around the way-awesome new website. You’ve introduced yourself in the new forum — or maybe you’re just lurking, and that’s totally okay. And hey, maybe you’re even taking part in this month’s Game Making Adventure. That’s pretty cool. If only there were some regularly-scheduled event at which we could celebrate these things.

Welcome to the new MRGS website!

We’re super-psyched to be setting up in this new space — its new aesthetics are optimised for digital raster and optical enjoyment. Check out those scanlines!

Along with the redesign comes a brand new FORUM for his and her pleasure. Come on over and chat with local devs about devving, about the weather, about the Expos — anything and everything.

Are you excited? Are you electrified? If you answered “Yes” to at least one of these questions, seek a nearby earth-grounding terminal.

April has followed suspiciously quickly on March, which means it’s time for another annual April Meetup! This time around, we’re kicking it middle-school and heading back to our regularly-haunted haunt: L’Amère à boire, which we haven’t visited since our last annual January Meetup.

The Game Developers Conference is set to rock San Francisco next week, and to accommodate the sizable Montreal contingent that will be networking/recovering/contracting Swine Flu, we’ve pushed our regular meetup back to March 14th. Auspices were consulted, and the outlook is positive.

The Ides of March: synonymous with family fun and senate reform!

WHEN
Wednesday, March 14th, 19h30

WHERE
Foonzo, 1245 rue Drummond, (internet map).

Amazing things this weekend:

>>> NUIT BLANCHE // YU WA [GAMES/PEACE] <<<

Saturday Feb. 25, 17h00-03h00

La Société des arts technologiques (the SAT, you acronymophiles) is throwing a party for Nuit blanche Saturday night. Should your nightly perambulations carry you thither, stop on in for a refreshing beverage, dance-party melodies, and a place to sit down with some wall-projected video games. Video games! You like those, right?

[Schedule // Facebook]
 

>>> Pirate Kart Jam <<<

All weekend; Group jam Sunday Feb. 26, All day

Another year, another controversy-free Independent Games Festival. The recent IGF Pirate Kart was an incredible creative success with over 300 games submitted, and it’s happening again — just in time for this year’s Game Developers Conference!

This weekend, game jammers across North Dakota — and beyond! — are invited to participate in the 2012-in-One Glorious Developers Konference Kollection: to slam together with great gumption and ceremony as many crazy projects as the Internet can possibly hold, and unleash them on a possibly-suspecting San Francisco.

Meanwhile, we’ll be teaming up with sister groups in Ottawa and Toronto for a Tri-city-fecta of game jamming spamming. The jam lasts all weekend long, so hunkering down at home is one option — but jamming is best among friends. Let us know if and when and where you’re laying down your laptops, and we’ll see if we can’t all team up together for some in-person high-fiving game design action. Will there be live video streaming of the event, you ask? Anything can happen!

[More info.]

ALERT! ALERT! “FEBURRITO” HAS BEEN DECLARED ILLEGAL AND ALL MEXICAN FOOD-BASED PUNS AND PORTMANTEAUS ARE FORBIDDEN INDEFINITELY.

THE MEETUP FORMERLY KNOWN AS “FEBURRITO” WILL NOW BE REFERRED TO AS “A SOLEMN, STATE-APPROVED FEBRUARY GATHERING.”

FEBRUARY, THE MONTH OF LOVE. RESPECT YOUR FELLOW CITIZEN.

THIS MONTH’S MEETUP WILL TAKE PLACE AT FOONZO
(1245, rue Drummond, metro Peel)

Facebook event.

Mixcade! Get whisked away!

Mixcade! Videogames are cocktails, and we are your friendly bartenders.

Mixcade! These puns are getting pretty belaboured. Um… spoons… you’ll… get… stirred? No, already used that one…

Ah, whatever. There’s a videogame party happening next Sunday, and you’re invited!

The Mount Royal Game Society and Concordia’s TAG Research Centre present

MIXCADE

Sunday, February 5, 2012

4pm – 9pm

Concordia University Engineering & Visual Arts (EV) Building, Lobby
1515 rue Ste-Catherine O. (Metro Guy-Concordia) (map)

FREE

FEATURING:

At A Distance, Terry Cavanagh

Way, CoCo & Co

Swift*Stitch, Sophie Houlden

Forget-Me-Not, Nyarlu Labs

Johann Sebastian Joust, Die Gute Fabrik

Papo & Yo, Minority Inc.

And the triumphant return of
ARCADE ROYALE, Montreal’s indie games arcade cabinet

(Photo courtesy the ever-rockin’ Richard Flanagan)

If that’s not exciting enough, we have a few other surprises in store for you too. Stay tuned!

Facebook event.

MIXCADE: A SMOOTH BLEND

ALERT! ALERT! “FEBURRITO” HAS BEEN DECLARED ILLEGAL AND ALL MEXICAN FOOD-BASED PUNS AND PORTMANTEAUS ARE FORBIDDEN INDEFINITELY.

THE MEETUP FORMERLY KNOWN AS “FEBURRITO” WILL NOW BE REFERRED TO AS “A SOLEMN, STATE-APPROVED FEBRUARY GATHERING.”

FEBRUARY, THE MONTH OF LOVE. RESPECT YOUR FELLOW CITIZEN.

THE MEETUP VENUE IS NOW FOONZO
(1245, rue Drummond, metro Peel)

Facebook event.

=============================
ORIGINAL TRANSMISSION FOLLOWS
=============================

Burritos? Tacos? What’s the deal — ¿que’s the dillas?

With that successful mangling of not one but TWO languages, it’s time for another monthly meetup — and a surprising twist! A scheduling conflict! A dramatic reversal, a thematic upheaval! A different place with food and beer, where we will look at and discuss video games.

WHEN
Wednesday, February 1st, 19h30

WHERE
Burritoville, 2055 rue Bishop, top floor (internet map).

WHAT
You are presently jamming away at the Montreal variant of the Global Game Jam this weekend. Of course you are. You will make incredible and wondrous things! And we will play them!

All participants of the GGJ are invited to bring along their barely completed, hardly playtested, first-draft Jam games out for a celebration of all things hastily produced. Did you produce something hastily? Let us know down in the comments and we’ll play them all in an orderly fashion!

Come along and — taco in hand — we will sing the praises, and marvel at the wonders, of our amazing Global Game Jam lineup. Me gusta!

—-

Burritos? Tacos? Meetup? MENOUM.

Surprise! Ce mois-ci, un conflit d’horaire nous oblige à envahir un nouveau lieu avec nos discussions de jeux vidéo! Bouffe mexicaine, bière et pixels au rendez-vous.

QUAND?
Mercredi 1er février à 19h30

OÙ? – À vos crayons, il faut noter ceci!
Burritoville, 2055 rue Bishop, dernier étage

QUOI?
En ce moment même plusieurs d’entre nous participent au Global Game Jam. Profitons donc de l’occasion pour présenter les petites merveilles que vous aurez créé. Tous les participants de l’évènement sont invité à apporter le fruit de leur labeur! As-tu par bonheur fabriqué un jeu dans la hâte et la fatigue? Fais-le nous savoir dans les commentaires et nous les jouerons/testerons tous dans le désordre.

Allez, venez tous – un tacos à la main, une manette dans l’autre – nous chanterons des cantiques au rythme des pixels que vous nous présenterez. Me gusta!

ado.

Gladiators play test (Jan. 5)
If you’re in the downtown area tonight and want to see what’s going on in the indie board gaming scene in Montreal, Foonzo will be hosting a playtest of Gladiators, a new title from local video-game-industry-to-independent-board-game developers Geoff Rollins and Patrice Combatalade.

CUSEC and DemoCamp (Jan. 19-21)
The Canadian University Software Engineering Conference is a great opportunity to hear from and speak with software engineers from a wide range of backgrounds and industries. This year, Manveer Heir of BioWare Montréal will be speaking (among a long list of excellent presentations), and the conference is being sponsored in part by Riot Games (who are currently in the midst of a recruitment drive) — so, basically: video games! They are of interest. Relatedly, the CUSEC DemoCamp offers developers the chance to live-demo a work-in-progress; Norwegian Wood and other games have been shown rather successfully in the past. The application deadline for projects is Jan. 10, and thus many of you have several days of interesting programming ahead. Enjoy!

Global Game Jam (Jan. 27-29)
The Global Game Jam‘s 48 hours of international game development madness is approaching, and Concordia and l’ÉTS are co-ordinating on a jam site for Montreal participants. The plan is to accommodate up to 150 programmers/designers/artists/woodworkers/&c. for the duration; pre-made teams, randomly-generated teams, individuals, and floaters are all welcome, as are both digital and physical/board games. A URL with registration will be up shortly [EDIT: here it is!] — in the meantime, here is a list of different names for animal collectives, not counting the band Animal Collective.

Toy Company Festival (Feb. 10-12)
Local chiptune collective (“a linked-list of electronic musicians”?) Toy Company will be hosting a grand ole two-night shindig of 8-bit music, 16-bit dancing, and 93-bit revelry — more revelries than there are atoms in the observable universe. Local artists will be playing alongside special international guests, so not only is it contractually obligated to be a mad party, but it’s also a great opportunity to showcase the local game scene! Let’s make this explicit:
WE ARE LOOKING FOR GAMES.
If you’d like to make and/or showcase a game for the show, we want you to do that thing as well. The call is open for retro-aesthetic/lo-fi, easily-accessible games — preferably ones that are not dependent on audio, since the music, scientifically speaking, will be bumpin’. Contact us and make it happen.

salutation and end transmission.

Whoa now! A few too many Festivus grievances were aired and a couple extra auld langs may have been syned — we’ve been remiss in announcing our upcoming meetup! But hey, we know you fine folk keep all your first monthly Wednesdays free, so let’s get right to it: a meetup this week!

Let’s start off the new Gregorian year with a bang, or in style, or with some other indicator — indicators for all! Did you participate in Ludum Dare? Looking for partners in the upcoming Global Game Jam? Want to make a game for the upcoming Toy Company festival?

Convene // discuss // indicate! We consider it unlikely that you will regret it!

WHEN
Wednesday, January 4th, 19h30

WHERE
Brasserie Artisanale l’Amère à Boire, 2049 rue Saint-Denis, 3rd floor