A one day festival for discussing, making and playing radical games.
The huge success of last year’s festival proved there’s still loads to explore at the intersection of games and progressive politics – from how we cooperate (or fight!), to how we plan and produce, to what kind of future we want to play in. After a year of mass redundancies in the games industry, record profits from studio giants, and a surge of union organising, Games Transformed 2024 is going to be a space for game workers and fans from around the country to come together to imagine something better!
This year we’ll be joined by some incredible guests, including Jonathan McIntosh, creator of the Pop Culture Detective YouTube channel with over 1 million subscribers, Marijam Did, gaming industry journalist who is releasing her new book Everything to Play For: How Videogames Are Changing the World this September, members of ACFM who will be hosting a live role playing experience, representatives from the IWGB and Limit Break will talk about the mass redundancies and studio closures in the gaming industry, and IWGB will run a trade union Organising 101 workshop.
The theme of this year’s festival is No War But Class War!
From adverts that emulate first-person shooters, to Fortnite maps and eSport teams, Discord servers and Twitch channels – the British Army is gamifying its recruitment practices and targeting teenagers in the UK’s gaming community. It’s time to fight back. We’re focusing on anti-war and anti-imperialist ideas in games and we’re partnering with anti-war organisations to encourage people to make counter-recruitment games for our three-week game jam. Last year the winners of the jam worked with us to create a custom arcade cabinet that was showcased at The World Transformed festival. This year a jury will select a videogame to be turned into an arcade cabinet and a boardgame to be turned into a quality print edition. Both will be revealed in a direct action targeting the British Army’s recruitment drive.
If you want to contribute game ideas in the lead up to the festival, use this link to join the three week game development hack: https://itch.io/jam/gt24
Hope to see you there! Everyone is welcome!