Thanks for a great May social!

A recap of our May 2013 Speaker Social — from Mother, May I? presentations to Junicorn announcements.

May 27, 2013

We had a blast at our monthly Speaker Social on Saturday! Ten participants and teams presented games made during the previous weekend’s Mother, May I? jam to a packed house of 70 members and friends of Dames Making Games!

  • Alex Bethke and his mom, Kathryn Grimbly, showed off a polished version of their beautiful and atmospheric Brother Nature, a puzzler designed for the iPad.
  • Maggie McLean, Christine Brual, and Erica Gregory (first timer!) demoed the delightful Hibiki’s Dokidoki Room Cleaning Day, a time-based chore sim.
  • Hannah Epstein had the crowd in tears with Doubt Cloud, a game about struggling with the meaninglessness of game development.
  • Leisha-Marie Riddel, Yuliya Boublikova, and Alex Wong’s Mean Cuisine is an adorable cooperative game about racing around a kitchen to put together orders for diner customers.
  • Fans of Katie Foster’s The Disappearance of Emily Butler were in for a treat. She talked about ongoing development of her game about Newfoundland, and demoed a sketch of the game’s second level.
  • Soha El-Sabaawi (another first-timer!) & Beth Maher presented Sprout, a unique interactive game about a tiny magical family living in old photographs.
  • Special guest Samantha Allen showed off Alpaca Run, an indie sensation developed with Joseph Culp, Guy Conn, and Cameron Kunzelman. She wrote and performed the music, a catchy They Might Be Giants-esque tune integral to the gameplay.
  • Budd Royce Lam demoed Mother, May I?, a very creepy 3D platformer created with Tiffany Low Foon and Emma Burkeitt.
  • Cecily Carver showed us The Playground her Rogue-like (-like?) about a toddler’s playground escape (watch out for those Smart Bullies!).
  • Damian Sommer wowed everyone with the simple genius of his file-system-based dungeon crawler, Folder Quest.



Junicornees

This month, we received more applications than ever for a DMG program. But we could only select a small number to participate in Junicorn, due to the nature of our structured four-week incubator program. We reviewed applications through a blind process, aiming for as diverse a group as possible in terms of interests, background, and experience. We wished we could have said “yes” to every single one — the applications were all so excellent — but ultimately narrowed the group down to 10 Dames.

We’ll be posting recaps of all the sessions right here — plus at least one participant will be blogging her experience creating her first game. If you’re Twitter-inclined, follow this list of 9 of the 10 participants!

  • Carly Beath
  • Linda Boden
  • Kat Verhoeven
  • Daniele Hopkins
  • Natalie Zina Walschots
  • Daniella Armstrong
  • Kara Stone
  • Vass Bednar
  • Izzie Campbell
  • Hisayo Horie

Mother, May I? — and future jams

We had such a great time at the jam on May 18-19. Everyone — even the brave first-time gamemakers — produced an interesting, complete sketch of a game. Interested in participating in future member jams? Join DMG, and make sure you’re on our mailing list to be the first to know when the next one is announced!

Cecily Carver, Maggie McLean, and Christine Love looking cute… but tuff