Play Finland’s Weekly Newsletter
In this report we will combine week 16/2020 from the Finnish Game Industry.
News are gathered from the Play Finland group posts during the week. That is why we recommend you to post by yourself (however not flood) your Finnish Game Industry related news to the group. It also guarantees that your news will be visible in the weekly newsletter /news compilation. Play Finland is at the moment one of the main channels for sharing information inside the industry.
We (admins) occasionally publish industry related posts or links in Play Finland. But since there is so many things going on, we don´t even try to cover the whole field.
Best Regards,
Neogames Finland
Events:
24th April Retro Game Jam 2020 / Turku-
24th April at 13.00 IGDA Finland Virtual Mentor Cafe
- 13th – 14th May European Games BizDev Gathering
- 15th May BooBJam2020
- 26-29th May AWE – Augmented World Expo AWE USA 2020’s online event
- Become a member of AWE Nite Helsinki’s meetup group https://www.meetup.com/AWENiteHelsinki/ and get a special discount at just $99 (by April 1st)
- 27-29th May Nordic Game 2020 / Malmö, Sweden => online event
- June 8-12 PG Connects Digital #2. Interested to speak at there?
- 4-6thAugust GDC Organizers Plan New 3-Day GDC Summer Event For August
- 25-29 August; Gamescom / Cologne. Gamescom will under no circumstances take place on site in Cologne this year. Digital event will be organized.
- 29-30th September Pocket Gamer Connects Helsinki
- 15th October Reboot Develop Blue / Croatia
- Over the years, Develop Blue has become one of the main annual conferences for European game developer communities. Therefore, EGDF and Neogames Finland ry. are happy to announce a 10% discount code for a STANDARD CONFERENCE PASS Please do not hesitate to contact the associations to receive yours.
- 16 October W Love Games conference / Helsinki
- Tickets sign-up starts in May and the link is first shared to those who have signed up for W Love Games newsletter. Sign up to a newsletter here.
- 6th of November #XmasJKL 2020 – The Finnish Game Industry Seminar / Jyväskylä
See also The Game Industry Events calendar: http://www.neogames.fi/en/events/eventcalendar
Webinars & Streams & Videos
Since all the game industry events have been postponed, cancelled or moved to online due to Corona virus epidemic, EGDF in co-operation with European country organizations has collected a list of online (and postponed) events.
Open jobs & Recruitment:
- Superplus is hiring! Positions like Community Manager, QA Lead, Programmer(s) and Artist(s) will open soon.
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BusinessFinland has launched a nationwide job board to advertise jobs for #English speakers in #Finland. Advertising the open positions in the portal is free of charge for the companies.
- Games Factory Talents launched new Games focused tech Talent board that helps Talents to land a Dream job at a Games Studio in Helsinki. Please check the positions and companies and APPLY
- Pocket hunt has launched their recruiting app for games people in Finland, Sweden, Germany, the United Kingdom, the Benelux countries, Bangalore and Singapore.
- Jobs in Games: Rovio’s Heini Kaihu on how to get a job as head of studio.
- if people are interested in taking part in ‘Jobs in Games’ series feel free to get in touch with Craig Chapple!
- Take a look at https://thehub.fi/jobs for the current list of all jobs available in the Finnish Game Industry!
Announcements:
- Superplus Games raises $4.7 million to bring player-versus-player competition to casual gamers
- Nordisk Film Games invests SEK 45 million into Nitro Games and becomes the largest shareholder.
- Demoskene elävän perinnön luetteloon – digitaalinen kulttuuri hyväksyttiin kulttuuriperinnöksi / Finland recognises the Demoscene as part of its cultural heritage. Subculture is now part of the National Inventory of Living Heritage, and can be nominated for UNESCO international heritage status
- Epic launches new publishing program with 50/50 profit sharing for developers. Remedy Entertainment, Fumito Ueda’s genDesign, and PlayDead are the first three partners
- PEGI announced that video game publishers will start to provide additional information about the nature of in-game purchases if these include random items (like loot boxes or card packs). The information will be included in the form of a notice (Includes Paid Random Items) on physical packaging and on digital storefronts.
- Gamescom / Cologne will under no circumstances take place on site in Cologne this year. Digital event will be organized.
Financial support;
- Neogames has conducted the government support together in one page
- Business Finland lanseeraa kaksi uutta rahoituspalvelua lieventämään koronavirusepidemian aiheuttamia talousvaikutuksia. / Funding for SMEs and midcap companies whose business is affected by corona virus outbreak.
- 1) Only apply if you are in actual need. Every application is reviewed and that takes time and going through “free moneys, gimme!” applications just takes times from those in real crisis.
2) To be applicable for the grant, the Covid-19 must have affected your business in a negative manner and the project you plan to do with the funding needs to be either a new function/service/model for your company while the crisis is on-going or some way that you cope with the situation. This is not a grant to develop a DLC!
3) Check that you don’t have any unpaid taxes in foreclosure and match your application grant according to your revenue. If your company is generating 10k a year you will not be receiving a 100k grant. If you are a startup with running costs, external funding and product still in development but can’t launch due to covid or have some other issue, explain it to us in the application and this will be taken in account.
4) BF crisis funding is now only for companies between 6-250 employees. If you applied before this rule came into action last week your application will be reviewed and this new rule will not cause the application to fail.
- 1) Only apply if you are in actual need. Every application is reviewed and that takes time and going through “free moneys, gimme!” applications just takes times from those in real crisis.
- ELY-keskusten rahoitus yrityksille koronaviruksen aiheuttamassa poikkeustilanteessa ELY tuki tarkoitettu alle 5 hengen yrityksille. Business Finland tuki tätä isommille, jos kuitenkin on jo haettu BF tukea ei hakemusta pidä peruuttaa. Molemmista tukea ei kuitenkaan voi hakea / ELY Centres’ funding for companies in the exceptional circumstances caused by the coronavirus. Note that if company is over 5 people you should apply from Business Finland and smaller from ELY. If company already applied from BF, then it is ok, do not cancel your application. However, should not apply from both BF & ELY.
- Hallitus julkisti 15 miljardin pelastuspaketin Suomen taloudelle, katso tallenne – Yle seuraa hetki hetkeltä talouden superpäivää / Government announces 15billion EUR support to secure Finnish economy.
Other News:
- FAQ on W8BEN-E: Neogames office receives every now and then questions from new studios related to US W8BEN-E form. As US tax administration isn’t really our speciality, we decided to send an email to our super friends and they kindly gave us the following 101 tips on US tax administration:
First or all, use the correct form (W-8BEN-E): The form W-8BEN is Certificate of Foreign Status of Beneficial Owner for United States Tax Withholding and Reporting (Individuals). Instead, you should use form W-8BEN-E Certificate of Status of Beneficial Owner for United States Tax Withholding and Reporting (Entities).
When you reach point 8, only fill point 8c “Foreign Tax Identification Number (TIN)” that is basically your y-number (e.g. 1234567-8) in an international format (e.g. FI12345678). - IGDA Future calls all artists, programmers, audio designer and other amazing talents to help us make in a short time the most engaging edugames ever.
- Boreal Foundry are going to Kickstarter on April 21st!
- Joakim Achrén shared a template for allocating stock options to employees in a games company. Startups can’t compete on salary with more prominent companies, but they have something that big companies can’t offer: attractive stock options to buy shares of the company.
- Nopia is looking to buy a used Mac desktop or laptop for dev purposes. Needs to be able to run and build with Unity. Anyone selling? Budget as low as possible. Will need it shipped to Pori
- Panu Mustonen & Olli Ikonen releases their new game story document.
- Blast from the past; Rovio Mobile – early interview before Angry Birds (in Finnish)
- Juuso Sipiläinen tekee esport tradenomi opintoja ja siihen liittyen selvitystä siitä kuinka paljon COVID-19 on vaikuttanut esport- ja pelialan eri toimijoihin. Hän kaipaisi vielä paria haastateltavaa aiheesta!
- Tampere Game Incubator returns 2020. Building a game studio startup and making sure your game hits the right market can be challenging – that is why Tampere Game Incubator returns 2020 to bring the best Finnish game industry mentors to help local game teams succeed!
Tampere Game Incubator 2020 will start May 2020 this year with a special remote phase using Discord. In Fall 2020, we will have a 10 week sparring course with all the mentors in attendance. Tampere Game Incubator 2020 is totally free, including the degree.
What we are looking for- You must have a game team or a newly established company (less than 12 months old)
- You have a game in progress with either picture or video footage ready
- Your team or company is established in or near the Tampere region, or you and your team can travel to Tampere once a week in Fall 2020
- You and your team complete the included education (yrittäjän ammattitutkinto) and each team member completes the skill assessment (game company business plan). Note that the skill assessment must be done in Finnish.
- Kimble Games; Freestyle King coming soon
- Kayo Games; Learn how airplane engines work with this Augmented Reality experience. Try it on Facebook or on Instagram
- Moposota; old rare piece of Finnish indie PC game development history in pristine condition. No digital game stores or streaming services then – game is delivered on floppy disc. EGA or VGA graphics recommended, but does not mention anything about RTX compatibility.
- Kuusi aivotärähdystä, kaikki hyvin? Vauhdikas minidokumentti esittelee RedLynx-pomon menoa toimistolla ja avannossa
- Lahjoita tarpeettomaksi käynyt tietokoneesi koululaiselle
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EGDF COVID19 survey results indicate that many game developer studios are struggling to survive, be productive and deliver. For this reason, at EGDF, we are trying to create support measures to help the European game dev community in any way we can.1. #Devs4Devs – matching those studios that are looking for extra hands with those studios looking for subcontracting deals#Devs4Devs is a project initiated by EGDF and Games Bavaria Munich with the kind logistical support of RCP, which aims to match those studios that are looking for extra hands with those studios looking for subcontracting deals:
- If you’re SEARCHING SUPPORT, fill in your contact details and job description here then check out those who are offering their services to support bit.ly/DevSupportList.
- If you want to OFFER SUPPORT, fill in your contact details and description of the services you offer bit.ly/DevsForDevs then take a look at the companies searching for support here.
2. European BizDeV Gathering – matching game developer studios with publishers and investorsEuropean Games BizDev Gathering offers game developers an invaluable opportunity to get their projects in front of investors and publishers from all over the world!It is a special event organized by the joint EGDF, rcp and Reboot initiative while supported by some of their key European partners. It will take place online from 13th to 14th of May 2020 while using MeetToMatch as a platform for pitching and meetings. - KORONA AID: Digi & Game Center tarvitsee apuasi!
- The End of an Era – Rival Games is closing down.
This is the weekly summary of news from the Finnish game industry. If you want to have your news on the list, post them on the Play Finland Facebook group. The summary will be posted every Friday afternoon. Check out previous week’s list.