Weekly News 25-28/23

Play Finland’s Weekly Newsletter

In this report we will combine weeks 25-28/2023 from the Finnish Game Industry and will be posted every Friday afternoon. Check out the previous post here.

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.

Best Regards,
Neogames Finland

Events:

• 23-27th August Gamescom / Cologne
• 5th September Over 7 Hills 2023
• 12-13th September PG Connects Helsinki
  • Tickets are available at our Early Bird rate, and we have a special discount for this group: PlayFinland20
    You can get a double discount if you register now!
• 14-15th September Game On! Hack-a-job in Tampere
• 4-6th October Northern Game Summit. Tickets are available
• 12th-13th October W Love Games free tickets available. 
  • Call for speakers and workshop facilitators for this year’s WLG Conference is still open for a bit over a month, make sure you send your proposals by June 25th
  • Showroom are now open, the booths are free of charge as everything else WLG offers.
    Sign up here
• 2-3rd November Game Connection Europe
• 30th Nov.-1st Dec. SLUSH

See also The Game Industry Events calendar  Game Conference Guide Calendar Flemish Game association calendar & Game Industry Biz

 Announcements:

 New releases 

• First city (Meidän Pori) in entrepreneur based mobile game has been released on Google Play and Steam 

 Discussion

• Veli-Pekka Piirainen has faced a problem: Google requires proof of eligibility for tax exemption for withholding tax in Taiwan. Finnish tax authorities couldn’t help VP with this. Does anyone know more about this issue?
• Joonas Pylvinen asks Are coworking spaces past now and is the reign of remote work now on? Because Joonas is hatching a plan for a accelerator/coworking spaces to Kajaani for new game startups. BUT. According to some polls, the fresh companies would rather do either full or part remote work.
• Suvi Latva asks opinions? “Valve says it’s not “discouraging” AI-generated content and that Steam’s “review process is a reflection of current copyright law and policies””

• Janne Seppänen shares that L’Oeil Blanc, a game that Janne worked on as a freelance music composer was released last month! To be exact, it was the first full chapter of a longer story set in a medieval world filled with magic, where the player takes on the role of an individual devoid of his vision.  The game is available only from the French App Store and Google Play, but you can read more about the game and the team behind it from https://oeilblanc.fr/ as a freelancer Janne would like to seize this opportunity to state that Janne is open for new projects. Check the website.
• Kick Motion has more mystical monster from the lake. How about Mage Monster fish? Get them soon! Play Kristala game!
• Mike Laaksonen tested GPT4 for coding and noticed how GPT4 makes quite obvious logical errors, especially in narrative continuum. For example, in the beginning it states that the player is “in his office in downtown Arkham”. But then the player has this letter where he is asked to come to Arkham, and given a train ticket from Boston to Arkham. So yes, it suddenly is obvious that player and his office are in Boston.
  Otherwise it is interesting how it incorporates real life events into the story, like German hyperinflation. 
• 10tons Reveals Dysplaced – After falling from the sky into a realm of myth and magic, you’ll start a new life in a stunning, yet imperiled domain: Gather resources, build, cook, fish. Learn magic, smithing, hunting, alchemy, and more. Is there a way back? 
• Solip’s Comic is commenting to new Finnish coalition’s anti-immigration rhetoric! (Does anyone who proposed this reform have lived in any other countries? ) Many game expats around my network have express their concerns over this new immigration law reform proposal. Neogames have announced their statement and putting this issue as one of their priorities. Some Finnish game studios have sent emails to their international workers that they will try their best make Finnish game ecosystem as diverse and inclusive workplace. Call in for more political rallies and actions! Let’s stick together!
• Open opportunity to test the demo of IAH: Internet War (By Vitali Kirpu) in August as part of the Steam Strategy Fest.
• We in Games stands with tbe Finnish Startup Community in their concern and criticism of the new Finnish government’s planned changes to immigration law. We feel such changes would hurt not only many of our members, but the game industry as a whole.
  Read more from the Finnish Startup Community here.
• Roleverse is a new game studio in Helsinki! They’re aiming to take over the world with a completely new way for players to create their own games.

• Helsingin Sanomat has chosen 10 most promising and interesting game startups to follow Great teams!

  In the article Tomi and Sonja talk about AI in games, mobile winter, cross platform and other trends.

  The article is in Finnish, paywall
• The first results of We in Games and Better Games Together’s 2023 survey of game industry professionals 2023 are ready. The first post relates specifically to sexual minorities.
  Super short summary: a strong representation of the LGBTQIA+ community in the industry but that does not equate to a homogeneous group of people; mostly people do not see the necessity to stay closeted at work but that might depend on circumstances; homophobia is not inexistent but not very visible; and conflicting feelings about PR work related to LGBTQIA+ representation.
• Aalto Universities invites you to join their Research Project: Exploring Household Digital Gaming Experience:
  Do you play digital games with your children? With your partner? Or any individuals in your household? We are conducting a research project on household digital gaming experiences and we want to hear from you! Share your experience and contribute to our study.
  • Complete our quick screening survey 
  • You’ll be compensated with 20 euro vouchers for participation in the interview study
  To be eligible, you must be at least 18 years old。
• Jyväskylä and Jamk University of Applied Sciences: Multidisciplinary and international competence hub that focuses particularly on research, development, and innovation activities (RDI). Its aim is to promote the use of game technologies across various industries and create new business models and expertise around esports, such as entrepreneurship, coaching, well-being, management, and education. To achieve these goals, investments are made in hardware, competence development, and operational environments, such as XR showrooms and esports environments.