2006-2007 Season Report, part 1: Biggest Achievements of the Season

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Hi Everyone! The 2006-2007 Season that just ended in June has again been our most successful one ever. IGDA Finland has seen some serious growth in several areas.

In this post, we will focus on some of IGDA Finland's biggest achievements of 2006-2007 Season, as judged by the coordinators. Later post will look at all the Gatherings as well as give you some very impressive statistics about our growth. Don't want to hit you with too much information all at once :P.

But now, on to the achievements

1) International Prestige & Recognition

The IGDA Finland has been receiving great recognition for it's work this year and we have had some major visibility within IGDA. This year the international IGDA mother organization and the games development scene in large has noticed what a great chapter we have here. At a IGDA VIP luncheon during GDC this year, we were awarded with one of three MVP awards for the year, our Gathering After Action Reports made it to the igda.org front page twice (the other time with the infamous 'Queue of Death' picture) and a picture from our December Gathering was seen by everyone in the IGDA Annual Report for 2006.

2) Re-organization

During 2005-2006 Season, we recruited the original set of volunteers to help the chapter team with the increasing workload of running the rapidly growing chapter. This season our organization took the next step forward, when chapter team was split into an advisory board and group of coordinators. Without this restructuring, we could not have handled the growth and kept things running while preparing new initiatives for the future.

3) Website design, v.3.0

Last summer gave birth to the third iteration of IGDA Finland website and all season long it has been slowly developing into what it is today. We also moved the hosting to a local server here in Finland, which gives us much more flexibility and control over our website. You have already enjoyed some of the benefits of this in form of more and new types of content such as the featured articles. Rest assured, much more is planned for the future.

4) Events in Gatherings

We managed to arrange two great sponsored events this season, together with our sponsors Recoil Games, AMD, AMO/Nintendo Finland and Samsung. Again, a big huge thanks to all or our sponsors for their co-operation and contribution! We also managed to do something I've been dreaming about for a while: have a more joyful little X-mas party event in December. And what a success it was, largely thanks due to the Wii madness :).

We also brought Finnish games more into spotlight as we have hoped to do for a long time. In April attendees saw a sneak-preview video of Flatout Ultimate Carnage, in May we got to play Super Stardust HD prior to it's launch on Playstation Network on June 29th and in June, it was Flatout Ultimate Carnage that peole got to play (prior to launch also).

5) Group of Volunteers

Our group of volunteers, consisting mostly of students, grew from 15 to 21 this year. We also had a chance to reward all their hard work by a behind the scenes visit to one of the powerhouses of Finnish mobile game development - Sumea Studio.

6) Great Year for Finnish Game Industry

Finnish game industry has been doing extremely well during this season and ultimately that's what really counts. Obviously, we can't take credit for that and I in no way intend to. The credit is due to all the hardworking developers behind the games and the companies that develop them. Ultimately the success of the industry in Finland is what we are all after at IGDA Finland and that's why I wanted mention it here. Hopefully our activities have helped the industry succeed - even if just a little bit.

It's been a very eventful and rich year in the Finnish games industry. From the avalanche of awards at IGN Best of 2006 awards to the multitude of titles either launched (Super Stardust HD on PS3, Flatout Ultimate Carnage on X360, etc.) or announced (Earth No More, Shadowgrounds Survivor, etc.) to the fact that a new next-gen studio, Recoil Games, was founded or how Universomo was bought by THQ, making THQ the first big publisher to become part of the Finnish game development community.

That's it for now, stay tuned for part 2 of the season report...

Jay - Lead Chapter Coordinator

You can read the second part of this three-part report here and the third part is here.

Great press coverage for the Finnish game industry

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Wow, we're getting great press right now! I don't know about you guys, but it puts a big smile on my face and for good reason, there's been lots of big news for our industry lately.Bugbear released Flatout Ultimate Carnage, Housemarque released Super Stardust HD, Frozenbyte announced Shadowgrounds Survivor, Recoil announced Earth No More, THQ bought Universomo, etc. But I digress, on to the news links..Helsingin Sanomat (the biggest newspaper in Finland) had a good sized article and claimed that the Finnish Game Industry is doing great! http://www.hs.fi/kulttuuri/artikkel...8177869?ref=rss

Talouselämä (the Finnish "Wallstreet Journal") also ran a sizable piece about the Finnish game industry: http://www.talouselama.fi/docview.do?f_id=1182718

Last but not least; eDome, a Finnish gaming site claims 2007 to be a great year for Finnish game industry http://plaza.fi/edome/artikkelit/yl...lan-suuri-vuosi

Jay - Lead Chapter Coordinator

Announcing: Website team!

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From left to right: Antti Tuppurainen, Miikka Luotio & Mika Rantanen

In the recent wake of IGDA Finland chapter's rewarded success, we have reacted to the increasing usage of IGDA Finland website by creating a completely new team to develop and maintain the IGDA Finland website further.

It is my honor to announce the new IGDA Finland website team! The team consists of IGDA Finland volunteers, Antti Tuppurainen, Mika Rantanen and me. We hope to take IGDA Finland website to the next level by fine tuning it's existing features and creating some new ones in the way.

Mika Rantanen:

"I'm a 25 year old gamer and hobbyist game developer from Helsinki. My favourite game genres are RPGs, strategy games (both turn based and RTS) and old style arcade games and I'm also a fan of tabletop games."

Antti Tuppurainen:

"My name is Antti Tuppurainen, I'm a 19-year-old student at aRTO Pelikoulutus, learning all about game production and focusing on programming, hoping to create a career in the games industry."

-Miikka Luotio

IGDA Finland Receives MVP Award '07

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IGDA honors one of it's most active & succesful chapters during GDC 2007. Pictured: Liz Lehtonen, Lasse Seppänen & Jyri Ranki only moments after receiving the award

IGDA holds a VIP Luncheon every year at GDC. At the luncheon, IGDA recognises outstanding contributions to the betterment of the game development community by giving out MVP awards. The term MVP comes from a well known sports term Most Valuable Player. This year, IGDA Finland had the honor of being one of 3 recipients!

The MVP award has my name written on it, but IGDA Executive Director Jason Della Rocca asked me to convey to all of you that it really is to all those who volunteer their time and energy for the IGDA Finland chapter.

And I couldn't agree more! Without all the volunteers, my fellow coordinators and advisory board members, we wouldn't have such a successful chapter. So thank you all for your great work! It has been recognized on a global scale (see about us for full listing of people behind the chapter).

I also want to thank all of our c.200 members and the hundreds of others who regularly attend our gatherings. Without you, there would be no reason to have them. Your presence is what makes them valuable.

I will be bringing the award to the next gathering for all of you to see.

Go Finland!

- Jyri Ranki, Lead Coordinator