The last few months have been particularly busy for the Construct team, but one of the most fun events we’ve been to recently was gamescom back in August. Gamescom is frequently heralded as THE games event in Europe so it was about time we went along to see what all the fuss was about.
So, I was shipped off to Cologne for the week to experience all that gamescom and devcom had to offer.
For those of you who’ve not come across it before, gamescom is a huge event held in Cologne, Germany. For a solid week, industry people and fans alike descend on the German city for a festival of all things gaming.
The festivities kick off on Sunday evening with pre-devcom events for industry folk there early enough. Then on Monday morning, devcom begins in earnest with tons of talks throughout the day covering all manner of topics. An evening mixer rounds out the first day of the conference to allow attendees to catch up with and meet new friends and colleagues from across the industry.
Unfortunately, I made the mistake of arriving late Monday evening, so I missed some really cool talks, and ended up spending my evening half-asleep in a hotel room, but I know for next time!
Tuesday follows the same program, with a fresh set of speakers and subjects for people to enjoy. This year, Courage Cologne held a mini expo in the city alongside the evening’s developer mixer if the handful of indie games on the devcom floor weren’t enough for you. Piggy also made his mark on the lil indie game zone at devcom!
Gamescom itself doesn’t begin until Wednesday afternoon if you’re a general ticket holder, but those of us on trade passes get extra hours in the mornings (think along the lines of Magic Hours at places like Disneyland) to experience the show before the public floods in. Then, from Wednesday through Sunday, a plethora of AAA studios and indies alike have their games on show for you to get a taste of.
For someone whose recent event experience included the somewhat disappointing EGX last year, seeing an event of this scale was almost overwhelming. I had a blast though, and got to meet some great people from the Construct Community.
Wednesday was all about meetings and it was a pleasure to meet several Construct devs in the gamescom industry halls, alongside the great folks I caught up with during devcom. Shoutout to Gustavo of NotePike for being my buddy for the devcom Developer Night!
Rising Pixel are doing some great work with Construct over in the Canary Islands, and it was great to finally put a face to the name of Samuele Sciacca who is a huge pillar of the Italian community. I even got stopped in a hallway by an old user of Construct who noticed my company polo shirt and wanted to know how the company was doing after all these years, which was surreal but very cool!
Of course I also got to sit down and chat with the great folks over at Poki who are doing fantastic things in the web game space. Plenty of Construct developers are making super popular games for their platform, in fact Construct is the second most used engine with Poki!
One of the many highlights from the event was getting to play a couple of Construct games on the show floor. This year, two studios had their creations in the gamescom indie halls. Blastmode were showcasing Sea Sniffers for the first time as part of the Indie Game Arena, while Lootzifir had a spot with House of Indies for their game, Battle Wizards Attack.
Sea Sniffers
Sea Sniffers is a very cute, cosy diving game where you play as Kiwi, a newly appointed Sea Sniffer, on an adventure across the seas with your seal companion, Momi. If you’ve come across Blastmode before, you’ll notice that this is somewhat of a contrast to their previous release Mighty Goose, but the game is shaping up to be another hit.
As a fan of creature collecting games, I was immediately hooked by the idea of filling up my poké- I mean Fish Encyclopedia.
For a good chunk of the game you’ll be controlling Momi as he dives into the ocean looking for treasures and sea creatures to sell. Armed with your trusty net and feisty flippers, Momi can punch his fellow sea citizens to temporarily stun them, making them easier to capture. Not all fish are equal though, some denizens of the deep have gained the ability of speech and will grant you quests or just simply stop and chat for a bit.
I fell in love with the chill vibe and beating up fish to catch them will never not be funny to me. The handful of characters I met during the demo were all beautifully designed and suited the world perfectly.
Every time I walked by the stand, someone was playing Sea Sniffers, and it looked like a hugely popular game! Plus it was great to get a chance to have a good, long chat with Richard and Diane from Blastmode, and Richard kindly offered some insight into how the event went for them:
Gamescom was the first time we showed Sea Sniffers to the public, and it was a great experience. Seeing players' reactions firsthand was super valuable, offering us insights that only real players can provide.
Of course we spotted a few bugs during the event, luckily they didn't pop up too often. We had a great time at Gamescom, and it was a valuable learning experience! Currently we're hard at work on implementing Japanese as we'll also be showing the game off at TGS!
Sea Sniffers is currently available to wishlist on Steam, and be sure to keep an eye on Blastmode for updates.
Battle Wizard Attack
Now, normally I’d look at a game like Battle Wizard Attack and think, I’m gonna be absolutely terrible at this, but I am delighted to have been proven wrong! In this pixel art retro-inspired RPG, you play as one of eight different wizards, each with their own spell set, and battle your way through a vast world filled with nods to German mythology.
Having expressed my fear of being terrible at the game, the folks at Lootzifir suggested I play as the Ether Bender. Well, she and I got along great and soon I was blasting my way through hordes of enemies, unlocking new skills and generally having a great time.
There was tons of world to explore, filled with enemy encampments to destroy while trying to avoid the terrified citizens running for their lives. It was nice to see some NPCs too, it really added flavour to the ether-fuelled chaos.
As with Sea Sniffers, Battle Wizard Attack had a group of players crowding the booth whenever I strolled by which was brilliant to see. Marco Kehler confirmed this too, telling me that lots of people came by and thoroughly enjoyed the game – it was especially a hit with the younger audience. They even had some folks from a prominent Berlin games event, AMAZE swing by!
“Gamescom was a blast!” Marco said. “Players loved Battle Wizard Attack, and we were thrilled to share our development process with Construct 3. The interest [in the game] was incredible!”
Battle Wizard Attack is available to buy on Steam, and you can watch a trailer below.
All in all gamescom was a fantastic event and one we hope to attend in some capacity again in the future. Keep an eye on our socials to learn about which events we’ll be heading to and if you’re showcasing a Construct game at an event, don’t forget to tell us about it!