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In this year edition, the festival offered the possibility of watching all the presentations for free through a stream from its website, and as a novelty this year, also through the Steam platform. The festival has been catered on this feature for its program of conferences and workshops.
A full auditorium was able to hear some valuable advice on how to start in the world of videogames from key figures in the industry with interesting statements about their latest projects and what those productions have involved.
Tim Schafer, an industry veteran and co-creator of titles like Monkey Island, Grim Fandango and Day of the Tentacle is back in 2021 with his latest hit, Psychonauts 2, commented in his inspiring talk that “directing an independent game studio has a lot of fun stuff and a lot of freedom… but also a lot of night terrors and existential dread every day wondering if you’re going to close next month “while confessing that the favorite part of his job was to “invent new worlds. It’s really what we’ve been doing; creating new worlds”.
The festival ended with the traditional ceremony of the Titanium awards for best games of the year, with Tim Schafer’s new production, the impeccable Psychonauts 2, winning the Game of the Year category, as well as Best Narrative Design. Another of the most mentioned titles of 2021, It Takes Two, by Hazelight Studios, was awarded Best Game Design, and Best Art Direction has been given to Deathloop, the latest release from the French, Arkane Lyon. Metroid Dread by the Spanish MercurySteam, won Best Sound Direction, while Best Adaptation, a category dedicated to transmedia products was awarded to Arcane, Riot’s animation series based on the League of Legends universe. The indie game categories have awarded Chicory: A Colorful Tale as Most Innovative Indie Game, and Mirlo: Above the Sun as Best Basque Game.
In the words of the director of the festival, Alfonso Gómez: “We closed the eleventh edition of the Fun & Serious Game Festival with a very good taste in our mouths. Returning to its presence has given us the impetus we needed to prepare for the 2022 edition with more energy and enthusiasm as possible. I want to congratulate the winners and nominees for the high level and quality of their productions, I know that although it sounds cliché, it has cost the jury a lot to decide the absolute winners by category“.
About Fun & Serious Festival
The Fun & Serious Game Festival, held every December in Bilbao, is the largest video-game festival in Europe and a key meeting-point for the industry as a whole.
The event’s mission is to recognize and promote the work of video-game producers, directors, artists and developers, based on a comprehensive program of conferences, roundtables, networking and activities, aimed at both companies and the general public. As is customary each year, the Festival will conclude with an exclusive Grand Prize-Winning Gala for the best video-games of the year.
The Fun & Serious Game Festival enjoys the support of the Basque Regional Government – SPRI, Bilbao City Hall and the Provincial Council of Biscay. The event’s strategic partners include Microsoft, PlayStation and Ubisoft. The Festival features the collaboration of the Spanish Video-Games Association (AEVI), UTAD, Virtualware and Digipen.
