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{softBoxWide|A philosophy of alternative software||squished|by Owen on 2nd November 2025}
In the lead-up to last year's annual game jam, GAMERella incorporated, becoming an official non-profit organization. Hats off to Gina and Courtney for spearheading that effort and all the paperwork it entailed. However, we weren't finished yet. Leading into 2025, with the GAMERella Mentorship Program on the horizon, I stepped into a more technical role. I spent early Spring developing a new website and finding software alternatives for the team.
As an organization predicated on social change and accountability, we knew we wanted to distance ourselves from the uncomfortable Google hegemony (especially with yet another controversy at the time). Beyond that, we were also searching for alternatives for data storage, website hosting, and collaborate document-writing.
In this blog post I hope to detail what we found, as well as include some 3rd-party game development solutions, and address more philosophical concerns relating to the social media attention economy and software fatigue. More and more, the tools that we use (originally designed for efficiency and innocuousness) are vying for our attention and our valuable usage data. As they absorb AI-powered content slop and and eat into our browsers' RAM, a switch to 3rd party solutions becomes increasingly liberating.
Detailed below is a list of software alternatives that we found to be effective, cheap, and reliable.
Disclaimer: Being committed to using 3rd party software alternatives means accepting that moving between tools is part of the practice. It's not uncommon to find that, after a few months of using a new software, it's not right for you. The tools listed below are a starting point, informed by the knowledge and experiences we have gathered as individuals and as a team.
Let's get the obvious out of the way. These first few are potential solutions for the tools we use most regularly in our day-to-day lives.
Firefox As an alternative to Google Chrome
Firefox is, without a doubt, a hill I will die on. When I say that everyone uses Google Chrome, I mean everyone. As of September 2025, Chrome has a market share of nearly 72% (Sims, 2025). Its browser is infamously known for its appalling overuse of your computer's memory, and it's probably Google's most powerful tool to collect your data. That isn't even considering the fact that other popular browsers such as Opera, Brave, or Vivaldi are based on Chromium (the base architecture of Google Chrome). The only two truly popular browsers in the world that are not derived from Google Chrome are Safari and Firefox.
Dislike for Chrome aside, Firefox stands on its own. It is an open-source browser developed by Mozilla, equipped with a myriad of features that go above and beyond. It shares a lot of common features between other browsers, but consistently puts in the extra effort to make them safe, easy to use, and transparent. Here's a list of some of useful features:
If you're looking for a great search engine to go along with Firefox, I recommend Ecosia. It plants a tree for every 45 searches you make! DuckDuckGo is another popular one.
Notion As an alternative to Google Docs & Sheets
I started using Notion last year for personal projects, and instantly fell in love with it. It's a collaborative document-writing software/website with a focus on databases and nested pages. It's easy to write shared documents together in real-time, and its page organization features (i.e. treating each paragraph as a block that can be further transmuted into quotes, sub-columns, collapsible sections, etc.) tow a great line between user-friendly and endlessly customizable. It's prefect for formatting nerds like me.
With even just a little more familiarity, Notion's database system can be a nice replacement for Google Sheets. It's got a ton of granular categories, sorting, grouping, and filtering options for those of us who love crunching data. Even simple 5-10 entry inline databases can be put together in seconds. Lastly, databases can easily be converted from one type to another, should you wish to convert your long list of items into a nice visual gallery, for example.
Disclaimer: As of late, Notion has been really pushing its AI features. This sucks, but the features are so far entirely optional, and the rest of the software still works great.
EthicalHosting As an alternative to Hostinger / Namecheap / GoDaddy / BlueHost
During the search for a good website host for the updated GAMERella website, we stumbled upon EthicalHosting. They are a Toronto-based host 100% powered by renewable sources and carbon offsets, and make annual and other regular donations to social and environmental organizations. It feels great to know that GAMERella's website data is being stored on Canadian soil, in environmentally friendly conditions, by real humans, at a reasonable cost.
I didn't have room to list all possible general-use alternatives here, so here are a few more that I recommend:
Luxe / Bitsy / Bevy / Twine / Adventuron / etc. As an alternative to Unity / Unreal
As a developer, I understand the power of the long-established and well documented game engines that most of us start our journeys learning. However, more and more I find myself drawn to the engines that lie on the margins of use. Taking the time to understand even the basics of these lesser-used tools can really help to round out a game developer’s problem-solving and creative toolkit.
The truth to the question “which engine should I learn?” has never been “the biggest one out there”. The answer is “the one that lets you express yourself to the fullest”. That might end up being one of the major ones, but it doesn’t have to be. Inspiration is all around.
Mesh2Motion As an alternative to Mixamo
Mixamo is a great tool and library for rigging and animating 3D characters. It’s the default for many people, and it’s the one I learned to use for game jams and other small projects. The problem is, as a software owned by Adobe, there has always been a discomfort in using it.
I recently learned about Mesh2Motion, a wonderfully 3rd party website to perform exactly the same functions as Mixamo, and it even has 4-legged animal rigs! Wholeheartedly recommend.
JetBrains As an alternative to VSCode / etc.
There’s no simpler way to say it but: JetBrains IDEs (ie. programs for writing code) are the absolute best ones available today. Intuitive, nice to look at, feature-rich, and full of their own plugins that you can add. I personally use JetBrains Rider every single day for work, and have absolutely no desire to return to Visual Studio. The best part is, every single one of their editors are free for students!
I didn’t have room to list all possible alternatives here, so here are a few more that I recommend:
Forcing yourself to change tools is no easy task. Whether it’s a personal choice or a required software from your work/school, the amount of websites and applications that we’re using can often feel overwhelming. The solutions to these problems are never straightforward, but a dual approach of simplification and community support is the starting point (Tobelaim, 2025).
Finding tools that perform multiple tasks is great. Maybe the 3D materials you design in your modelling software can be exported over rather than having to be re-engineered in your game engine. Maybe the writing software you use to take notes as a team can also house your images or PDF diagrams.
Furthermore, working together as a team can help to demystify and share the burden of new software. Either for work, with friends, or in online forums, discussing what works and what doesn’t, and ways to improve usage help a lot to break down the overwhelming barriers.
There’s no cure-all for software fatigue, and it’s undoubtedly true that we as people and organizations alike have adopted a website or software for pretty much everything. Jumping into third party software can trigger these feelings, but with a mind for exploration and community discussion, we can all come out the other end using responsible tools that better suit our needs.
Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about boredom and discomfort. The desire as soon as you wake to check your phone. Feeling unsettled if you’re not able to watch something while you eat your lunch. The monotony of commuting. These are emotional responses that, while in many aspects timeless, have been driven lately through the attention economy of the apps and websites that we use. It feels more and more like attention is money these days for major tech platforms.
Without trying to sound too dramatic: considering the ways in which Chrome, Adobe Cloud, Windows 11, and ChatGPT present themselves to us, the switch to thoughtfully-developed is feeling more and more urgent. Not unlike the sanctity of work-life balance, we need to value the time we deliberately take away from the things that profit from our attention. The initiatives are out there, the utopic torch of the personal computing movement still held aloft in their hands.
Take this blog post as a starting point. I’d love to hear your thoughts about the tools that I’ve recommended. If they turn out flawed, let’s re-evaluate. This is the conscious effort, the good work, that is required to ever so slowly break us away from hegemony.
I highly recommend the book Busy Doing Nothing by Rekka Bellum and Devine Lu Linvega (Bellum & Linvega, 2025). The two form the members of the artist collective 100 Rabbits (100R — home, 2025). The short book chronicles the day-to-day lives of the authors as they sail across the Pacific ocean, all the while developing software, fixing problems on the boat, and finding ways to keep themselves engaged. It has a very well-written epilogue that was the inspiration for this final section.
The internet was made to share, and we were meant to create. If you’re attending this year’s GAMERella Game Jam, maybe try and plan to use any of the tools listed above. It might make for a better game!
Sims, D. (2025, October 2). Google Chrome dominance grows, hits record 72% market share. Techspot. https://www.techspot.com/news/109708-google-chrome-dominance-grows-hits-record-72-market.html
Tobelaim, A. (2025, February 23). Overcoming Tool Fatigue: A Guide to Simplifying Workplace Tools & Processes. The Pulse of IT. https://www.siit.io/blog/overcoming-tool-fatigue-guide
Bellum, R., & Linvega, D. L. (2021). Busy Doing Nothing. https://100r.co/site/busy_doing_nothing.html
100R — home. (n.d.). Retrieved September 26, 2025, from https://100r.co/site/home.html
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{softBoxWide|GAMERella Mentorship: Phase One - Press Start|blog/mentorship_2025_phase_1/mentees.png|squished|by Tiff on 22nd August 2025}
Let's flash back to Sunday, June 15th.
For the last two months, we've been locked in on our collaboration channels. Living in our inboxes. Seeing in colour-coded timelines composed of sticky notes. Now we're here on the morning of our launch call, adding some last-minute script-pacing notes for the onboarding orientation. And before we knew it, there everyone was: GAMERella's inaugural cohort of our first-ever Mentorship Program.
GAMERella's Mentorship Program is the product of feedback we've received from our 13 years of jam participants expressing interest in some kind of long-term program to provide guidance in navigating the transition from baby game-maker to industry-ready. We know Game Jams are the bread and butter of learning the proverbial ropes of the games industry — we even contributed to “That's My Jam: Understanding the Value of Game Jams,” (which you can download for free here) a white paper by Michael Iantorno investigating jams, jammers, and how it helps them make the bread. Jams are great! Our people want more jam!
So that's what we did. With the help of Canada Media Fund we put together the Mentorship Program— a plan to help equity-deserving folks connect with industry professionals and arm them with the tools to break into the games industry. We have been so touched by our mentor pool, who have jumped at the chance to share the things they wish they'd known when they were just starting out, and absolutely amazed by the veritable talent of every single one of our mentees.
Almost a month later, those faces framed in Zoom windows became whole, embodied humans at our August Retreat. For the first time, we met up with our mentees in person before grabbing coffee together, before visiting the studio of Don't Nod here in town.
All those colour-coded sticky notes, timelines, emails, and meetings have turned into this incredible opportunity to uplift emergent game-makers by connecting them with folks open to sharing their professional knowledge and experience.
And we couldn't have done it without all the folks who came together to make this happen, such as our workshop presenters, mentors, Mentor Canada, Baby Ghosts Studio Development Fund, Don't Nod, Pixels & Poutine, EA Motive, 4th Space, Milieux Institute for Arts, Culture and Technology, and whoever invented Miro.
Flash back to today, August 15.
Summer's drawing to a close, our program is nearing it's halfway mark, and we've got the annual Game Jam coming up on the weekend of November 15th. We can't wait to see everyone again in (hopefully) cooler weather!
Jam sign-up link will be live from September 12: https://gamerella2025.eventbrite.ca
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{softBoxWide|LUDODROME 2025: Celebrating Experimental Games|blog/ludodrome_2025/ludodrome1.jpg|squished|by Alexi on 20th June 2025}
At GAMERella, we spend a lot of time thinking about creative expression. We design events that encourage whimsical creation, offer workshops that strengthen creative skills, and build spaces where people feel safe trying something new. We've watched hundreds of creators dive into their first game jam, transforming personal ideas into playable experiences.
But supporting creative expression is not just about helping people create. It's also about making sure that creations actually get seen, played, and celebrated. Because personal, exploratory work shouldn't just sit gathering dust on a shelf, but should be actually expressed and shared with others. The challenge is that spaces dedicated to celebration are rare, especially for non-commercial, indie, and experimental work.
"While Montréal has a solid ecosystem to support games as an industry (MIGS, La Guilde, Zone Indie, etc.) we are missing venues that highlight games for their artistic, innovative and critical approaches (whether commercial or not)."
- LUDODROME
Enter LUDOROME: An arcade celebrating the Montreal experimental games community, launched by the Milieux Institute for Arts, Culture and Technology
When: May 15th, 2025
Where: Société des arts technologiques (SAT)
450+ Attendees, 44 Games, 5 GAMERella Games
This one-day event brought over 450 (!) participants together to play games that pushed creative boundaries. Weird, wacky, wonderful, and welcoming games developed by people with a passion for the craft and an eagerness to share.
"We want to find exciting games wherever they can be found – solo work, indie and artists' studio work, and, of course, university research-creation initiatives; local games that beat with the experimental impulse, that explore new, wonderful, and eccentric mechanics, narratives, aesthetics and formats."
- LUDODROME
Of the 44 games on showcase, 5 were from our very own GAMERella jams! Created over the span of just two days, these games represent what it means to take a weekend and simply have fun making something. To try something new, step away from regular work, and experiment with novel tools and ideas.
"[GAMERella] gives the space for everyone to be themselves, to experiment and take risks without judgment. I think the outcome is so much more interesting, exploratory and creative than other (more competitive) game jams."
- Kamylle Grenier (Witcherella)
GAMERella games at LUDODROME 2025:
We curated the games from seven years of jams, representing everyone from first-time designers to seasoned jammers. From an arcade-style Bitsy to an immersive cozy horror, our games showcased what it means to create something deeply personal just for the sake of creation.
Watching experimental work being played, discussed, and celebrated was special. It sent a clear message: non-commercial, deeply personal work has value and deserves to exist.
"It honestly made me feel more confident in myself knowing that people actually enjoyed playing our game, and makes me feel hopeful about my future in the industry of making music for games."
- Lucas Vannelli (Snoot and the Big, Big Dark)
And celebratory spaces like LUDODROME don't just allow creators to put ideas out into the world. They also give the chance for creators (and players) to take ideas in, and be inspired by the voices of others.
"I don't think I've ever felt more grateful and inspired at the same time. More than ever, I want to make games. I feel more ready to make games and make art than ever."
- Maya Harry (Masks)
Although LUDODROME was only a 1-day event, we want to keep the party going! Our next big step is our first-ever mentorship program, which aims to support emerging creators and help them accelerate their journey in the games industry.
In November, you'll also find us at the Montréal International Games Summit (MIGS) and, of course, at our yearly GAMERella Game Jam!
If that seems too far away, we've got some other ways you can follow along with our work. Follow us on social media, sign-up for our newsletter, or support our work through our newly formed Patreon! Our Patreon is a dedicated GAMERella community where you can gain access to workshops, connect with like-minded gamemakers, and support spaces that promote creative expression.
LinkedIn: GAMERella Instagram: @gamerellajam Bluesky: @gamerella.bsky.social
And, if you know of any other cool, funky experimental events that celebrate diverse creators — let us know! We'd love to hear about it and join in on the fun.
We'd like to thank all the people that made LUDODROME a reality! For a more photos from the event, check out https://tag-milieux.ca/research-creation-projects/ludodrome-2025:
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{softBoxWide|GAMERella Newsletter #9|blog/newsletters/9-3.jpg|squished|by GAMERella Team on 30th April 2026}
This month, we hosted the GAMERella Mentorship Arcade to showcase our amazing mentees, our collaboration with Bridging Divides, and for a chance to hang out with all the wonderful game folks in the Montreal scene (we’re trying to get “lo-fi networking” to catch on - it’s fetch!)
Celebrating lo-fi networking bingo!
We were delighted that, at 6 pm on the dot, a crowd was ready and waiting to come in and see all the exhibits. The evening was filled with folks playing game demos, checking out amazing art, watching clips from our Phase 1 mentees, and spinning the wheel of possibility and side quests.
Maëlig Beaupérin showing their concept art
2025 GAMERella Jam participants showing off their games
Thank you to all those who came and supported the event! If you missed it, not to worry! Check out all the portfolios and links for our Phase 2 mentees:
There will be Beauty by N. A. Melamed and Void Blob
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GAMERella will be back at Ludodrome! We’ll be showcasing 3 jam games:
Come check out these and other experimental games hosted at Parquette on June 11th.
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One thing is always sure in these consistently unprecedented times: there will always be a GAMERella Game Jam. In our usual early November weekend timeslot, we’ll announce dates and sign up at the end of summer. Don’t worry, we’ll remind you 😄
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Canadian tech journalist site MobileSyrup interviewed Gina about all things GAMERella!
Courtney was on air again, talking about the Mentorship Arcade at CBC Radio Montreal.
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That’s all from us this time - now what are you doing looking at your screen? Go frolic in that sweet spring weather!
The GAMERella Team
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{softBoxWide|GAMERella Newsletter #8|blog/newsletters/8-1.png|squished|by GAMERella Team on 25th January 2026}
From all of us here at GAMERella, we hope you had a wonderful 2025 and that your 2026 is even better. We have exciting things in store for this year!
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Phase 2 of the GAMERella Mentorship Program has begun! Congratulations to the following mentees who have moved on from Press Start to Power Up:
We want to express our most profound pride in all mentees who participated in Phase 1, and can’t wait to share more updates about Phase 2 as we zoom along though 2026.
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Global Game Jam is right around the corner (Jan 26th - Feb 1st)! If you plan to participate, we want to remind you to sign up for one of their designated jamming sites ahead of time. You can also jam at home or in another space of course! Find out more info on the Global Game Jam website.
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Courtney was interviewed recently by Montréal Guardian, a local online magazine, for their Charity column. It was a great opportunity, and we strongly recommend you give the article a read.
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That’s all from us this time around! More newsletters in the coming months as we slowly stumble out of our holiday hibernation caves, but for now, we wish you a lovely start to your year!
The GAMERella Team
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{softBoxWide|GAMERella Newsletter #7|blog/newsletters/7-1.jpg|squished|by GAMERella Team on 9th December 2025}
We made it! The winter holidays are coming, so it’s time to wrap up the year and celebrate!
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2025 marked the 13th annual GAMERella Game Jam! We had almost 30 games made by 100+ participants. Thank you to EA Motive and Behaviour Interactive for sponsoring the event! You can check out the games using the theme “i made this for you” at the jam’s itch.io page.
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It has been an amazing 6 months with our 15 mentees and mentors. We had countless coffees together, worked on dozens of games and projects, visited Don’t Nod, Indie Asylum, Unity, MIGS and more! Thank you, CMF, for making this dream come true! Phase Two: Power Up kicks off in the new year, more on that in January <3
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Did you know that Global Game Jam supports tabletop games and other forms of non-digital design? We'll be talking to experienced site organizers and jammers about this very subject.
🗓️ December 11, 6 p.m. UTC/1 p.m. ET Sign up: https://luma.com/p4kkcuec
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We hope that you all find time to get some well-earned rest this holiday season. It is important to recharge and reset over the break. Take some time to play a new game, read a book, stroll to your local coffee shop (if it isn’t too cold!), and if you’re buying gifts - support your local artists!
In the meantime, follow us on socials to stay in touch: we want to know about your favourite holiday/cosy games!
XOXO The GAMERella Team
GAMERella will be closed from December 7th - January 7th, so email replies will come in the New Year!
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{softBoxWide|GAMERella Newsletter #6|blog/newsletters/6-3.jpg|squished|by GAMERella Team on 5th October 2025}
Hello once again lovely humans!
It’s been a busy summer at GAMERella HQ. As the leaves finally start to fall and the temperature isn’t making us all feel like delicious bread in an oven, we’re back with a newsletter to mark the end of the season.
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As always, GAMERella invites women (cis/trans), trans men, non-binary/genderqueer and 2-spirited folks, LGBTQIA+, BIPOC, and any others who feel they haven’t had a chance to make a game, to join GAMERella in a weekend of fun game-making on November 15-16, 2025.
Sign up at the Eventbrite here!
In-person location: District 3 Innovation Centre: Concordia University - FB building, 6th floor (1250 Rue Guy, Montréal, QC H3H 2L3)
Jam from home: You can also jam from anywhere! Sign up as a Discord participant, and you and your team will be able to access our online support package.
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As our sign-ups for the jam opens, so too do opportunities for folks to mentor our lovely jammers!
If you’d like to mentor at GAMERella 2025 please send:
to jam@gamerella.ca or courtney@gamerella.ca! Check out the full call here.
Many folks have been impacted by mass layoffs in the industry, so this year we will prioritise those between contracts or opportunities for jam mentoring roles - please feel free to highlight this as you wish on your application.
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We ran an industry panel for our mentees for the highs and lows of game industry work. Our wonderful panellists offered insights into their career trajectories and how to advocate for yourself within studio environments.
Thanks to Kim, Adrienne, Stevan, and Maxime for all your amazing insights!
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Courtney fulfilled a millennial must by appearing on the Girl Pod podcast with the lovely Candy and Lady V of Gamer Social Club and Gina was interviewed by their editor Dan Jackson!
Gina and Courtney also got the chance to chat with Luke Williams from Console Creatures about GAMERella - check out the interview here.
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QGCon (Queerness and Games Conference) returned in person after many, many years of online-only talks! And we wouldn’t miss it! QGCon brings together a phenomenal array of scholars, thinkers, artists, game developers, students, and activists to reflect, discuss, think about and play games together, from queer perspective.
GAMERella’s Gina Hara and GAMERella bestie Alex Custodio teamed up to discuss the importance of queer-driven research and its practical implementations. Gina talked about how our game jams are more than just your usual game-making marathon:
“The jam is the practical side of that inquiry: a continually unfolding experiment in how one would redesign access to the industry. Each jam we run is an invitation to individuals who have never seen themselves represented in games before. This community-driven practice is essential in my experience, because it demonstrates that another kind of games industry is not only possible but already happening in pockets of collective care.”
GAMERella Mentee Justin Roberts presented as well on their research around queer metagaming and long-time GAMERella mentor Jess Marcotte is one of the core organizing team members for QGCon!
Follow QGCon on socials and check out the list of amazing speakers and presenters who were there.
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That’s all from us for this newsletter. We’ll see you on the other side of GAMERella 2025!
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{softBoxWide|GAMERella Newsletter #5|blog/newsletters/5-1.png|squished|by GAMERella Team on 24th August 2025}
What’s up subscribers, GAMERella here with your Summer Newsletter to catch you up on all the latest GAMERella news!
Check it out, our Mentorship Program has been featured in articles by CGM and Lien Multimédia!
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Catch up with what we’ve been up to during the first summer of the Mentorship Program! Read our newest blog post here.
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We contributed a section in That’s My Jam: Understanding The Value of Game Jams , a white paper on the value of game jams and their jammers, by Michael Iantorno. Download it for free off the website!
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Fall is just around the corner — and so is our annual!! G A M E J A M!!
The Jam sign-up link will be live from September 12: https://gamerella2025.eventbrite.ca
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Can’t get enough of us? Follow us on Bluesky , Instagram , and LinkedIn to get your updates hot off the social feeds 🔥
The GAMERella Team
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{softBoxWide|GAMERella Newsletter #4|blog/newsletters/4-1.png|squished|by GAMERella Team on 11th July 2025}
Our mentees and mentors joined our Launch call on June 15th to officially start the program! We shared what’s in store over the next few months, had some introductions (it turns out many of us love Minecraft), and our mentees attended a Goals and Accountability workshop run by the wonderful Enric Llagostera, setting the whole crew up for success in the Press Start phase of the mentorship program.
We can already tell it is going to be a wonderful few months with this cohort, and we’re excited to share with you what they get up to along the journey!
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The 13th (ooh spooky!) edition of GAMERella Game Jam dates are ready to roll! The jam will be:
🎮 Saturday November 15th - Sunday November 16th 2025 🎮
Our sign-ups will open in September! You’ll be some of the first to know as our newsletter subscribers. Be sure to save these dates in your calendar - spaces go quickly!
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We’ve now got a News section on our website! Digest versions of our blogs will be in our newsletters, but if you want to read more on what we’re up to check it out here.
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GAMERella were delighted to be a part of the Ludodrome event last month at the SAT.
Of the 44 games on showcase, 5 were from our very own GAMERella jams! Created over just two days, these games represent what it means to take a weekend and simply have fun making something. To try something new, step away from regular work, and experiment with novel tools and ideas.
Check out more about our game-makers and their game, and the event in our blog post by Alexi!
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Hand Eye Society is preparing for their biggest annual event, SuperFEST , a multi-day hybrid showcase running November 1–7th. This year, they aim to double their inclusion of Canadian artists, and we recommend you apply! All selected artists are paid for exhibiting and showcasing their work!
Submissions are open until July 20th, and they’re looking for completed videogames, workshops, panels, and alt controller games.
Submission Link: https://filmfreeway.com/HES-SF25
HES have kindly offered us some waiver codes! Please email us for them!
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That’s all from us at GAMERella HQ. Remember that you can support us by following our socials, connecting us with folks looking to sponsor initiatives like ours, and spreading the word about what we do!
Thanks for reading,
The GAMERella Team
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{softBoxWide|GAMERella Newsletter #3|blog/newsletters/3-1.png|squished|by GAMERella Team on 2nd May 2025}
We’ve been busy at GAMERella HQ since we last sent a newsletter. Here are some upcoming things coming from us in the next couple of months:
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Applications are still open for our Mentorship Program for both mentees and mentors. Our two phase program is designed to help equity-deserving mentees break into the games industry with knowledge and confidence by developing professional skills, boosting their portfolio, and participating in networking opportunities. Mentees are paired with mentors hand-picked to best support their development through the program.
The program is two phases:
Thanks again to the CMF Changing Narratives and Sector Development Support Funds for supporting us and our ambitions.
Deadline to apply is May 5th!
Notice of acceptance goes out in late May.
For eligibility and more details, check out our website here!
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A segment following the GAMERella community at events, arcades, workshops and conferences! Come hang out with us :)
GAMERella @ LUDODROME Arcade!
When: Thursday, May 15th: 1 PM - 11 PM Where: Société des arts technologiques (SAT), Montreal
Come play with us at LUDODROME: an arcade celebrating the Montreal experimental games community!
We’ll be there to support 5 teams from past GAMERella jams as they showcase their work! Join us for a super fun (free!) night of playing indie games, chilling by the GAMERella campfire, and getting involved in the Montreal video game ecosystem!
Follow along with the event on Instagram: @ludodrome and @gamerellajam! We’ll be sharing some fun behind-the-scenes pics as we go :)
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Our friends at Weird Ghosts have the Baby Ghosts Peer Accelerator!
Are you an indie studio founder curious about cooperative and worker-centric models? Need time and space to focus on developing your studio’s operating and business models? Our Peer Accelerator could be for you!
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That’s all from us this time! Remember to follow us on our social media (links below) for other updates as they happen!
The GAMERella Team
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This year’s GAMERella (Nov 23-24th) is fast approaching, here’s a highlight of what’s coming up before the jam weekend!
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We are so excited to open sign-ups for the jam this year!
GAMERella 2024 will be hybrid: both in-person and online this year.
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All workshops will be hybrid as well: taking place at the 4th Space at Concordia University as well as online! No prior knowledge is necessary for any of the workshops.
Pixel Art Introduction and Applications w/ Hazel Thexton October 21st @ 1-3pm
Pixel art is a creative and fun way to make art, especially for video games. In this workshop, you’ll learn fundamental pixel art techniques, working with a limited palette, and some basic animation. Stay for the following Bitsy workshop to put your new skills to the test.
Bitsy Game Engine Introduction w/ Squinky October 21st @ 4-6pm
Bitsy is a tiny game engine that’s easy for beginners and a lot of fun. In this workshop, you’ll learn to make small games where you can explore worlds, talk to characters, and collect items. Apply the pixel art skills you learned in our preceding pixel art workshop in a practical context.
Blender Introduction and Applications w/ Owen Hellum November 5th @ 1-3pm
Blender is a free, open-source 3D modelling, texturing, animating, and rendering software. In this workshop, you’ll learn basic geometry and modelling techniques, as well as simple texturing and export best-practices. Stay for the following Unreal workshop to put your new skills to the test.
Unreal Game Engine Introduction w/ Leonardo Morales Vega November 5th @ 4-6pm
Unreal Engine is a powerful game engine, used everywhere from independent developers to industry veterans. In this workshop, you’ll learn the basics of Unreal and what it’s capable of. Explore everything from scene creation to character controllers, and even some basic examples of physics and triggered events. Apply the 3D models you created in our preceding Blender workshop in a practical context.
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Finally, we are sure you want to know the theme of the jam. So…
THE THEME…
…will be posted on our socials very soon! Go, follow us! ;)
We look forward to seeing some of you at the jam!
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Buckle up for an abundance of exclamation points because we’re EXCITED!!!
Our first, and most important, piece of news is that we’ve officially filed as an independent non-profit organization!
What does this mean? It means we’re our own entity. We’re in charge of finances, resources, operations, and everything else! A shout-out thank you to Eileen and Jenny at Weird Ghosts , and Jess and Squinky at Soft Chaos for answering our questions and giving guidance along the way!
Crack out your calendars to save the date for GAMERella 2024. We’ll be running our 12th instalment of GAMERella:
Saturday 23rd November - Sunday 24th November 2024
It’ll be hosted once again at the D3 Space at Concordia University, downtown Montreal.
We are currently raising funds, looking for partners and seeking experienced game-makers to mentor. If you would like to support GAMERella with your talent, time or funds please get in touch with us at jam@gamerella.ca and we’ll follow up with you!
We have a sparkly website: gamerella.ca
See our social media bubbles below!
Thanks to you all for your support, and here’s to promising futures at GAMERella!
Gina and Courtney
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