Friday, April 18, 2008

...and we have the Pelixi winners!

Pelixi is a game concept and demo competition for Finnish children and youth under 21 year of age. The competition was arranged by The Centre of School Clubs.

The best game concept and game demo were awarded today at Heureka Science Center. Game concept Nivium won the grand prix of Pelixi concept category and Kiertoradalla (On the Orbit) game demo category. The idea of Nivium is to generate snowflakes from crystal pieces. The game is a rhythm game where the player has to tap the buttons at right time and at right order. There are various shapes, colors and sizes of crystals and different shapes create different sounds. The player will be awarded by the complexity, aesthetics and musical aspects of the snowflake. For Toshio Iwai fans Nivium most likely reminds a bit of Electroplankton game made for Nintendo DS and influenced by Toshio Iwai's earlier media art pieces such as "Composition on the Table" and "Sim Tunes".

On the Orbit is a game where the player has to do various tasks at the Space Ship. Some of the tasks will be carried out in a quiz format. The game could be interesting "learning environment" for space enthusiasts but also pleasant casual game.

Eight game concepts or demos were awarded at the competition. It was interesting to see how many game concepts obviously were influenced by Pokemon, The Sims or different racing games. It was also a bit pity that only four girls participating the competition but interesting to see that girls' games were quite stereotypical "pay it forward" friendship adventures where as boys' games were often versions of their favorite games or game types.

The results of the competition in Finnish.

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