SAGA Award

(StyriAn Games Award)

We’re proud to announce that this year during Button Festival the third SAGA Awardsith a total value of EUR 1500 sponsored by UBIT/WKO and Game Dev Graz will be awarded!

This was the SAGA 2019, SAGA 2018, SAGA2017

Here are the details:

** Grand Prize **
* Audience Choice Award *
* Local Star Award *

There will be five named finalists selected by an international jury for the Grand Prize. Finalists will be given free passes to the Button Festival and space at the festival to present their games. The Audience Choice Award will be voted at the Button Festival by the audience of the festival from the finalists. The Local Star Award will be awarded to the best game from developers from/living in Styria.

Submit your game pitches here: SAGA 2020 Google Form
The winners will be announced at the Button Festival.

Criteria: The competition is also open for entries in the prototyping stage, and finalists will be mainly judged based on their potential. Submissions must include a 2-3 minute pitch-video including gameplay of the game. Games must be in a playable stage for the Button Festival and presenting the game live at the button festival.

Open to all independent game developers worldwide. Award winners from previous years are not eligible for re-submission.

Deadlines:

Feb 23, Preliminary Submission Deadline
Mar 4, Finalists Announced

May 9, Award Ceremony @ ~~Button Festival (May 8.-9 in Graz)~~ 23.12.2020 8PM twitch.tv/gamedevgraz

International Jury:

Tara J. Brannigan, Director of Player Experience at Behaviour Interactive, Canada
Tadej Gregoric, Co/founder, CPO at Coherence, Sweden
Sithé Ncube, Founder at Prosearium.net and Ubongo Game Lab, A MAZE Johannesburg, Zambia

Details Button festival: http://gamedevgraz.at/button2020

SAGA Finalists:: These five games will be exhibited in the Game Dev area as well @ button 2020:
SAGA Award :: Fourth Styrian Games Award will be presented at Button Festival!

Get to know the five finalists here:

Title: Galactic Conflict 2 PvP Battle (Bitmen Studios)

The game is primarily a real-time multiplayer PvP experience in a Sci-Fi setting for iOS. It offers two interesting layers, the strategic layer (card management and deck building) and the tactical layer (PvP old-school RTS combat).

Players collect spaceships and create a deck of 8 ships, then test their strategy against other players in a fast-paced multiplayer real-time online experience. During the match, players earn resources (minerals) they can use to build ships from their previously created deck and try to destroy the enemy planet while defending their own.

Games yield rewards that can be used to improve the player’s fleet. They can unlock new ships or improve the ones they have already unlocked.

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Title: B.i.t.Lock (Petorio)

B.i.t.Lock is a 2D puzzle game where you move different blocks in a grid-based system. These blocks can be shifted and shaped to create certain patterns, which are required to solve the puzzle. All blocks move at the same time in the same direction and interact with their environment. A puzzle is solved when the movable blocks fill out the required shape with a certain pattern.
You navigate through six different worlds with their own themes and mechanics and free the world bit by bit with each level solved. Each world has its own style of gameplay and requires different ways of thinking to solve the puzzles.

Title: Vintage Story (Anego Studios)

Vintage Story is an uncompromising wilderness survival sandbox game inspired by Lovecraftian horror themes. Find yourself in a ruined world reclaimed by nature and permeated by unnerving temporal disturbances. Relive the advent of human civilization, or take your own path.

Start out empty-handed and learn to survive by foraging, hunting, crafting, and fighting. Enter the stone age by knapping primitive stone tools and sculpting clay for essential pottery. Advance further by smelting copper for more powerful tools, creating bronze alloys, learning to work iron, and ultimately mechanizing common tasks.

Enter a vast open-world populated by a range of cute, strange, dangerous, and outright horrifying creatures. Vintage Story utilizes a great deal of procedural technology to create immensely diverse landscapes, climate conditions, and geological features to always keep exploration fresh and exciting.

Take on the role of a lost being in the body of a tall blue creature and discover the remnants of civilization. There is no linear storytelling; it is up to you to piece together who you are and what has happened from the little evidence that remains. During your journey, you will encounter wayward creatures, find old stories, battle temporal instability, and endure temporal storms.

Title: Weaving Tides (Follow the Feathers)

Weaving Tides is a charming single-player adventure set in a world of magic and textile. Ride on the backs of your carpet dragons and explore the stunning landscape soaring above and diving below the weave.
Call your Weaver and set out on a journey to explore ancient dungeons, solve puzzles, challenge quirky creatures and unravel the great mysteries of a long-forgotten past!
• Dive into an enchanting, woven world and reveal secret pathways.
• Stitch and cut your way through the textile landscape and wrap up your foes using your Weavers unique stitching abilities.
• Solve tricky textile puzzles that are scattered across the world.
• Conquer Zelda-like dungeons but beware of their fearsome guardians!
• Befriend different Weavers, choose the one that fits your playstyle.
• Outfit your Weavers with mystic embroideries to enhance their abilities.
• Uncover hidden mysteries packed in a charming story.

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Title: Pixel Soldier (Accidently Awesome)

Pixel Soldier is a fast-paced game about fighting frantic bosses, while quickly dodging their attacks. Disregard gravity while walking on walls and jumping from one side of the room to another. With a minimalist yet dynamic 4-color aesthetic that doesn’t distract from the pure arcade action gameplay.