Interview: TOVG crew outlines IndieLand 2023 & teases bright future ahead TOVG\/ Sabotage StudiosThe indie game showcase IndieLand will be running for its seventh year in a row in 2023. We spoke to Jirard Khalil and Michael Barrye of TOVG about the shift for this year\u2019s event, as well as what the team has planned for the future. The annual indie celebration run by the team at That One Video Gamer has come quite a long way since its origins in 2018. With 2023\u2019s event still to come, the team is setting up a more refined and technical showcase this year, instead of looking to go overboard with what could end up as a messier show. One of the donation incentives for IndieLand 2019 was to host the event live. Though with the global crisis in 2020, this live iteration was pushed back to 2022. IndieLand was held in Los Angeles that year and proved to be a huge success. This year, however, TOVG announced that IndieLand 2023 would be an online-only event once again, with viewers able to \u2018attend\u2019 via streaming platforms like Twitch or YouTube. When asked about the reason behind this decision, Barrye spoke about wanting a \u201ctighter, stellar show\u201d, as opposed to breaking their limits. IndieLand in 2023 to be a \u201ctighter\u201d show overall \u201cJiard pulled me into his office and was like, hey Mikey, \u2018I wanna talk about IndieLand. We\u2019re doing too much, we have taken on so many projects this year\u2026\u2019 We\u2019re not normally the type of people, for better or for worse, who recognize our limits,\u201d Barrye said. \u201cThis was a time when Jirard was like, \u2018we need to recognize our limits.\u2019 Yes, we absolutely could have done the event again in person, however, all the things that we had talked about would not have necessarily manifested the way that we wanted them to.\u201d \u201cBased on everything that we currently have going on looking at the calendar, it will serve us better overall to put on a stellar, tighter show that is digital than a more bombastic and half-developed show.\u201d Looking to the future of IndieLand Whilst IndieLand 2023 has been somewhat locked in, the TOVG team is already eyeing what\u2019s to come, more than hopeful for the future of the event. \u201cWe would love to be comparable and in some ways, we kind of are like being The Game Awards and being able to break exclusives. Last year we presented the trailer for Blossom Tales II: The Minotaur Prince. PlayTonic Friends provided us with the game trailer, so that was very, very exciting.\u201d Alongside the opportunity to unveil indie games, the team is hoping to continue the trend of showcasing exclusive game builds specifically made for IndieLand as well. The team has \u201ckicked around\u201d several ideas, however much of them require large productions like game jams and conventions, which require bigger sums of money. \u201cThe reality is, is that we are self-funding and a lot of the self-funding that we do is dependent on how I do as the owner of a business,\u201d Jirard explained. So, you know, if The Completionist has a good year, then sure, IndieLand will have a good year. If The Completionist doesn\u2019t have a good year, then it\u2019s digital.\u201d Looking toward the future, however, Jirard would love for IndieLand to be the indie game reveal stream with world premieres aplenty, giving indie developers their time in the spotlight more than ever. Even if some changes do come in the future of IndieLand, the TOVG team would love to remain true to sharing visceral conversations with developers. \u201cIt\u2019s the people who make these games, in this kind of Hot Ones exposure-esque format. They\u2019re not really doing the hot sauce stuff, but the aspect of them just being so raw and real with themselves and us in the moment. To show us their heart and what they\u2019ve been working on is a herculean task that only some can do. \u201cThe fact that we tell developers, \u2018hey, you\u2019re gonna come on and talk to The Completionist\u2026\u2019 one of two things happen. They go, \u2018oh, holy crap, Jirard, The Completionist. That\u2019s insane. I don\u2019t wanna do that.\u2019 \u201cOr option two is, \u2018I like that guy. I know who he is. Yeah, I\u2019ll talk to Jirard, it sounds awesome.\u2019\u201d The largest hope for Jirard, however, is to make an impact that will hopefully inspire others to follow in his steps and honor the legacy of all they\u2019ve done. \u201cMy motto in the company is that I am here in this space to make an impact and to make it so that when I am long gone from this industry, we will have made such a large impact that everyone who comes after us will honor what we\u2019ve done with our legacy and continue to carry that torch that we\u2019ve kind of established.\u201d We interviewed the TOVG crew over a three-part series. You can catch up on Part 1 & Part 2 here. IndieLand will return on October 20 \u2013 22 2023 and can be viewed on The Completionist Twitch channel.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Interview: TOVG crew outlines IndieLand 2023 & teases bright future ahead TOVG\/ Sabotage StudiosThe indie game showcase IndieLand will be running for its seventh year in a row in 2023. We spoke to Jirard Khalil and Michael Barrye of TOVG about the shift for this year\u2019s event, as well as what the team has planned […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-82388","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82388","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=82388"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82388\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=82388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=82388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}