The Casual Games Association, a world-wide organization for the video games industry that hosts the Casual Connect conferences, has finally ended after a fun and eventful successful show at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Belgrade. Those that missed our coverage last week can check out the full archive here along with photos here and here. Earlier in the year we attended Casual Connect USA which took place in San Francisco. The full archive of our coverage for that event can be seen here.

Here’s some highlights from the Causal Connect Belgrade event:

• This conference marks the first time Casual Connect Eastern Europe has been held in Serbia.
• Over 1,000 professionals from 51 countries in attendance.
• Over 400 developers in attendance, with 24 countries represented in the Indie Prize Showcase.
• More than 60 lectures from companies including Nordeus, Eipix, Mad Head Games, Creative Mobile, Facebook, Seriously, Wooga, HeroCraft, Fun 2 Robots Ltd., as well as Unity who provided a full Developer Day.

Lectures at Casual Connect Belgrade included a wide range of topics like industry insights, the indie experience, and game development across platforms from mobile, PC, console, as well as web.

Select Speakers

1. Mirko Topalski, Eipix
2. Vladimir Funtikov, Creative Mobile
3. Bob Slinn, Facebook
4. Leonid Eletskikh, App Annie
5. Nick Berry, Facebook
6. Connor O’Sullivan, Nordeus
7. Katya Nemova, Wargaming
8. Vladimir Zivkovic, Eipix
9. Alina Brazdeikene, Signus Labs
10. Jaroslav Stacevic, Nordcurrent

For the full list of speakers, be sure to check out the official Casual Connect Eastern Europe website here. Additionally, some of the videos from the conference can be seen at Gamesauce.org. Looking towards the future, Casual Connect turns their focus their next conference — Casual Connect Europe in Amsterdam on February 4th — 6th, 2015. Similar companies like Unity, Gamepoint, Glu Mobile, Playtika, and others will attend which we’ve seen previously at the San Francisco and Belgrade event. A full list of speakers can be seen here.

Last but certainly not least, PocketFullOfApps also hopes to attend the event and be apart of a panel for a change of pace. While we’ll still do our typical coverage with photos and recaps, taking part in a panel discussion would be a lot of fun. The Indie Prize winners will also get a nice prize from us as well just like previous conferences. Continue reading this post ->

Casual Connect Belgrade has been an absolute blast this year and there were numerous good games from all over the world showcased at the Indie Prize floor. Being apart of the judging process, there was much debate and discussion on which games should win the awards. Out of the 40+ games showcased at the event, only of the seven walked away with a highly elusive prize. Below you can find a list of the categories along with the name of the game, developer, and location.

• Best Game Art – STEAMPUNKER by Telehorse, Poland
• Most Innovate Game – Gauge by Etienne Perrin, France
• Most Promising Game In Development – Skyhill by The Mandragora Team, Russia
• Best Game Design – Out There by Mi-Clos Studio, France
• Best Family Friendly Game – Train Valley by Flazm & Oroboro, Russia
• Best Game In Show: Aufience Choice – Mayan Death Robots by Sileni Studios, Belgium
• Best Game In Show: Critics’ Choice – Awakening of Heroes by COFA Games, Serbia

“The Indie Prize Showcase in Belgrade turned out great,” says Yulia Vakhrusheva, Director of Indie Prize. “An impressive variety of games was demoed in this showcase: from match-3 to endless runners to FPS and role playing games. Many potential partnerships have started here.”

The judges included Nick Berry, Facebook; Oscar Clark, Unity; Candy Yang, Aarki; Djordje Radulovic, Power Up Digital, myself, as well as a number of other journalists. The showcase and its prizes were sponsored by Amazon, Intel, Plantronics Gaming, Unity, PocketFullOfApps, Photon Realtime and Splitforce. What’s also neat about Indie Prize is that they provide an “Indie Prize Scholarship” which allows for qualified indie development teams to showcase their games at Casual Connect and get some assistance or discount.

The next Casual Connect will take place in Amsterdam from February 4th – 6th. Continue reading this post ->

In addition to the Big Fish Rock Star Party, Nordeus is hosting the Indie Prize Awards Ceremony starting tonight at 9:00 PM at New Bitef. There will be a party immediately afterwards with plenty of drinks, music, networking and fun. To our knowledge, this is the last post-conference party for Causal Connect Belgrade, so if you have a chance we highly recommend you come out and celebrate.

• Location: New Bitef, Mitropolita Petra 8, Belgrade
• Time: 9:00 PM – 1:00 AM (2100 – 0100)
• Other: round trip shuttles between Crowne Plaza and New Bitef from 8:30 PM – 1:00 AM (20:30 – 1:00)

Interested? Be sure to check out these two Facebook event pages here and here. Continue reading this post ->

After a successful and very fun first day at Casual Connect Belgrade, it’s time to play some more fantastic games. Later tonight at 9:00 PM local time, the winners of the Indie Prize contest will be announced at the Indie Prize Awards Ceremony. Those who are interested in attending can check out the full event details here. Just like the Casual Connect San Francisco event there’s some close competition, so it’ll be interesting to see how everything plays out. Once we find do find out who the winners are, we’ll let you know as soon as possible.

Photos

Updates

Stay tuned.

• 10:15 AM — First speeches and sessions have begun. Indie Prize floor is slowly building up with people, however, it should be packed later today.
• 10:30 AM — We were able to secure an adapter/converter for our computer equipment, big thanks to Yulia for helping us out.
• 10:45 AM — Taking some pictures, will update later. More people are still coming into the Indie Prize area.
• 11:00 AM — Listened to Leonid Eleskik’s session on trends impacting the international game market. Overall, it was fairly interesting and had some good insights and tips for developers.
• 11:30 AM — Played a few rounds Mayan Death Robots. Took some time getting used to the gameplay and controls, but it’s somewhat similar to the Worms franchise. After getting the hang of the controls, it was a lot of fun.
• 12:00 PM — Got a demo of Data Wars. Despite being in an early development stage, the game is well made and the graphics remind us of the Tron movies. We’re definitely looking forward to seeing the final version of the game sometime next year.
• 12:30 PM — Lunch provided by Big Fish Games again. Great food and lots to choose from. Thanks!
• 3:30 PM — Judging as finally concluded! There was much debate and tough decisions made, so tonight’s Indie Prize Awards Ceremony will be pretty stellar. While we can’t let the cat of the bag early, we’ll keep you updated later tonight and tomorrow on the winners.

You can see the Indie Prize Belgrade website here.

Session Highlights

All times in CET/local time (Belgrade, Serbia). Full the full list, see this link.

• 1o:00 AM — 7 Tips to set up a game studio and survive — Petr Benysek, MADFINGER Games
• 11:00 AM — One of Mobile’s Greatest Success Stores – QuizUp — Spencer Scott, Fiksu
• 11:30 AM — The Biggest Trends Impacting the International Game Market Today — Leonid Eleskikh, App Annie
• 2:00 PM — Go HTML 5 or Die! Reasons Why You Should Diversify Your Content Strategy — Rakesh Raju, TreSensa
• 2:30 PM — Beginner’s Guide for Kids – Building Your Community from the Ground Up — Taras Leskiv, Nravo Kids
• 3:00 PM — TargetMail.ru: A Brand New Look at App Ad Monetization — Dmitry Shkolnikov, Mail.Ru Group