GameCity5

Nottingham, 14/10/10 – GameCity, the World’s best-loved videogames festival, today announced the latest addition to GameCity5’s line-up, with Chris Hecker’s upcoming espionage thriller, Spy Party. Invitation to a Spy Party will take place in the Council House Ballroom on Thursday 28 ^th, from 10:30am-12pm and will be playable in the GameCityLounge from 2-6pm as part of GameCity5, which runs from October 26 – 30 ^th throughout Nottingham.

A penchant for vodka martinis, fast cars, beautiful women and a license to kill. GameCity has none of these, but in their place brings Chris Hecker to show his highly anticipated espionage title, Spy Party, for its very first public hands-on outside of North America, only at GameCity5.

Since its debut at PAX last year, the world has waited with baited breath for Hecker’s master class in subtlety, deception and subversion to reemerge, and this year’s GameCitizens will gain an insight into this unique title with its latest build and developer insight delivered by its creator.

From 10:30am-12pm, Invitation to a Spy Party will place Hecker under the spotlight and force a confession into its making, while from 2-6pm, Spy Party will be available to play for those eager to see more.

GameCity Director Iain Simons said, “Chris is widely known as one of the most talented programmers around, though few people know that during the development of Spy Party he also became an expert marksman, adept at hand to hand combat and a smooth talker.”

Focusing on subtle interactions as opposed to overblown action, Spy Party pits players against one another as undercover agents, tasking them to read facial ticks, decode body language and tackle situations with brains over brawn in a race against time.

Chris Hecker’s Introduction to a Spy Party is just one part of GameCity5, the yearly festival from GameCity that explores and celebrates videogames culture. For the full details on the festival line-up, go to www.gamecity.org. To book your attendance at this event, go to http.my.gamecity.org

NOTES TO EDITOR

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*GameCityNights is a series of after-dark monthly events that brings together developers, students and players in a celebration and exploration of videogame culture - with prizes. Every month a brilliant headline speaker will be making their way to Nottingham to share their thoughts, passions and give a unique insight into their work.

GameCity is what a videogame festival should be. 

The Centre for Contemporary Play is a research centre based at Nottingham Trent University which pioneers innovative thinking through new partnerships. Since 2008 it has worked with a variety of leading organisations from the commercial and public sector to deliver major research and inclusion projects. These include the ITAG conference, the GameCity videogame festival and the National Videogame Archive - a unique collaboration with the National Media Museum.

Driven by leading thinking at NTU, the Centre for Contemporary Play continues to create radical and innovative projects in the academic and public engagement space.

Gamecity’s aim is to bring together developers and the public to explore and celebrate videogames and videogames culture, with a particular focus on students. We attract the best speakers in the world, offer up-and-coming artists and developers a platform for their games and create totally unique events.

Some of GameCity’s greatest hits include a world-record breaking zombie gathering, Keita Takahashi designing a children’s playground and Masaya Matsuura, Lorne Lanning, Alexey Pajitnov and Media Molecule having headlined.

We’ve worked alongside some of the most prominent names in gaming, including; Warner Bros, TTGames, Crytek, Activision, Namco Bandai, SCEE, Xbox, Ubisoft, Electronic Arts, Nintendo, Freestyle Games, David Braben, Media Molecule, Splash Damage, Harmonix, Rare, Denki, Monumental Games, Midway, Zoe Mode, ThatGameCompany, Nana-on-Sha and lots more.

Going way beyond just playing games, GameCity offers other new ways for people to interact with videogame culture. Art exhibitions, director commentaries, playground building, live recreations of videogames, gigs, gong-shows, three World Records, arcade trails, club nights – nothing is off limits for this most radical of videogame festivals.

Don’t just take our word for it, see what others have said after working with us,

GameCity looks poised to become our industry’s ?rst Sundance. A truly unique approach for hosting a game festival that seems long overdue.

Lorne Lanning, Oddworld Inhabitants

GameCity is unique. Any games festival that can reunite industry legends, lead to a Japanese game developer designing a playground, and evoke religious sentiments in a shopping centre is doing something very right for sure.

Edge Magazine

The year’s most inventively programmed new arts festival

The Times