May 052006
 

Raigan BurnsI’ve done a fair amount of writing about Raigan and Mare, two indie game developers I know. This 10 minute documentary I made was a bit of a revelation, however: instead of writing about how fun and stylish their game was, I could show it. Instead of talking about how they’re not your typical nerd coders, I could show them in person. It’s the cardinal rule at writing school — showing, rather than telling — and with this project I realized that video was really good at this. As the kids say, it’s a powerful medium, but I seem to always have to learn these trite truisms myself before I believe them.

I’m going to be screening this video and my six other videogame shorts at a screening of Pleasure Circuit Overload at the megacool Blim Gallery in Vancouver. Monday May 8th, 8pm, $5-7 sliding scale. If you can’t make it, click through to see my mini-doc.

  6 Responses to “Freeware Rebellion”

  1. Great game. Great documentary. Just stumbled across your blog. I love finding stuff like this on the web.

    BTW, there is another metanet interview here:
    http://www.gotoandplay.it/spotLight/N/

  2. Excellent, excellent documentary. I’ve been playing N for almost two years and now administrate at Metanet’s forum (metanet.2.forumer.com). It’s been cool to watch how things have progressed for Mare and Raigan and to see the awards they’ve received for their work.

    It’s always kind of inspiring to see what two people can do in their spare time that affects so many people. The line about playing guitar “to be a really good guitar player or … because you want to write songs” really strikes a chord with me. This documentary is really nice work, and you’ve really done us all a favor by making it.

  3. […] Tim at Independent Gaming found a link to a great documentary, Freeware Rebellion. It’s nice to see the faces behind the excellent game N, and to learn about their motivations and inspirations, and to find out they’re Canadian. N has long been a favourite of mine, so consider this a plug if you haven’t yet tried it. Kenta Cho’s name also comes up, in a discussion of style and substance in games. A very interesting video, thanks Tim. […]

  4. Very interesting documentary. I have much respect for the makers behind my favorite indie and freeware games. I’m also an N player, just about two years for me as well, and the ride has been just lovely. It’s crazy when you become part of a community when a game goes from low to high profile. When the game got more media coverage, we saw jumps in the number of members, players, and maps being posted. It was insane.

    There are many games out there that deserve so much more respect and popularity than they receive. Aside from N, I believe that these games deserve shoutouts: Notrium, any Kenta Cho game, Grid Wars, Cave Story, Bontago, any e-Games games, Little Fighter 2, Pogo Sticker, StepMania, Soldat, Space Cowboy, and Nexuiz. All of these guys make free gaming part of normal life to me.

    Some parts were hard to hear for me though (mostly Mare’s speech), so maybe we can get a subtitled version of this documentary? Otherwise, this was an excellent interview. It’s definately worth a save.

  5. […] Eine tolle Mini-Dokumentation über Metanet, die Macher des hervorragenden Plattformspiels N. Download der Doku als Quicktime-Film bei No Media Kings. […]

  6. Inspiring. Everytime I play this game I am in awe. Something about it just makes my heart skip a beat.

    Personally, I’ve been playing N for about a year now. I’ve made roughly around four-hundred maps. The community surrounded by N is amazing. Not just the game, but everyone around the world who plays it has changed my life. I would love to get into programing someday.

    Amazing job. Thanks for your contribution to the gaming world, M & R.

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