Hey Reader! Emily Vincent here. Some of you know that last year I decided to branch out from game design into game publishing. I see so many great designs in our online community and wanted to become a part of bringing those games to tables around the world. As part of this process I applied for and was accepted to the GAMA Horizons Fellowship program, an accelerator for emerging publishers and retailers from historically underrepresented groups in the tabletop industry. I'm excited to share with you all that the Fellowship is now open for applicants to the 2025 class! GAMA Horizons Fellowship Applications are OpenThe GAMA Horizons Fellowship is a eight-month accelerator program for prospective and newly established tabletop game publishers and retail store owners. It was created by GAMA’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee to help address the needs of communities that have been historically underrepresented in the tabletop industry. Now in its fourth year, the Horizons Fellowship connects participants with industry professionals who will serve as mentors and peer coaches, and will provide access to grants and resources essential to developing and sustaining successful business relationships. The new cohort of Fellows will start the program in September. This year’s program will include travel and accommodations for GAMA Expo in Louisville, KY from February 23-27, 2025, and the Origins Game Fair June 18-22, 2025. My personal experience has been that the Fellowship was a huge boost to my publishing company. The Fellowship comes with a significant financial benefit as well as some great educational opportunities. I would add that there are also some amazing intangible benefits, with one of the largest being the growth in my network to now include retailers, distributors, media, and more. I'm also connected to a small group of publishers and retailers who are at the same phase of their business, so there have been many opportunities to learn together as a cohort. Additionally, the experience of putting together and running my own booth under the mentorship of an experienced publisher is a huge leg up as I look toward future conventions. The Publisher Fellowship is best suited for a publisher that has one or two published games OR a publisher that is getting ready to produce their first game. Previous year's Fellows ranged from those preparing to launch a Kickstarter to those who'd already launched to those who had self-funded their first game. The Retailer Fellowship is well suited to those who are preparing to start their retail company as well as those who have recently stood up their company. While our Protospiel Online community is global, the Horizons Fellowship is only available to those in the United States and Canada.
That’s it for now. Stay tuned for more awesome events, community opportunities, and updates about games tested at Protospiel! ~Emily P.S. If you have something you'd like to see featured in our Community Newsletter, you have 3 options -- either submit an official feature request, reply to this message, or, if you're a current attendee or alumni, post in the #🙌share-your-wins channel in the Protospiel Online Discord server to let us know the details. We'd love to celebrate you! |
We love helping our community of game designers and playtesters find encouragement and connection through our virtual conventions and the supporting content like our Twitch streams, YouTube channel, and Community Newsletter. It lights us up to see all the amazing milestones Protospiel community members are reaching with their game designs.
Hey Reader! David Kessler here. Indie Games Night Market at PAX Unplugged The Indie Games Night Market is coming to PAX Unplugged on Dec 7th, 2024, and three vendor tables will have games by Protospiel Community members! In the same vein as the Tokyo Game Market, the Indie Games Night Market serves as an in-person marketplace for small batch, unique games that would otherwise have no channel for purchase. The featured games have not been signed by publishers and have no intention to go on a...
Hey Reader! Emily Vincent here. I know many of us are looking for help in getting our games out there, whether it's connecting to a publisher or self-publishing. There are a couple of cool opportunities in the next month that might help you on these journeys, so today I'm sharing these opportunities in case you missed them! Panda Next Big Game Giveaway (Gen Con) Panda is looking to manufacture the Next Big Game. This is a contest that's specific for folks who are attending Gen Con, since the...
Hey Reader! David Kessler here. July is an exciting month for games tested at Protospiel Online. Two games from the early days--we're talking 2020--have found a place in the world this month. Scattered Nexus was tested at PO in October 2020, and again in May 2023. Sinoda was brought to PO in July 2020, and later in January 2022. Congratulations to the creators of these games! The 2024 Edition of Scattered Nexus is live on Kickstarter Scattered Nexus is an ongoing passion project that will...