IGDA Finland February Gathering - 20th February 2007

Dear developer colleagues! Next IGDA Finland Gathering is again fast approaching! The heart of winter is upon us - at least it has been this week. But come rain or snow, sunshine or storm, you can rely on the IGDA Gathering bringing you joy. So come join us at the IGDA Finland Gathering in two weeks! There's no special programming this month, just good company, great conversations and cool beer.

IGDA FINLAND FEBRUARY GATHERING

Place: System Rock, Keskuskatu 4, 00100 Helsinki (map) Time: Tuesday 20th February, doors open at 19.00

Don't forget to bring your handheld consoles!

Come one, come all! Jyri - IGDA Finland Chapter Coordinator

Look Back at 2006 - A Record-Setting Year

2006 was a Record-Setting Year for Finnish Game Industry. What a year it was!

Countless awards, great reviews for many Finnish developed games and the developers themselves. When was the last time you remember a Finnish game receiving 10/10 in any major review source? When was the last time Finnish developers & their games were nominated 17 times on IGN's Best of Year awards?

And IGDA Finland has done great as well. We have managed to grow in every area - memberships, size of invitation mailing list, maturity & size of volunteer organization and most importantly in our attendance.

In my earlier post, I was just looking at Fall 2006 numbers, due to the fact that we organize our IGDA activities based on seasons which run from August to July. So we usually track our activities in three periods: Fall, Spring and the full Season.

But if we take the numbers for the whole year, from January 2006 to December 2006, they are nearly as impressive:

- 11 organized events - total of 1301 attendees - Average attendance of 118.27 - Minimum attendance 53 - Maximum attendance 210 - Memberships grew from 87 to 180 (106.9% yearly growth) - Invitation list grew from 480 to 587 (22.29% yearly growth)

These growth numbers would not have been possible had we not developed our organization further during the year as well. Here's a list of the major changes in our organization:

- 6 person Advisory Board formed - 2 new people added to the Advisory Board - 2 Student Volunteers stepped up to become Chapter Coordinators - 4 new Student Volunteers joined - Total number of volunteers rose from 21 to 25 (includes Advisory Board, Chapter Coordinators & Student Volunteers)

A big thanks to all people who are involved and volunteer their free time with such dedication - You are the force that keeps IGDA Finland going! With a historically successful year like 2006 behind us, I look forward to the challenge of matching, maybe even exceeding, that success in 2007. Above all else, I hope you all keep coming to the IGDA Gatherings!

- Jyri Ranki, Lead Coordinator

January Gathering - 23rd January 2007

Finnish Game Developers! Holidays are over and Finnish winter has been exceptionally depressing this year - unless one likes rain that is. But first IGDA Gathering of the year is here to bring you some joy. After an exceptional fall term, it is time to start the Spring half of our 2006-2007 season. No big programming this month, just good company, good conversations and cool beer.

IGDA FINLAND JANUARY GATHERING Place: System Rock, Keskuskatu 4, 00100 Helsinki (map) Time: Tuesday 23rd January, doors open at 19.00

Don't forget to bring your handheld consoles!

Come one, come all! Jyri - IGDA Finland Chapter Coordinator

Fall 2006 - Tremendous Growth for IGDA Finland

With Average Attendance of 146, Final Figures for Fall of 2006 Show Tremendous Growth for IGDA Finland It has been a great fall and our 2006-2007 season is off to a great start. In the last 5 months, we have organized 5 gatherings, the last two of them with sponsoring. In December we had our most labour intensive program to organize in IGDA Finland history, in cooperation with AMD, AMO / Nintendo Suomi and Samsung. Looking at the numbers, I can only be happy with the results of our group of volunteers.

When compared to last year figures during the same period, we have achieved some considerable growth in attendance. In the Fall 2005, our average attendance was 98.75 attendees/gathering. This fall it has been 146.4 attendees/gathering. That's a growth of almost 50%! Even if we exclude the attendance numbers from sponsored gatherings, we have still achieved 45% growth in average attendance.

We have also managed to grow the number of actual IGDA memberships. In July 2006, IGDA Finland had 162 members. By the end of the year, we now have 180 members! That's huge! That means Finland is #5 country in IGDA memberships, behind such game industry heavy weights such as US, Canada, UK and Japan.

This fall also saw the re-launch of igda.fi, with all it's improvements. The website is not only better looking, but we have managed to update it more regularly and provide more interesting content for it. Since the release of the new website we have seen a rapid growth month to month: from 213 unique visitors per month in August to whopping 1022 in December. Truly remarkable progress, which really validates that the website re-launch has been a huge success!

And last but not least, we have grown the size of the invitation mailing list as well. In July 2006, we had 541 people on the list, now we have 587.

Here are all of these afore-mentioned stats in pure numbers:

Average Attendance - Fall 2005: 98.75 - Fall 2006: 146.40 - growth: 48.25% Average Attendance w/o sponsored gatherings - Fall 2005: 72.00 - Fall 2006: 104.33 - growth: 44.90% Memberships - Summer 2006: 162 - End of year 2006: 180 - growth: 11.11% Size of invitation mailing list: - Summer 2006: 541 - End of year 2006: 587 - growth: 8.5%

- Jyri Ranki, Lead Coordinator

IGDA Finland Xmas Party - 12th December 2006

Fellow Finnish Game Developers! IGDA Finland December Gathering - Christmas Party SPONSORED BY AMD, NINTENDO SUOMI / AMO & SAMSUNG Place: System Rock, Keskuskatu 4, 00100 Helsinki (map: http://igda.fi/?page_id=5) Time: Tuesday 12th December, doors open at 19.00

The year is drawing to a close and it is time to gather once more before we all head for well deserved Christmas holidays. After the phenomenal success of our November Gathering it is now time to end the year on an even higher note!

The December Gathering will be our first Christmas Party (or pikkujoulut in Finnish) for IGDA Finland. This means we have something special in store for those who take a break from all the pre-Christmas hassle and joins us at System Rock. Not all the details have been locked yet and we haven't finalized our third sponsor deal, but we can already reveal that we will have: -DRINK TICKETS sponsored by AMD! (* 3 tickets per person, while tickets last. Doors open at 19.00 sharp.)

- 2 x NINTENDO WII provided by Nintendo Suomi / AMO - 2 x 40" LCD TV's provided by Samsung - COMPETITION(s) & etc.

In the spirit of Christmas, AMD (www.amd.fi) will be sponsoring the drink tickets. There will be 2 NINTENDO WII consoles for you to play at the event, courtesy of NINTENDO SUOMI / AMO (www.nintendo.fi), played on beautiful 40" LCD TV's courtesy of SAMSUNG!

But that's not all Nintendo has in store for you. If you bring your Nintendo DS you can download free demos to it. And if you also bring along a copy or Brain Training or Animal Crossing, you'll get a chance to download some new special content for it.

There will also be a competition where you can win great prices, generously donated by AMD and NINTENDO SUOMI / AMO!

So mark it on your calendar and come on, come all!

Ho ho ho, Merry X-mas! Jyri - Santa's Little Helper