Following yesterday’s Summer Game Fest showcase, indie game collection The MIX was set to host an in-person event in downtown Los Angeles. Indie developers from around the world showed up to demo more than 40 new games for media and fans during the event, but just moments before the show opened its doors, the city’s fire marshal shut the entire thing down.At 5:17pm on Thursday, just 43 minutes before the event was scheduled to begin, The MIX sent out a cryptic email to attendees stating that the event had been canceled, with no other information. A half hour later,the MIX’s Twitter account explainedthat that event had to be canceled due to “circumstances that were outside of our control”. Developers at the event, who were already setup for demos and now had to scramble to pack up and leave,claimed that, unbeknownst to The MIX, the event space did not have the proper permits in order, forcing it to shut down. This would have been a catastrophic situation for the studios attending, many of which are run by teams as small as a single dev, if not for the quick thinking of streamer and video game preservationist Jirard the Completionist.Related:All The Games You Missed At Summer Game FestJirard, who recently made headlines forbuying every 3DS and Wii U game before the eShop closed down, was scheduled to host a livestream from the event, showcasing several of the games there on Twitch for those who were unable to attend in person. When the event shut down, Jirard quickly made arrangements to bring as many devs as possible back to his office, turning the event into an impromptu, all-night livestream showcase.Three hours later, around 9:30pm,Jirard went live. Over the next six hours Jirard interviewed devs and demoed gameplay for 22 different games, including Crashlands 2, Animal Well, Gunbrella, and Blackout Protocol. The stream continued until after 3am, and though not all of the developers that came to the MIX event could have their games featured, Jirard promised that the developers whose games were not featured will get a chance to be in a future stream.
The stream, which you can watch at any time onThe Completionist Twitch page, will be particularly interesting to those that miss the all day livestream coverage we used to get during E3. Before the pandemic the big E3 press conferences would be followed by five days of livestreams just like the one Jirard hosted. Hundreds of developers would get a chance to show off their games on big Twitch channels like Nintendo Treehouse Live, E3’s official channel, and various major outlets like IGN and Giant Bomb. That’s a crucial staple of summer gaming that was lost when E3 ended, and even though he hadn’t intended to, TheCompletionist was able to bring it back in a small way.
The MIX was already going to be indie’s answer to the big corporate-funded Summer Games Fest show, but the way Jirard was able to turn a bad situation into a celebration of indie games is a special moment that should be celebrated. It goes to show how important community is to gaming, and it’s a helpful reminder to acknowledge the people and passion behind the games we love. In a weekend full of big publisher press conferences and high-profile reveals, the Completionist’s impromptu indie showcase might be the most important event of all.
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