The BAFTA New Talent awards is an annual competition for people who have just begun their careers in the screen industries, or who have released their first work. The competition is open to students, graduates and newcomers of all shapes and sizes.
This year’s competition saw three very different games entered for the competition, one created by a small independent team to commemorate the Japanese Tsunami, one during the nine weeks of Dare To Be Digital and one at the 48 hour global games jam.
As it turns out, the title created in a mere 48 hours scooped the award. Lub Vs Dub, the local multiplayer game in which players race their opponent along a pulsing SCG line, caused the judge’s hearts to race.
It was a close run competition. The eerie, haunting and artistic first person commemorate-em-up 9.03m demonstrated that the FPS genre can offer far more than more photo realistic bullet holes. Attack Of The Ghastly Grey Matter’s frankly weird crane grabber alien abduct-em-up was instantly engaging and seriously stylish. Lub Vs Dub however, won on it’s sheer playability, simplicity and fun.
The awards cover areas from animation, writing, director of photography, screen acting, sound design and many of the different crafts rewarded within the mainstream screen industries. The inclusion of games is major recognition that the interactive sector has much to offer the wider screen world.
Since it was created at the 2013 Global Game Jam in Glasgow, Lub Vs Dub has done pretty well. In January it was chosen as App Of The Week and appeared in every Starbucks across the United States and Canada. In seven days the game was downloaded over 300,000 times.
Huge congratulations to Futuro, the team behind Lub Vs Dub. Commiserations to Space Budgie (9.03m) and Milksteak And The Jellybeans (Attack Of The Ghastly Grey Matter). The judges found the whole decision very difficult. All of the games were incredible…
You can find all of the winners and nominees of the 2014 BAFTA New Talent awards here.
You can also find and play all of the games which were nominated…
9.03m (Space Budgie) – PC (£1.59/$1.99)
Attack Of The Ghastly Grey Matter (Milksteak And The Jellybeans) – Android (free)
Lub Vs Dub (Futuro) – iOS (£.06/$0.99)