The selection committee was composed of professionals with expertise in various aspects of the industry:
- Valérie Hénaire, independent producer
- Yanick Piché, Lead Game Designer at Gearbox Studio Québec
- Vincent Bergeron, Lawyer, Trademark Agent and Partner at ROBIC
- Julien Lassonde, Partner in charge of the tax credits and government incentives at PwC, Montreal and Québec City
Below is the project summary of each selected studio. Learn more on April 4!
01 Studio
01 Studio was founded in Saint-Hyacinthe in 2017 by Sébastien Couture and Dany Gervais. For CATAPULTE, they are presenting Citywars Savage, a massively multiplayer game where each player must build their own city and develop or expand their territory by attacking other players, solo or in teams.
Non-player characters (NPCs) can also be programmed to accomplish very specific tasks, such as helping gather resources, defending the territory, etc.
Beyond Fun Studio
Located in Québec City, Beyond Fun Studio is made up of Samuel Lapointe, Sébastien Gauvin and Jonathan Nadeau. Their game, Aeolis Tournament, is a more advanced concept of the prototype they created during the Pixel Challenge 2018. In this multiplayer party game, players must use air blasters to interact with objects and changing environments in various short challenges.
Designed to be easy to pick up and play, the game features several modes and ways to play locally or online, with friends or against computer opponents with different difficulty levels.
Geeko Studio
This start-up studio was created in Québec City in 2018 by three computer graphics and illustration enthusiasts. They are developing Infinite Discovery, which incorporates elements from role-playing, survival and card games.
Set in outer space, the story progresses by answering multiple-choice questions, while battles are settled using cards collected during the adventure. Every decision impacts the player's survival and the cards they will get.
Qwerty Stud.io
Consisting of a talented team originating from various parts of the world, but mostly the Québec City region, Qwerty Stud.io was created in 2018 at the start of ReWorld Adventure’s development. This co-op exploration game takes place in a fantasy medieval universe and features a player-versus-player (PvP) battle mode and procedural world generation system. However, this is only one part of the project presented in the CATAPULTE competition.
The studio also hopes to integrate ReWorld Adventure as part of a massively multiplayer game where the community can modify the environment and create their own universe to share with other players. The final project will be called ReWorld Online.
The Forge Arena
Begun in Blainville by a team of eight people, development of The Forge Arena is already well underway. This first-person shooter game uses the momentum gathered by eSports to gain recognition in a large market based on the game’s extremely competitive quality.
Through a partnership with the founder of OpSkins, the game will include a strong focus on skins to personalize the weapons’ appearance. Players will be able to buy, create and sell these skins, which should provide a continued source of profit and content to finance the game.
About CATAPULTE
CATAPULTE is a unique acceleration program designed to support independent video game studios. Created in 2014, CATAPULTE was launched by the Digital Arts and Interactive Entertainment (ANDI) niche of excellence and Québec International, in partnership with Caisse Desjardins de Québec.
For this fifth edition, a $55,000 grant will be offered by Caisse Desjardins de Québec, Ubisoft, PwC and ROBIC. Almost $48,000 in services will complete the prize, including:
- professional coaching by expert teams in every aspect of video game development,
- a work session in Ubisoft Québec’s User Research Lab,
- the professional conception and design of the game’s indie trailer by the team at Sunny Side Up,
- coaching by a sherpa and a one-year residency at LE CAMP,
- taxation advice, business coaching and tax credit preparation services for the production of multimedia titles and for scientific research and experimental development, provided by PwC,
- a consultation on intellectual property, courtesy of ROBIC,
- coaching in sound design by Peak Media,
- a class on project presentation by Denis François Gravel (offered to all finalists).
