On the first business day of Games Ground, in addition to the approximately 100 indie games on display, numerous first-class lectures and panels dominated the event, even if they did not always receive the attention they deserved.
The first events of the day were relatively poorly attended, which may have had something to do with the fact that the official opening was not until lunchtime – when Games Ground also got really crowded – and the festival, including consumer days, runs over the weekend. In terms of quality, however, the presentations and panels got off to a good start right from the outset.
The panel “Daring to ‘Press Start’” focused on the topic of start-ups. Beck Niederländer, project manager at the Digital Game Culture Foundation, moderated a panel with Sara Shabani (Darya Studios), Sophie de Frenne (Screen Play Studio), Mareike Rescheleit (Midnight Muse Games), and Denise Koch (Monstersongs Interactive), all of whom are participants in the Press Start start-up program, which has supported over 100 founders since the beginning of the year.
Not only did they provide detailed insights into their very different start-up stories and projects, but they also encouraged others to start their own businesses. In particular, they emphasized the supportive nature of the games industry in general, the German games industry, and the indie scene in particular.
The truly refreshing fireside chat “We Survived 2025, Now What?” with Megan Zoe Garrett (Lively Studio) and Charlotte Cook (CALM Consultancy) also deserved a much larger audience. After all, they entertainingly worked their way through various topics such as IPs, changes in the global market, and the target audience, drawing on their extensive experience in the industry, which could have been an inspiration and an eye-opener for young founders and developers in particular, showing them that the winds can be rough in the games industry, but giving up is not an option. The comment from the audience that the two should do a podcast together is one that can only be agreed with.
Another important topic throughout the day was the Impact Track. It focused on responsibility, but also on sustainability and crises. Among the participants were Maria Wagner from the Sustainable Game Alliance, which recently presented its standard, and Lukas Galinski from Instinct3, one of the partner companies in the SGA network.
In any case, crisis was a word that accompanied the entire day, either directly or indirectly. This is because reports of layoffs in the games industry continue unabated. There was also a separate panel on this topic at Games Ground, which we reported on.
One can only hope that things will improve in this regard over the next twelve months. Otherwise, Megan Zoe Garrett (Lively Studio) and Charlotte Cook will be proven right in the end, and we will all be sitting together again in Berlin in 2026, discussing the topic “We survived 2026, Now What?”
