Whether it’s the Final Fantasy Fan Fest in Berlin or GermanDevDays in Frankfurt – there’s plenty going on outside of gamescom too. Although, of course, this Monday also brought new exhibitors, new games and new events for gamescom.
It doesn’t always have to be a surprise, dear readers,
when it comes to awards. At the GermanDevDays Indie Awards, it was precisely the two games that had garnered the most nominations in the run-up to the event that came out on top. Apart from the Berlin-based team at Blue Backpack, very few others were able to celebrate winning an award, but the person who, in my view, deserves it most of all is Dieter Marchsreiter. For more than 30 years, he has been helping studios, games, publishers and service providers to gain and increase their visibility through communication channels and the press. He has therefore more than earned his place in the GDD Hall of Fame.
Here are the news of the day!
Your Stephan Steininger
The university clubs for Magic: The Gathering have been running since November 2025, introducing the club program. We spoke to Jin-A Graham, Brand Manager and Rob Jansson, Director Commercial Sales Operations at WotC about this program that is unique to Germany.
(Read more...)
by Pascal Wagner
From emergency contacts to party guides, tips for traveling in Cologne and information for trade visitors and exhibitors: Learn everything there is to know about being at gamescom on our big service portal.
Two more studios are receiving funding from the German Federal Government's Video Game Funding Programme. The beneficiaries are Sandbox Interactive in Berlin and stillalive studios in Munich.
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by Marcel Kleffmann
Almost all the prizes at this year’s GermanDevDays Awards went to Blue Backpack and Spoonful Games. Only Jonas Pfeiffer and Dieter Marchsreiter were also among the winners.
(Read more...)
by Stephan Steininger
As in recent year, Rhineland-Palatinate (RLP) and the Saarland have come together for a joint booth at gamescom 2026. Nine main exhibitors and 21 indie studios brought in by gameUp!, Medienförderung RLP, gamesAHEAD and the Saarland Ministry of Economy are exhibiting.
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At the Final Fantasy Fan Fest keynote in Berlin, FF XIV producer Naoki Yoshida and FF 7 Director Naoki Hamagutchi presented the collaboration of both teams for the MMO's content. Yoshida also introduced a new minigame aiming for outside franchise implementation.
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The multi-award-winning German solo developer Christoph Minnameier has unveiled a new project, Monster Mesh. Minnameier, also known as Pig Knight Games, will also be speaking at the Open House at Gamerei on 13 August about puzzle games like his Dungeons of Dreadrock series.
(Read more...)
NullRef Entertainment’s debut game, Chop Chop Inc., is maintaining its momentum: over the past two months or so, the number of wishlist entries has doubled to over 100,000.
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At the keynote of Final Fantasy Fan Fest in Berlin today, director Naoki Yoshida has revealed the release date for the Switch 2 version of FF XIV. The game will release on 4 August with a free testing month for everyone. Afterwards, it will need a separate subscription.
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Publisher Gryphline has announced that Arknights: Endfield will debut at Anime NYC in New York from 20 to 23 August, before returning to gamescom in Cologne with an expanded booth.
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At the Berlin press conference, director Naoki "Yoshi-P" Yoshida gave his view on how Final Fantasy fostered its enamoured audience. He also gave his view on retirement: If he ever were to retire from Square, he'd want to remain in the audience as an indie studio founder.
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Madeleine Egger
06.07. - 23.08.2026: Esports World Cup (Paris)
31.07. - 03.08.2026: ChinaJoy (Shanghai)
05.08. - 07.08.2026: Serious Play Conference (Durham/USA)
23.08. - 25.08.2026: gamescom dev (Cologne)
25.08.2026: gamescom opening night live - tbc - (Cologne/Stream)
26.08. - 30.08.2026: gamescom (Cologne)
27.08.2026: gamescom congress (Cologne)
04.09. - 07.09.2026: PAX West (Seattle)
04.09. - 08.09.2026: IFA (Berlin)
18.09. - 20.09.2026: Gaming Istanbul (GIST) (Istanbul)
18.09. - 20.09.2026: Nexus Nerd Rock Festival (Leipzig)
Find more events in our GamesMarket calendar.
