The Tribeca Film Festival has nothing to do with E3, aside from the fact that it’s going on right now. Oh, and they invited eight upcoming narrative-focused games to be involved this year for their first game award category. Several of the bunch, Sable, Harold Halibut, Kena: Bridge Of Spirits, and more are games we’re quite looking forward to around these parts. Regardless of opinion on video games at film festivals, Tribeca put together a neat showcase with some new trailers and developer interviews for all eight of the entries.
This is the first time that Tribeca are offering a games award category, the organisers say. For my money, they’ve actually picked a pretty swell group. The trailer for the showcase is down below, in case you want a quick sizzle reel version before you tuck in. The full showcase is over here.
Sable is in there, the Moebius-inspired adventure game that we’ve been seeing a lot more of in the past week. It announced a September release date just yesterday, which was swell to hear. The showcase from today has some extra nice chat from Sable’s developers and writers and a even more hoverbiking and exlporing to absorb.
I’m particularly excited for action adventure Kena: Bridge Of Spirits, which I got to play recently. It’s an impressive first game from a former animation studio, from what I got to try. You can spot a couple of the puzzles and boss fights I got to see in this new showcase footage.
Retro-future handmade space aventure Harold Halibut is in the mix as well. The showcase brings some additional insight into the handmade side of all Harold’s sets, and how its characters were animated. It’s still fascinating!
There’s five other entries to spot. Looping narrative thriller 12 minutes has a bit of chat from its Hollywood voice cast Daisy Ridley and James McAvoy. The 90’s adventure story The Big Con is a nice one to see in there as well. Horror game Signalis, southern gothic adventure Norco, and Lost In Random by the creators of Fe round out the list.
As for the awards bit, Tribeca say:
“For its 20th anniversary celebration, taking place June 9th through 20th, the Tribeca Festival will feature its first-ever games award, in which Tribeca Games will celebrate an unreleased game that has ‘the potential for excellence in art and storytelling.'”
It’s a swell selection of games they’ve pulled together. That, and I’m always up for any chance for developers to talk mini-doc style about their projects.
E3 2021 runs June 12th-15th, with more events around it. Please see our E3 schedule for more, genuinely useful information on the whole virtual shebang, and visit our E3 2021 hub to stay up to date on all the latest news.