The last day of BitSummit 2014 saw a large and active audience, so it was a little harder to get a read on reactions than previous days, but here's what I saw on the Nico Live stream.
Microsoft - People slowly trickled into this day and there wasn't much activity except a murmur of interest in Unity support...until a nerve was suddenly struck and the audience remembered to be pissed about Xbox One. The tone of the presentation seemed almost apologetic, but it was really upsetting people.
Kakexun - Managing to settle down, most people seemed to understand the background of this project and the late Kenji Eno. Unfortunately, the presenter opened with a fairly long-winded self-introduction and anecdote which viewers increasingly found to be self-aggrandizing, though many still appreciated the eventual point where the story crossed with Mr. Eno. The talk actually raised quite some debate. Many commentors felt that it was tasteless to use the deceased as the focus of fund-raising while others supported the project. After being presented with the game concept itself, there was very much confusion. Some wondered if it were feasible to support such an unusual idea despite its tragic circumstance, if it could succeed Eno and even some darker comments about whether Eno was a solid enough creator to afford such legacy. I hate to say it, but I think this presentation actually left many people more uncomfortable with the idea than they initially felt.
Walk of the Show Floor - After a couple of game PVs they decided to treat us to footage of the game floor itself as the cameraman perused some booths. This was really exciting and banished the dark moods. Seeing the fuller picture of what the event was, the audience rallied support for BitSummit, vowing to attend next year and a few even declared that Kyoto would become the center of the indie gaming world.
EF-12 - Now we got to see a little of the EF-12 engine in action with a character developed specially for BitSummit. The atmosphere was light-hearted and enjoyable and there was a lot of action in the chat as viewers tried to ken the subtleties of the system.
Unity - This was essentially a repeat of Saturday's presentation and many viewers were disappointed. But those who stuck through it were rewarded with a live gameplay demo of Ball-point Universe! As I mentioned before, this game was definitely a huge star of the show.
Next Level/Brian Davis - Davis gave a speech on his history with Japanese games, the universal appeal of games between East and West and how we can move forward together as developers and players. The audience was very moved and inspired by his speech.
Brave Wave Productions - Saori Kobayashi played some enjoyable songs and then the Japanese and English audience were both delighted when Yumiko Takahashi appeared and they performed some songs together. Brave Wave announced a new Kobayashi album to the heated interest of the audience.
Takayuki Nakamura - When the performance began it was...well, it was a bit shit and the audience was bewildered and pissed. They soon began to perform Lumines songs in earnest though and inspired a chaotic mess of unintelligible thought and mood.
Awards - The awards ceremony moved at a very good pace for such segments. Overall, the audience seemed pleased with the results. Some viewers were disappointed in some instances where a Western developer won an award instead of a Japanese developer, but they also expressed understanding in the results and a desire for Japanese devs to push themselves.
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