Applications for participation in the Indie Cup Europe’24 festival have been accepted. The organizers hope that this will be the largest Indie Cup festival since its inception in 2016. Ukrainian independent developers are invited to participate in the festival along with representatives of 39 other European countries, including Germany, France, the UK, Italy, etc.

During Indie Cup Europe’24, traditional Indie Cup activities will take place: awarding prizes for indie games in development, online showcases of participants and receiving feedback from judges for the games that are finalists of the festival.

The winners will be chosen by an independent jury consisting of experts from such companies as CD Projekt RED, Crytek, Remedy Entertainment, Ubisoft, ZA/UM, etc. The full composition of the Indie Cup Europe’24 jury will be announced in the coming weeks.

This season’s Indie Cup games will compete in 7 nominations, of which six nominations of the main competition (Official Selection) are open to games that are at the late stages of development. For the first time, projects in the early stages of development will compete separately in the new Early Consideration category, which currently has one nomination.

Contest nominations:

Gameplay Excellence Award — The best game of the festival in terms of gameplay
Rising Star Award — Best project developed by a team of 1-5 people without a publisher
Critics’ Choice Award — The best project according to gaming journalists
Creators’ Choice Award — The best project according to video bloggers and streamers
Artistic Excellence Award — Best audio and visual design of the project
Most Experimental Game Award — The project with the most original game design
Next Big Thing Award — The best project in the early stages of development

Festival timeline

Call for applications: April 15 – May 19, 2024
Opening of the online showcase: May 29, 2024
The first round of evaluation: May 24 – June 23, 2024
Announcement of nominees: July 3, 2024
Second round of evaluation: June 28 – July 28, 2024
Announcement of the winners: August 1, 2024

Ukrainian developers who take part in Indie Cup Europe’24 will also receive an invitation to participate in the Ukrainian Games Festival 2024 on Steam, which the Indie Cup team is organizing as part of the Ukrainian Games initiative. So we encourage Ukrainian indie developers to submit their projects to the competition, application is already open.