Blogs - COFAGames

Our team has been invited to participate in Casual Connect in San Francisco, a large gaming event that each year hosts more than 5000 professionals. This year, COFA Games will get a chance not just to present Awakening of Heroes to industry experts and game aficionados, but also to compete for some of 10 indie game awards at Indie Prize showcase.
We are preparing for the huge event to be organized by Casual Games Association from July 22 to July 24 in San Francisco. The ninth Casual Connect will gather over 300 most talented and respected experts in the casual gaming sector with the mission to further this evergrowing industry by sharing their valuable knowledge with developers.Besides, over 90 game development teams from more than 20 countries will take part in the Indie Prize showcase, competing for the prestigious Indie Prize Award.

Thus, Awakening of Heroes will be among the world’s most promising indie games, with the chance to win the award in one of 10 categories – Best Audio, Best Narrative, Most Innovative, Most Promising in Development, Best Desktop, Best Mobile, Best Free-to-play, Best in Show: Audience Choice and finally, Best in Show: Critic’s Choice.Members of our team are working hard to finalize visuals and animations for this prestigious event. Besides, we want to implement several authentic features in order to receive direct feedback from the competent audience.

Another prove of Awakening of Heroes game potential came from the Startup Sauna! This huge foundation that connects the most promising startups with entrepreneurs and investors invited us to participate in an intensive 5-week accelerator program, in Helsinki, Finland.

Together with 19 companies from Nordics, Eastern Europe and Russia, COFA Games will take part in the prestigious program which is strictly focus on business development. The best teams will get additional benefits from the Startup Sauna Accelerator.Considering the fact that more than 300 companies had applied for this program, it is a huge honor to be ranked among the 20 most-promising startups. By participating in Startup Sauna accelerator, members of our team will receive valuable lessons from the most talented serial entrepreneurs, investors and other industry experts whose main goal is to prepare early-stage startups for entering the market.

Since Finland and this accelerator as well are famous for having successful startups for entertainment and especially gaming, this is the biggest benefit as seen by COFA Games founder, Nikola Mitic.“Game development is relatively new industry in Serbia and with mobile phones and facebook it is changing very fast, and therefore continuous education and constant improvement and adjustments are needed. Finland is the Mekah for game development and we are very glad to be in the center of the action”, said Mitic.

From the programme itself, besides the focusing on business development, we are expecting to gain a lot of new contacts and help regarding the finalization of the product and marketing plan. Once accepted to Startup Sauna, a company also gets access to Slush, the leading startup event in Europe, with more than 6.000 attendees, 1.200 startups, 100 VC funds and 300 media representatives in 2013. Besides, after the accelerator program, teams with the best results are brought to Silicon Valley in order to meet American investors, media, customers and potential partners.

Finally, the best of them are offered up to 40.000 Euros of funding. As a non-profit organization, Startup Sauna organizes its free-of-charge accelerator programs twice a year, starting in early May and in mid-October.Other then Startup Sauna Awakening of Heroes was also recognized by SoftLayer Catalyst startup program and received a grant from the Innovation Fund.