DeVuego and AEVI present the book that includes all the Spanish games of 2022

From 1980 to 2022, approximately 2,900 video games of all kinds have been published in USA. It is not a fact that we know by heart or that we have written down in a post it on monitor. It is the result returned by a quick search by DeVuegoan extensive database of the USAvideo game that this year celebrates its tenth anniversary. Despite being born as an online tool, the non-profit platform has celebrated the anniversary with the Yearbook of USAvideo game development in 2022a book that collects and explains the national titles published last year.

The volume, which has had the support of the USAAssociation of Video Games (AEVI) for its realization, has been presented by the authors and editors of DeVuego Adrian Granados (blog creator Monkey Island) and javier larrea (community manager from the Barcelona studio Jandusoft). The appointment took place on the morning of this Wednesday April 26 in Voxel Schoola Madrid university center attached to the University of Deusto and associated with the Complutense where video game developers of the future are trained, among other digital arts.

The 42 USAgames published in 2022, in detail

The conference, in which DeVuego founder Yova Turnes called the publication of the book as “a milestone in the trajectory” of the project, focused on the details of the work. Edited by Editorial Dolmen (although the plan at first was self-publishing), the Hardback volume reviews 42 games with purpose-written texts for the yearbook, all of them titles published last year or whose ports They appeared in 2022, and they talk about what is there behind the development of the title, of what it has conveyed to the authors, or of details that are not usually highlighted in a critique or an analysis.

Articles are preceded by introductions written by other authors of DeVuegoand accompanied by more than 380 illustrative images that dominate the pages, despite the nearly 13,000 words that make up the book. After the compendium of articles, a visual calendar where not only commercial games are collected, but also all those that have been created for gamejams or that are not intended to be commercial (including some for PS Vita, NES and Spectrum). The colophon is a section on the USAgames of 2023 most outstandingand a text where the good health of the independent USAvideo game over the last decade is brought out.

Care in the content, but also in the form

But in this Yearbook of USAvideo game development in 2022 the form is almost as important as the content. Each of the main texts are accompanied by two QR codes. The first of them leads to the soundtrack of the video game on Spotify, to surround yourself with the setting of the title while you wander through the words. The second leads to database de DeVuego, where you can consult many more details than the basic ones offered on the pages: developers involved, dubbing actors and much more.

Granados and Larrea point out that the visual presentation has evolved and improved exponentially since the first layout tests in October 2022 until the final results in February 2023; Not surprisingly, both of them inexperienced in the matter, they began to make layouts with Photoshop, which led them to start practically from scratch after two months of work.

Finally, the volume has a gimmicky personality adapted to each production. For example, articles devoted to The Longest Road on Earth and astroniteboth games in black and white, completely omit the characteristic blue color of the book, while that of Oxide Room 104a horror title, is full of scratches and blood marks that do not make it difficult to read.

He Yearbook of USAvideo game development in 2022 is available through the Dolmen Editorial website by 24.95 .