Applications
Short. Sweet. Game Fest. is an annual, family-friendly event where hundreds of people may experience your game. Each year, SSGF Arcade features a selective group of independent developers whose works are centered around a particular theme. We are now accepting applications for inclusion in the 2025 showcase; if selected, developers will show their game at SSGF Arcade Saturday, March 1, 2025.
We do not financially compensate participants in ANY CATEGORY for acceptance into our festival. A single festival pass will be given to one representative for your project if you should be accepted.
Applications are now closed. Please attend the Short. Sweet. Game Fest. for FREE at Atlas Cinemas Shaker Square on Saturday, March 1, 2025.
Meet the Judges
Chris Totten
Chris Totten is an Associate Professor and Program Coordinator of the Animation Game Design program at Kent State University. He is also an award-winning independent game designer, artist, and animator. He holds a master’s degree in architecture (M.Arch) with a concentration in digital media from the Catholic University of America. Chris is a co-founder of the Smithsonian American Art Museum Arcade and a lifetime member of the International Game Developers Association (IGDA). He was a member of the inaugural class for the IndieCade Horizons Faculty Excellence Awards, winning the Innovation Award for his work building an appreciation for games in the context of the arts. He has written multiple books on design, including An Architectural Approach to Level Design and the upcoming book World Design in 2D Action-Adventures, he is also the editor of the collected volume, Level Design: Processes and Experiences and the Level Design Practices series.
Jarryd Huntley
Jarryd Huntley is Sr. Lead Optimization Engineer at VR studio, Owlchemy Labs. He plays important roles in Cleveland’s game development scene, as an educator running workshops and teaching classes, and as an organizer with the Cleveland Game Developers community group. He was lead programmer on the 2022 game/music project, We are OFK, which notably was a recipient of a Peabody Award in 2024. He was co-author of the 2017 book Game Programming for Artists, which has been used by a number of game studios and universities. Jarryd was also an inductee in the Video Game Awards Future Class 2021.
With talks at universities and conferences around the world, he brings a unique perspective by drawing on his experiences from enterprise software engineering and as a professional musician. Jarryd has marked his career by helping to create spaces and help more marginalized voices get into programming and into game development. His studio, Polytundra LLC, has helped port console games like Quench, and EarthNight on Switch and PS4. Polytundra released its debut title Art Club Challenge in 2018, which was featured in the 2017 Smithsonian American Art Museum Arcade.