What better way to spend a Thursday night than playing three new & super amazing Austin-developed & -published videogames? Join us this Thursday, August 6th, at 7:00PM at Austin’s North Door, as JUEGOS RANCHEROS presents Tiger Style‘s Spider: Rite of the Shrouded Moon and two games published by Finji: Feist & Panoramical.

[ RSVP FOR THIS EVENT AND INVITE YOUR FRIENDS ON FACEBOOK BY CLICKING HERE! ]

While all three games showcased on Thursday have been featured at JUEGOS RANCHEROS meetups and/or prior Fantastic Arcade lineups, all three are returning in actual, final, awesome form.

Spider: Rite of the Shrouded Moon — developed here in Austin by Tiger Style and being released for iOS & Steam on the same night as our meetup — is a game in which you play as a clever arachnid explorer, mastering your web crafting skills with a combination of action and planning as you solve each of Spider’s seven enigmatic puzzles.

Just released by Austin publisher Finji & developed by Switzerland’s Bits & Beasts, Feist is a lush and visually striking action-packed game in which you outwit a sprawling forest full of secret danger and fierce creatures.

And finally, first featured as a surprise addition to Fantastic Arcade 2012, Fernando Ramallo & David Kanaga’s Panoramical is just on the cusp of its final release, co-presented by Finji & Polytron. We’ll be debuting this latest version of the interactive musical landscape anthology, in which you immerse yourself in a series of synaesthetic alien vistas, like an ambient disco-god controlling your own tiny universe.

All of the games will be playable Thursday, August 6th, at 7:00PM at North Door, 501 Brushy Street, Austin, TX 78702. The show is free and open to all the public, so come join us as we drink, play and meet the people changing the way we think about games!

What’s it like to play a game that takes place in half-hazy childhood memories? Join us and find out this Thursday, July 2nd, at 7:00PM at Austin’s North Door, as JUEGOS RANCHEROS presents the world’s first look at Loren Schmidt‘s Strawberry Cubes, a low-fi & glitch-heavy game that lets you explore reconstructed & recollected spaces around your grandmother’s house.

[ RSVP FOR THIS EVENT AND INVITE YOUR FRIENDS ON FACEBOOK BY CLICKING HERE! ]

Best known for both the IGF 2010 Excellence in Design finalist Star Guard or the more recent Realistic Kissing Simulator, produced in collaboration with Jimmy Andrews, Schmidt has of late been producing multiple new works thanks to the continued support of fans on Patreon.

We’ll be showing a number of those newer games, including Strawberry Cubes (far easier to get a real sense of in motion, as above), the arena-shooter Murder Simulator v. 666, as well as an early look at Schmidt’s latest collaboration with Austin artist Katie Rose Pipkin, which itself includes what almost definitely must be the world’s first moth generator, seen below.

All of the games will be playable Thursday, July 2nd, at 7:00PM at North Door, 501 Brushy Street, Austin, TX 78702, along with a short presentation on the games on display. The show is free and open to all the public, so come join us as we drink, play and meet the people changing the way we think about games!

Ever thought about taking things a step further with a canine friend? Then join us Thursday, June 4th, at 7:00PM at Austin’s North Door as JUEGOS RANCHEROS presents Hot Date, the world’s first game about speed-dating a series of sincere but highly opinionated pugs.

[ RSVP FOR THIS EVENT AND INVITE YOUR FRIENDS ON FACEBOOK BY CLICKING HERE! ]

Just released by UK developer George Batchelor, and already taking the dog-lover/game-lover venn-diagram-overlap by storm, Hot Date puts you in the hot seat across the table from a prospective match and gives you a couple minutes to pry out their likes, dislikes, and hopes for the future.

Don’t like who you’ve been paired with? Suddenly reached a dealbreaking impasse about jazz? Hang in there, swig another drink, and a new date will be just around the corner.

Hot Date will be playable Thursday, June 4th, at 7:00PM at North Door, 501 Brushy Street, Austin, TX 78702, along with some other assorted & related works! The show is free and open to all the public, so come join us as we drink, play and meet the people changing the way we think about games!

Want to take a first-person trip through the breathing, blossoming landscape of a colorful cloud village? Then join us Thursday, May 7th, at 7:00PM at Austin’s North Door as JUEGOS RANCHEROS presents the work of Montreal’s Paloma Dawkins, including Gardenarium, her just-launched debut psychedelic exploration game.

[ RSVP FOR THIS EVENT AND INVITE YOUR FRIENDS ON FACEBOOK BY CLICKING HERE! ]

The most recent addition to Montreal’s KO-OP Mode game collective, Dawkins first landed on our collective radar with her appearance at last year’s Fantastic Arcade, and pretty much instantly became a local favorite. The recent release of Gardenarium — which she describes simply as “a chill adventure taking place on a cloud in the sky” — has only strengthened that love.

We’ll be giving Austin a chance to play Gardenarium as it’s meant to be played: filling our entire field of vision on the ND’s massive two-story screen, along with some of Dawkins’ older but no-less-characteristically psychedelic games.

We’ll also be screening some of her earlier assorted shorts & videos, which perfectly demonstrate her sensibilities and illustrate why we’re so excited to see what she cooks up next.

As part of the event, we’ll be bringing Dawkins in via Skype to talk more about her games, animations, illustrations and comics, answer any questions you might have, and maybe, possibly get a first look at new projects on the horizon.

Gardenarium will be playable Thursday, May 7th, at 7:00PM at North Door, 501 Brushy Street, Austin, TX 78702! The show is free and open to all the public, so come join us as we drink, play and meet the people changing the way we think about games!

[NOTE: because of scheduling conflicts, this JUEGOS RANCHEROS show will take place Wednesday, April 1st instead of our usual Thursday night! We’ll be back to the regular Thursday shows in May! We promise this is not an April Fools joke!]

Love the likes of X-COM, Oregon Trail and roadtrips across a ruined American landscape? Then join us Wednesday, April 1st, at 7:00PM at Austin’s North Door as JUEGOS RANCHEROS presents the local debut of Overland, the forthcoming tactical survival game from Austin’s own Finji.

[ RSVP FOR THIS EVENT AND INVITE YOUR FRIENDS ON FACEBOOK BY CLICKING HERE! ]

Just back from a critically acclaimed first showing at San Francisco’s Game Developers Conference, Finji will be giving Austin an early opportunity to play the game, in which “players scavenge fuel and other supplies as they head directly into the heart of a cataclysm” which has produced “a hardly-recognizable America.”

As part of the event, members of the development team — which include Austin locals Adam Saltsman, Shay Pierce & Jocelyn Reyes, in addition to LA’s Heather Penn — will give a short presentation on both the influences & design goals of the game, in advance of its desktop/tablet release later this year.

Overland will be playable Wednesday, April 1st, at 7:00PM at North Door, 501 Brushy Street, Austin, TX 78702! The show is free and open to all the public, so come join us as we drink, play and meet the people changing the way we think about games!

Want to get the first look at a long-lost but newly preserved videogame classic? Join us Thursday, March 5th, at 7:00PM at Austin’s North Door as JUEGOS RANCHEROS looks back fondly on the wistful wonder of being a kid again with Zero Zero (1997) by the late Theresa Duncan, alongside two games by Nina Freeman that serve perfectly as contemporary counterparts.

[ RSVP FOR THIS EVENT AND INVITE YOUR FRIENDS ON FACEBOOK BY CLICKING HERE! ]

In the 1990s, filmmaker and game designer Theresa Duncan did something pretty revolutionary: she helped create some of the first deeply smart and engaging CD-ROM games for girls. Her point-and-click adventure games were funny and surreal, recalling influences such as Pee-Wee’s Playhouse, while simultaneously incorporating bits of poetry, philosophy, and history. While Duncan’s games were widely acclaimed and innovative for the time, they slowly fell into relative obscurity.

In December 2014, the NYC-based digital art nonprofit Rhizome successfully raised funds through Kickstarter to preserve Duncan’s three games—Chop Suey (1995), Smarty (1996), and Zero Zero (1997)—with the goal of making them playable online for free later this year. JUEGOS RANCHEROS is pleased to present Zero Zero to the public in advance of Rhizome’s exhibition of the games in New York City.

Zero Zero is set in Paris on the last night of 1899. Pinkée, the game’s young protagonist, delivers firewood to neighborhood shops while asking the eccentric grown-ups she encounters what they think the future will be like. Their responses are strange and surreal, offering a poignant commentary on 20^th-century history and technology. Join us and be among the few to have played Zero Zero in the 21^st century!

In addition to Duncan’s work, we’ll also be showing two games from Nina Freeman: Space Dad — originally created for and presented at our Space Cowboy Arcade — and 2015 IGF finalist how do you Do it? Like Duncan, Freeman and her collaborators create games that touch on funny and poignant moments of being a young girl.

All the games will be playable Thursday, March 5th, at 7:00PM at North Door, 501 Brushy Street, Austin, TX 78702! The show is free and open to all the public, so come join us as we drink, play and meet the people changing the way we think about games!