Gamescom is the world's largest video game convention, and it's expensive to debut your video game trailer at the Gamescom Opening Night Live showcase, so a ton of indie games are sharing beautiful GIFs or short videos of their games online for free instead. Here are 17 that look incredible and deserve your attention.
A 30-second advert during presenter Geoff Keighley's live broadcast in 2022 cost was approximately $94,000In 2024, it's closer to $127,000 based on sponsorship rates. KotakuThat's significantly less than the Summer Game Festival, which charges a fee this year. $250,000 for a one-minute trailer during the live show, but at both events, Keighley is setting aside space for curated selections that are being promoted for free. Still, even the standard Gamescom price is still far more than most developers can afford to release their games into the ether and ride out the rest of the Gamescom trailer storm.
The Gamescom Opening Night Livestream featured two hours of announcements, updates, and other hints at upcoming games, while other news from the week-long fan expo continued as a group of indie developers tried to draw attention to their work with the now-viral tweet, “Gamescom trailer is over $100,000, here's a GIF.”
Mullet Madness manufacturer HAMMER95, perfect boomer shooter It came out in May, started things During Tuesday's Gamescom livestream, however, other developers soon joined in with eye-watering GIFs showing off their upcoming projects. Some were games we've heard about before and have been featured in past roundups like the 2024 Dev Day showcase, while others were awesome things I'd never heard of and will definitely be on my radar for the rest of the year and into 2025. You can click through the slideshow above to see them all.