How independent studio got 400 games in a $ 10 package to help Fire victims

Since January 7, forest fires They were burning their way through Los Angeles. The effects are destroyed, with the destruction of more than 16,000 homes, drinking water contaminatedAnd more than twenty people were killed. Since the population has long been trying to rebuild, relief in all its forms came from donations to the American Red Cross to the people who offer the Gofundme efforts for individual families. Soon, those who are looking for help will have a new way to give: by buying a Video game package.

California Fire RLIF package is the work of Indie Studio Necrosoft games and a group of volunteers Brandon Sheffield Director, Organized to assemble the package. From 12 to 19 January, they collected 422 games – including popular titles such as jacketand Octodad: Dadliest CatchAnd HawaOn the independent game platform ITCH.IO. From these, Sheffield says, the collective aims to create a fire relief package in California, which will sell it for about $ 10 for pop, at a good price for hundreds of addresses. The package revenue, which aims to launch “ASAP”, will go to relief efforts aimed at helping the Los Angeles residents to return to their feet financially.

“I have seen a lot of (people) being priced because it might be an expensive place to live,” says Sheffield, a California citizen. “So when a fire like this reduces total housing, the angel inspires an increase in prices, and gets unlucky people in more vulnerable locations, it seems that those of us in stable living situations must do everything we can.”

Los Angeles occupies a special place in the heart of the video game industry. It is home to hundreds of developers and studios such as Riot, Naughty Dog games and Santa Monica Studio. before E3 closedThe city of Los Angeles has long been the house. It is a site Game Awards The place is for many of the smaller annual game events. Sheffield says this bond is due to this link, as developers intervene everywhere to help.

But there is another reason: climate change. The world of warming Increased probability California forest fires. The same applies to hurricanes and other natural disasters. For video game developers, who are at their work Having a large carbon fingerprintSheffield says these environmental effects are a “great deal for everyone”.

“This crisis deeply affected our teams, as some rioters lost their homes and many are still sitting,” Riot wrote in A. statement About fires. The game company has also announced its collection of its donations in the game evaluation and league of legends. Other video game companies such as Activision and Sony They also donate relief efforts.

according to Modern report Among the organizers of the game developers conference, 16 percent of the DEVS, which were included in the survey, said they were affected by natural disasters last year. Seventy -three percent of the respondents in the “game industry case” a reportThe organizers wiped more than 3000 people, identified that they were affected by water -related accidents, including hurricanes, floods and storms. One of the developers in Florida wrote: “Hurricane Milton caused some damage to a home office, causing a lot of unexpected financial hardship,” said one of the developers in Florida. “I am no longer able to pour money into my work as much as I did before.”