this is how I learned that babycastles is no more :( - ThreadSky

eyesack.bsky.social • 35 days ago

this is how I learned that babycastles is no more :(

i have been asked "what are cool tech/art/games spaces in NYC" a lot; today I made a big triangle (and a blog) to answer that question

lmk what i've missed!!

(all the places are great, placement on triangle is just my impression of vibes)

blog with details: eieio.games/blog/the-nyc...

Comments

halfrobot.com•35 days ago

2009-2020 RIP

eyesack.bsky.social•35 days ago

damn. is there anything remotely like it in nyc now?

halfrobot.com•35 days ago

Yes, Boshi’s Place is what I’d describe as a spiritual successor. And Wonderville covers some of what Babycastles did too. In some ways there’s more than ever, more art game curations happening etc. Big student culture (which always helped fuel BC too)

halfrobot.com•35 days ago

See also this series of events we helped sponsor, collaborating with a wide swath of lil community-based game orgs

https://game-design-days.glitch.me

ellaguro.bsky.social•35 days ago

boshi's place is like the crustpunk/diy parts of babycastles and wonderville is like the more normie/public facing parts of babycastles basically lol

charlesjpratt.bsky.social•35 days ago

Haha, this might be the first time anyone has described Wonderville as normal!

noahjnelson.com•35 days ago

Shit. Really?

eyesack.bsky.social•35 days ago

I guess they closed during early covid :(((

gamedesignerben.bsky.social•35 days ago

No, we survived Covid (and ran several remote events during it), but the guarantors on the lease had been out of NYC for years by the time the lease was up for renewal, around the time in-person was starting to be plausible. Replacement guarantors weren’t found.

eyesack.bsky.social•35 days ago

Ah I’m so sorry to hear that. I don’t even live in nyc and have many fond memories of the place

gamedesignerben.bsky.social•35 days ago

It’s okay. Babycastles spent a decade unsuccessfully trying to find a way to pay a single person a salary to run it, and we were all getting pretty old. Wonderville can pay people, and Boshi’s can be young for a while.

noahjnelson.com•35 days ago

We’ve lost so much over these last five years.

Comments

Posting Rules

Reply