This year was our first time attending the Montreal International Game Summit (MIGS) as both media (Arcade Pizza Podcast) and as a growing indie game studio (Noodle Goose Games). MIGS was part industry gathering, part creative recharge, and it also accidentally became part survival game thanks to the unplanned snowstorm and transit strike.
Here’s our full blog recap of what we saw, what we learned, and what we’d tell anyone thinking about going next year.
MIGS is one of those events that very feels huge both on paper and in person, yet still allows fast and close connections. You see a mix of indie devs, recruiters, tech vendors, publishers, students, studios, volunteers and media attendees, who all kind of blur into one warm, approachable ecosystem. Everyone is there to connect about the thing we all love, games! We got to try a bunch of new games and it was really fun meeting the developers behind those games and their passion for their work in-person.
We went to the different mixers that took place the night before and during the summit, and they were exactly what we expected: clusters of developers reuniting or meeting for the first time and a casual and fun atmosphere to warm everyone up for more business talks, networking, and learning.
Let’s talk about MeetToMatch.
Imagine a dating app, but for business meetings, and instead of awkward small talk you actually want to get right to discussing pipelines, products and publishing. You scroll through profiles, send a request, and if both sides match, you get auto-assigned a table at the venue to meet.
It was a great service for managing all our activities at the event, and keeping up with the app was essential. We received spontaneous meeting requests, had some requests that we sent out that we weren't sure would get accepted, so keeping an eye out for that was hard when busy.
Our suggestion if you’re going to an event with MeetToMatch: Schedule meetings before you arrive, if possible. And if someone declines or never responds, it’s not personal, it’s just conference bandwidth. Each MIGS attendee has their own objectives and agenda, which may not include meetings or may not match the exact type of profile they are seeking.
Also leave room for the spontaneous chats. Some of the best conversations we had weren’t planned at all!
There was some talk about how publishers aren’t playing the same role that they used to. Indie studios are more than ever deliberating on whether or not they take the conventional route of finding a publisher or to self-publish. Many publishers are working more and more with games that already have shown success in the market. This shift has put into question the need for publishers, or at least their role in modern day publishing.
We found it interesting how speakers on AI seemed prepared to get pushback on AI use in the game industry due to attendees coming in hot last year with questions. This year, however, the room did not heat up like a data centre and remained relatively cool throughout. Perhaps last year there was more unknown about the future of AI and now we’ve settled into our feelings about it as we have since lived a year with AI.
If there’s one thing we’d hope to see at MIGS next year would be clarity during the event around what each badge tier includes. A few attendees weren’t sure where they were allowed to be, which created some awkward door moments.
Keep in mind, this feedback is not even close to a dealbreaker, just something that could make the experience even better.
This is our biggest piece of practical advice to ourselves for attending MIGS:
If you can attend with a buddy, do it.
There’s a natural divide-and-conquer rhythm that happens when you have two people. One person can take a meeting while the other explores the floor, or one can stay at the mixer while the other follows a lead. It makes multitasking a lot easier.
MIGS 2025 reminded us how awesome and interconnected the international game development community is. You run into people multiple times, conversations grow naturally, and opportunities happen because you showed up and were curious and ambitious to connect.
If you’re thinking of going next year, whether you’re press, an indie, a student, or a studio, MIGS is absolutely worth adding to your calendar.