Who's got a Power Glove and is really excited about gaming at Fantastic Fest? This guy.

To call Fantastic Fest attendees “rabid genre fans” is an understatement if anything. Well, prepare yourself for a whole new subset of mouth-foaming fanboys to descend on us for this year’s fest because it’s been announced that there will be a Fantastic Arcade this year.

That gives you roughly six months to get your thumbs ready for hot, video-game controller action.

All we really know so far is that there will be a showcase of indie games at the HighBall. Additionally there will be bigger names showing demos on the big screen and industry types as guest speakers. The curators of the gaming portion of the festival will be Alamo co-owner Tim League, Mike Plante and Roger Tinch formerly of the CineVegas Film Festival, and Eddo Stern who is just a cool dude who bridges the gap between gaming and art. Check out Eddo Stern’s Everquest related art.

Based on Fantastic Fest’s track record with world premieres (eg., There Will Be Blood, Apocalypto) I assume there will be some gaming surprises as well. I’m hoping for a playable demo of Portal 2. But I’m just a man … with a dream.

This article appears in The End of UT Football.

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James graduated from Columbia University in 2000 and moved to Austin a year later. Ever since, he has followed the arts and video game scene in ATX, editing and writing stories for the Chronicle along the way. Over his more than 20 years with the paper he has climbed the "corporate" ladder from lowly intern to managing editor.