Welcome Back, Extra Life!

It's that time of the year again - and we're not talking about Christmas, though Christmas is pretty great - it's time for Codename Entertainment Extra Life 2018!

For those who may not know, Extra Life is a wonderful program set up to raise donations for Children's Miracle Network hospitals. The money raised is donated as unrestricted funds for hospitals to use as needed. But the best part? We can help by doing what we love to do: gaming!

For more information about the Extra Life program, check out their FAQ.

What's the Plan for 2018?

Like in previous years, the Codename Entertainment team will be playing all kinds of games, including TRPG games, board games, card games, and of course, video games. Dave even built a VR streaming setup!

The 24 hours of streaming include:

• Two Eberron-based D&D sessions, each influenced by donations to the Idle Champions Extra life Page. Two different teams of thieves will attempt to complete Adam's all-new scenario: LIGHTNING TRAIN HEIST!


• Art galore! Michelle and Alexis will be drawing sketches with pencil and paper and Kat will be drawing a tavern scene! Donations to Kat's Extra Life page get you a character added into the final scene! Follow Kat on Twitter to see her final image!


• A founders Q&A hour with co-founders Dave and Justin!


• A Magic the Gathering tournament!


• Classic SNES games played by Justin and friends!


• CNE plays the VR game Beat Saber!


• Our very own version of Hot Ones, mixed with party board games!


• Plus more!

And when we're not doing scheduled content, you get a bird's eye view of the office, awesome elevator music, and a custom stream overlay made by Dave and Adam, listing our schedule and current donations!

How Can I Help?

We've got a few different things happening this year for Extra Life.

Each of our actively supported games (Bush Whacker 2, Crusaders of the Lost Idols, and Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms) has a special item available for you to purchase in the game. Starting today, and until 10:00am Pacific Time on Wednesday November 21st, all net proceeds from purchases of these special in-game items will be donated to Extra Life!

Additionally, if you are feeling generous and want to donate more, you can contribute to any of the game's pages on Extra Life:

• Bush Whacker 2
• Crusaders of the Lost Idols
• Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms

Plus you can check out the Codename Entertainment Extra Life page here.

When do you Start?

We have time-gated our stream to this coming weekend, starting on Friday, November 16th, at 9am PST and running for 24 hours until Saturday, November 17th at 9am PST. You'll be able to watch the event in all its glory over on the Codename Entertainment Twitch.

Once again, you can find all our info and more over on the Codename Entertainment Extra Life Team Page.

Wish us luck surviving again!

Welcome Back, Extra Life!

It's that time of the year again - and we're not talking about Christmas - it's time for Codename Entertainment Extra Life 2017!

For those who may not know, Extra Life is a wonderful program set up to raise donations for Children's Miracle Network hospitals. The money raised is donated as unrestricted funds for hospitals to use as needed. But the best part? We can help by doing what we love to do: gaming!

For more information about the Extra Life program, check out their FAQ.

What's the Plan for 2017!?

We're glad you asked! Like last year, Codename team donations will be going to the BC Children's Hospital Foundation. In previous years we have managed to raise upwards of $5000 and dress Clive up like a princess. This year we want to do even better!

For starters, we're stepping up our streaming game this year. Some of you may have noticed that we now stream weekly on the Official Dungeons & Dragons Twitch. The side effect of taking that on is that we have an all-new streaming studio, handcrafted, hand-painted and painstakingly assembled by our very own cofounder, David Whittaker. On top of the Codename Streaming Studio we are aiming to have several camera feeds this year, focused on:

• Tabletop — all things boardgames and a three-part epic Dungeons & Dragons adventure crafted by Lead Artist Adam Kosh, in which he intends to put our characters through the ringer. Seriously, it sounds nasty, and he never stops cackling about it when we ask him.


• Multiplayer — the best way to play games is against your friends and in earshot so they can hear your cries of victory and so they are close enough for you to curse them out in defeat. What's it going to be this year? Mercenary Kings? Hellriders? Overcooked? Whatever it is, challenge accepted.


• Singleplayer — We have some pretty hardcore gamers among our ranks, so from time to time they'll take the spotlight away from the rest of the stream to show us how it's done (or earn our mockery forever). Time to put our money where our mouths are.

We are here for your entertainment, and more importantly, to raise money for kids. There will also be some fun and special donation rewards/perks, like rewards in Codename Entertainment games for all players and the ability to troll our D&D game.

You can find the Codename Entertainment Team Page here.

When do you Start?

We have time-shifted our stream to this coming weekend, starting on Saturday December 2nd at 9am PST until Sunday December 3rd at 9am PST. It has been a hectic couple months dealing with the release of our newest game, Idle Champions, and various other engagements (TwitchCon, Blizzcon, PAX, etc) preventing the gathering of the studio as a whole.

You'll be able to watch the event in all its glory over on the Codename Entertainment Twitch.

Once again, you can find all our info and more over on the Codename Entertainment Extra Life Team Page.

Wish us luck!

What is Extra Life?

Extra Life is a fun program set up to raise donations for Children's Miracle Network hospitals. Money raised gets donated as unrestricted funds, for the hospitals to use as needed. What's awesome is that you can help by doing what you normally do: game! For more information from the Extra Life program itself, click here.

What's the Plan for 2016?

The Codename team donations will be going to the BC Children's Hospital Foundation. Last year, we managed to raise just over $5000, beating our modest goal of $1000, mostly due to Clive rocking the Princess gear and Justin's Bush Whacker 2 in-game avatars!

Princess Clive

Custom Bush Whacker 2 NPC

This year, we're starting with a team goal of $3,500. To donate to our team, you can visit here. To find a staff member with a reward you'd like, you can click on the "Roster" button.

We've set aside time on the weekend of Saturday October 22nd from 9am PDT through Sunday October 23rd at 9am PDT for our 24 hours of gaming fun. We'll be taking turns in shifts to play games and chat with our viewers and you can watch it all on our Twitch! We hope to make our fundraising goal while the live broadcast is happening, but you can donate before and after!

For those staff members whose goals require doing things live on the Stream, as we get closer to the date, we'll have a rough idea of when you can see them! Will there be more Pirate Goats?


Pirate Goat!

Extra Life: Gaming for the kids!

From the desk of the CEO:

One of the things that I enjoy the most about my job is chatting with people who are passionate about video games. As a father of three, I particularly enjoy chatting with students.

This year at GottaCon (a local gaming convention in Victoria), I had the chance to participate in a panel discussion on working in the video game industry. This is the second year that we have organized this panel and both times it has been a fabulous experience. We work with local schools and their career coordinators to identify and bus in about 400 students. Last year the room was packed and this year we had over 150 students on the waiting list.



The moderator had some pre-made questions to ask the panelists, in case the students proved to be shy. However, this couldn't have been further from the truth. The students were brimming with questions:

• "What is our favorite video game?"
• "How do you get into the video game industry?"
• "I have a great idea for a video game. What should I do?"
• "What should I study in university to help me work in the industry?"
• "Do I need to go to university?"
• "What post-secondary schools would we suggest?"

For an hour, the students peppered us with questions. Afterwards, the students had a chance to visit the booths of the various video game companies and learn more abut what we do.

It was a great experience and I look forward to participating again next year.

Thanks to GottaCon for the use of their pictures for this blog! :)