Game Worlds has powered up at ACMI featuring over 30 videogames spanning five decades of interactive entertainment.
Step into ACMI and immediately hear it – the unmistakable bloops and bleeps of arcade classics mixing with orchestral swells from modern RPGs. Light spills across your face from dozens of screens displaying everything from pixelated sprites to photorealistic landscapes, while a gentle hum reminds you that serious computing power runs this digital playground…
Melbourne’s screen culture museum transforms into a gaming paradise this month with its latest blockbuster exhibition, showcasing everything from 1970s pioneers to contemporary hits.
Game Worlds is ACMI’s third major gaming exhibition following 2008’s Game On and the internationally touring Game Masters, which reached over 1.1 million visitors worldwide. Your thumbs are about to get a serious workout.
Game Worlds
- Where: ACMI Gallery 4, Fed Square, Melbourne
- When: Until 8 February 2026
- Tickets available at acmi.net.au
- Hours: Daily 10am-5pm
Stay up to date with what’s happening in and around Melbourne here.
Major titles have been unlocked
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Prepare for a wild ride through gaming’s greatest hits and hidden gems.
Headlining games include global phenomena like Minecraft, Final Fantasy XIV Online, World of Warcraft and The Elder Scrolls Online alongside life simulation classic The Sims and early internet favourite Neopets.
Hollow Knight: Silksong from Melbourne’s Team Cherry adds local flavour to the international lineup.
The exhibition digs deep into gaming archaeology with The Sentinel, an early 3D mind-bender that’ll make you question reality with its geometric puzzle landscapes. Meanwhile, check out text adventure legends Maze War, Colossal Cave Adventure and Zork for a lesson that sometimes words pack more punch than fancy graphics.
Exhibition content spans original concept art, rare design materials and over 44 playable moments. Visitors can compete against world record-breaking speedruns, experience pioneering games from gaming’s early decades, and explore development processes through never-before-seen materials.
It’s a showcase of homegrown talent
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Local studios receive prominent placement through dedicated Australian content, including new playable prototypes from Melbourne’s 2pt Interactive and development tracking of Isopod by Queensland’s Sbug Games.
Featured Australian titles span Guardian Maia from Metia Interactive, environmental puzzle game Terra Nil from Free Lives/Devolver Digital, and acclaimed platformer Celeste from Maddy Makes Games.
Think you’re fast? The Celeste speedrun challenge will humble you faster than you can say “pixel-perfect jump.” Try beating speedrunner Zkad’s jaw-dropping 53.7-second run and prepare to have your mind blown.
Four newly commissioned microgames created exclusively for ACMI demonstrate contemporary Australian game development. Players can nurture a communal creature in ACMI EGG by Apartment 809, restore colour in Tim Koch’s puzzle Salix8 Sunset, explore perspective shifts in What’s Your Angle by Callum Chatfield and Mally He, and experience gaming nostalgia through Hint Line ’93 by Secret Lab.
Classic Australian representation includes 1980s titles like The Hobbit from Melbourne House, while international classics feature DOOM, Team Fortress, early text adventures Zork and Colossal Cave Adventure, plus groundbreaking 1970s maze exploration games.
An exhibition that emphasises playable experiences
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Curators Bethan Johnson and Jini Maxwell designed Game Worlds around active participation rather than passive observation. Expect hands-on stations, prototype testing areas, and interactive displays that reveal development processes behind beloved titles.
Get ready to team up for some fantastic teamwork experiences as well, like the Isopod Giant Controller. You’ll help a tiny pill-bug as she jumps, rolls and swings through the Australian bush with an oversized controller – because why should one person have all the fun when two people can hilariously fumble through controls together?
The Stardew Farm Planner interactive is basically Pinterest for virtual farmers, showcasing the most creative agricultural masterpieces from a community that’s designed over 5.5 million farms since 2016.
Discover the mighty PDP-10
First, go back to 1973, when some genius high schoolers doing work experience at NASA accidentally created gaming history with a room-sized computer monster called the PDP-10. This beast was the first machine to let people play together across different locations, and gamers immediately went nuts for Maze War – so nuts that they apparently crashed the entire early internet with their gaming sessions.
Then, fast-forward to today’s Game Worlds, with a Hero Sky installation that will blow your mind by revealing how those gorgeous videogame sunsets actually work (looking at you RDR2). Spoiler alert: it’s all smoke, mirrors and brilliant “skybox” trickery that makes digital worlds feel endless without melting your computer.
Why limit the fun to daylight hours? Game Worlds cranks up the energy with late-night gaming sessions and developer talks that’ll have you geeking out with fellow enthusiasts. Mark your calendars for the absolute must-see event: Celeste masterminds Maddy Thorson and Noel Berry spilling behind-the-scenes secrets on Monday 6 October 2025 from 6:30-8pm.
For more information, head here.
This article was made in partnership with ACMI.
