Call it speed dating for creatives and game industry folks, minus the actual dating.

The Toronto chapter of the International Game Developers Association (IGDA Toronto) held its inaugural Game.Set.Match event last week – purposely timed to tie in with Valentine’s Day, naturally – pairing everyone from producers, artists, programmers, musicians/composers and writers as part of one big networking experiment.

IGDA Toronto president Lesley-Phord Toy says the event was not meant to serve as a job fair, but more about people coming to the table with specific skills to potentially help others complete an unfinished project. A developer with an already coded-game who could use a musical touch may have come to Game.Set.Match with the hopes of meeting a composer.

The event was largely comprised of the city’s rapidly growing number of indies and those hoping to make in-roads to the industry. But it also attracted folks from TV prodcos looking to expand their interactive reach, including Mike Drach from March Entertainment.

“If I was a producer or a developer actively seeking teams, I could see this being a valuable tool,” he tells Playback Daily. The marketing and development manager for the Toronto prodco remarked that the turnout was much better than he’d expected.

“It was an opportunity to talk shop, find out how others deal with challenges. You’re not going to meet anyone in eight minutes and seal the deal, but I relish the chance to talk with like-minded individuals.” Drach is also a co-founder of internet culture parody RPG Forumwarz.

IGDA member and president of Untold Entertainment Ryan Henson Creighton was the man running the show, consisting of six eight-minute meetings. Participants filled out a survey about their skills and what they were looking for, enabling Creighton to pair them with an appropriate partner.

“There are a lot of introverts in this industry,” he says. “And not everyone is bold enough to go up to someone they don’t know.”

Interestingly, Creighton noted the high turnout of artists looking to break into the gaming industry and discussed the possibility of a gallery event to showcase their talents, which may also draw interest from potential partners seeking talent.

March’s Drach says that some traditional media folks have a tendency to shy away from the game industry types, but he says: “These guys are the ones you need to know.’

Adds Phord-Toy, also a producer at Ubisoft Toronto: “Even if we can get one project off the ground, it’ll have been a success.”