Padel Rivals, one of the 3 winners at the Coworking EOI Demoday
A long day at La Harinera
Yesterday, 21 May 2026, La Harinera hosted the Demoday of the Coworking EOI "Financing and Publishing" Program, the acceleration we joined back in February driven by the EOI and València Innovation Capital together with Valencia Game City. After a few months of mentorship, sessions with publishers, financial coaching and a lot of internal cleanup of the project, the time came to put everything on the table in front of an audience.
Long story short: Padel Rivals was picked as one of the three winning projects.
23 pitches, 10 minutes each
The Demoday brought together more than 23 projects that had been through the program. Each team had its turn on stage, the same screen, the same room, the same audience. Pitching one of these is always more nerve wracking than it looks, especially when right behind you there are 22 other teams that have also been grinding for months on their own games.
We arrived with a very clear pitch: Padel Rivals, the first arcade padel video game for PC and consoles, the same line we have been polishing event after event. Market data, real numbers about the growth of padel, the gap in the gaming catalog, and a quick look at what the game looks like today.
One of the three picked
After all the pitches finished, three projects were called out. Padel Rivals was one of them. Honestly, it caught us slightly off guard. We are not going to pretend otherwise. The room had top tier projects, with much bigger teams behind them, and getting picked in that company is a quiet kind of validation that pushes us forward.
Edgar Gómez, founder of Krokanti Games, picking up the Padel Rivals award at the Coworking EOI Valencia Demoday
The reward is not a check or a trophy, but something arguably more useful for an indie studio at our stage: a full day with a free stand at OWN Valencia, the Gaming and Esports festival of the city, during its first week of July. A few weeks before what would have been a normal launch on the show floor, suddenly we are part of the lineup.
What this means for us
Programs like the Coworking EOI are rarely about the prize at the end. The real value sits in the months before the Demoday: the publishers we sat down with, the financing structures we now actually understand, the network we built around the studio, the feedback that landed hard. The Demoday is just the closing ceremony.
That said, the recognition matters. It tells us that the new direction we set after the Mad Games Show is the right one, that the way we are presenting Padel Rivals to the industry is starting to click, and that the next twelve months can be very real for the studio.
A small gameplay teaser
For the Demoday we also put together a 20 second clip with a few fresh gameplay shots from Padel Rivals. Same line as always: arcade feel, fast rallies, real padel rules. Nothing dressed up, no cinematics. Just the game in motion.
Next stop: Padel World Summit Barcelona
Barely a week between events. From 26 to 28 May we are at the Padel World Summit 2026 at Fira de Barcelona, on stand S20, inside the startup innovation area. If you are anywhere near Barcelona, come over, say hi and play a few points. The demo will be running live.
And in July, OWN Valencia. Same plan, different audience.
Stay close to Padel Rivals
If you want to follow this run from up close, these are the best ways:
Thanks again to EOI, València Innovation Capital and Valencia Game City for setting up a program that genuinely moves studios forward. And thanks to every team that pitched yesterday. The next Spanish wave of games is going to be loud.
The Krokanti Games Team
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