Slashdot Mirror
Austin Game Conference Reflections
Early in September, some of the luminaries of the mobile gaming and mmog industries got together for the Austin Game Conference, an event organized by the Austin Game Initiative. Running concurrently with the Game Conference was the Women's Game Conference, a get-together focused on women in gaming. Over the past two weeks there have been a number of good reflections and observations put forth on the experience of both conferences. Show Director Chris Sherman sat down for an interview with Gamespot. Gamedevnet has a wrap-up of the whole event, as does the Guardian. TerraNova has observations on The BigWorld Middlewear suite, and a mmog specific wrap-up. For those interested in wireless, IBM has an article about mobile gaming. There are discussions of the Women's Gaming Conference as well, from MemoryCard's parting thoughts and the Guardian's one day overview.
Might as well mention my report as well, which was posted on f13.net http://www.f13.net/2.php?subaction=showfull&id=109 4976204&archive=&start_from=&ucat=2&am p;
Bruce
Dammit, why didn't that format correctly?
Anyway, I also gave my report on AGC over on f13.net:
http://www.f13.net/2.php?subaction=showfull&id=109 4976204&archive=&start_from=&ucat=2&am p;
Bruce
The panels I attended, mostly the design and production tracks, couldn't keep me awake (except for Greg Costikyan's on the economics of the game business). Very little value in those.
It seemed to me the intended audience was people who want to work for one of the big MMOG companies one day.
Scary phrases heard in the panels I attend:
"Reward Schedule" [/me shivers]
"Social Interaction Space" [Uh...like a 'chat room', maybe?]
"I think the grind is a good thing." - Rich Vogel
"I think a game shouldn't be balanced" - Rich Vogel (speaking about class balance in mmorpgs)
[I may have the quote slightly wrong, but that was certainly the gist of it.]
Overall, the picture presented by design and production panelists is about the Business of games and not the art.
Don't miss Costikyan's writeup.
http://www.costik.com/weblog/
Running concurrently with the Game Conference was the Women's Game Conference, a get-together focused on women in gaming.
Thank god The Sims 2 just came out!
Just think, they can talk about: The Sims (+ expansion packs!)
The Sims Online
The Sims 2
And the upcoming- The Urbz
That's a full schedule, and we haven't even mentioned Pop Cap at all!
No reason to lie.