From Magical Wasteland comes a hilarious (and quick) wrap up of five of the gaming industry's most popular keynotes. Maybe it's just because I've hit my saturation point with this sort of stuff, but I found it wickedly funny and oh-so-true. My personal favorite is the first:

Let's think about the future for a second. You probably don't understand the kids that make up the bulk of our audience, but I do. I call them the network MySpace remix 3.0 social generation. Unlike any other people before them, young people today like to interact with each other. They also like music. YouTube is the perfect example of whatever point it is I'm making. Everything should be online and customizable.

It's short. It's funny! It's worth a read. As someone in the comments section said, "You just saved me so much in travel expenses." Touché.

Five Short Video Game Industry Keynotes [Magical Wasteland via GameSetWatch]

Aside from keeping tabs on the industry by refreshing Kotaku at least 150 times a day (or recommendation), there are other ways to prepare for the wide world of game design and break into a career promising endless hours for lesser pay. And Bethesda's Matt Grandstaff is here to tell you how!

Get your hands on the Source SDK, The Elder Scrolls Construction Set, the Neverwinter Nights toolset (either game, 1 or 2 or both!). Make lots of mods. When the time is right and you have a chance to interview for a design job, show them all your kick arse mods.

Of course, the same would apply for modding the software of pretty much any company you'd like to work for. But when you make it and publish your first title, we ask that you send us one of your two complimentary copies out of gratitude.

Breaking into Games: I want to be a Designer! [via gamingtoday]

Close watchers of the rumour mill will have noticed that the industry has recently acquired its own Deep throat. This oesophagus of privileged information has taken the form of a very innocent, plain-looking blog titled "Surfer Girl Reviews Star Wars".

In the last few weeks, Surfer Girl has enlightened us on the progress of Team Bondi's LA Noire, a Resistance: Fall of Man sequel and shared a few tidbits on Turn 10's Forza Motorsport 3.

Are these rumours tasty? Yes. Varied? Certainly. Accurate? Only one person knows, and that's Surfer Girl herself. As such, we kindly asked the knowledgeable lass for a moment of her time:

Logan: Would you say you're directly involved in the games industry?
Surfer Girl: I'm an insider. Insider.

Hit the jump for the full interview.

PS. If you're wondering where exactly the name for Surfer Girl's blog came from, she's already done an excellent job of explaining it:

3) "Where the hell do you get a blog title like "Surfer Girl Reviews Star Wars" from?"
The blog name comes from a Latvian tour guide who was on some sort of hallucinogenic and spoke random phrases.

4) "You never reviewed Star Wars, what did you think of Star Wars?"
Boring. A step down from a classic like American Graffiti. George did science fiction much better with THX 1138.

Surfer Girl also took the time to interview me during our Q&A. You can read it over at the Reviews Star Wars blog. It's mostly about Australian culture, which was awesome for me because I'm actually a Kiwi.

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Gaming makes players into fat, anti-social, cold-blooded killers. Right? Right?! Nope! The BBC has a nice piece called "In Defense of Computer Games," which aims to clue in John Q. Public about what gaming actually means. Think of it as antidote for questionable dummies like wacky Florida "lawyer." From the BBC piece:

It's a common misconception that gaming is a solitary activity, as today an increasing number of titles are for gamers to get together and play in turn. In this respect, it's no different to golf — a game which can be a source of marital friction but is rarely accused of incitement to murder... Games like Halo are part of such a large sub-culture that people who don't play them are likely to be seen as oddballs and excluded from many conversations — in much the same way as people who aren't interested in football or who don't have a television.

The piece goes on to cite a university professor who says gamers have more friends than non-gamers and mention evidence that games improve eye-hand coordination. Maybe it's something in the air, but I get the feeling gaming's days as the scapegoat for society's ills are numbered. More of this level headed reporting please!
In Defense of Computer Games [BBC]

The Game Developers Conference, now the largest industry-only event in the world, just kicked off their updated website and registration for next year's event which runs from Feb. 18 through the 22.

Next year's show will include an extra track dedicated to game outsourcing, helloooooo China, and all of the usual suspects.

More than 16,000 industry types will be hitting up San Francisco during the show, if you want to be one of them you better snag a registration but quick.

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