gdc

IGDA To Set Standards For ‘Networking Events’ In Response To GDC Party

Mass Effect

Mass Effect“Parties” are out and “networking events” are in under new guidance from the International Game Developers Association’s executive director, responding to the blowup over a party at Game Developers Conference 2013 that featured scantily-dressed dancers. “The IGDA will offer ‘networking events’ as its primary focus, not ‘parties’,” Kate Edwards wrote in a bullet-point memo published yesterday on Gamasutra.


Halfbrick Created A Game That Made People Not Want To Come To Work

We know that Fruit Ninja was the game that set Aussie mobile developer Halfbrick on its path of success. What we didn’t know is that studio’s creative powers could be used for eeeeviiillll, as the deceptively simple, yet oddly nefarious game Tank Turn Tactics showed.


Geeze, Can You Even Imagine The Walking Dead Without Clementine?

Clementine, the little girl that Lee Everett has to raise during a zombie apocalypse, is the bulk of what makes The Walking Dead so excellent. Telltale managed to create a character that we cared about, so much so that many of us shed tears by the end of the first season of the franchise.



Why I Cried At GDC

I did a lot of crying at GDC this year. Maybe it’s because I processed so many interactions — met so many good people, caught up with so many friends, cheered on so many heroes — that I am overwhelmed. From the distance of the internet I can usually manage it, Twitter and Facebook and however many internet comments I can stand to read, but in person sometimes it’s a lot. I am conditioned, like Pavlov’s dog, to hovering red notifications that demand addressing, to conversations that seem, in those moments of intimacy between my screen and I, to need immediate responses.


In Puppeteer, All The World’s A Stage

Last week, during the Game Developers Conference, I swung by Sony’s event space near the Moscone Center to check out Puppeteer, an upcoming platforming game from Sony’s Japan Studio.


The Guy Who Made The New XCOM Meets The Guy Who Made The First X-COM

This is pretty cool: Last week, during the Game Developers Conference, Jake Solomon, designer of last year’s XCOM: Enemy Unknown sat down with host Adam Sessler to chat with Julian Gollop, designer of 1994′s X-COM: UFO Defense.


And Then The Video Game Industry Woke Up

The 2013 Game Developers Conference is over. The chatter of the show floor has faded, the bathroom lines have evaporated, and the various stacked hangovers have worn off. The week still feels like something of a blur, but squint your eyes just so, filter out the noise and the music and the glowing laptop monitors, and a theme starts to take shape: Change is in the air. Change for the better.


Looks Like Newbie Team Fortress 2 Players Might Be Better Than The Pros On Virtual Reality

Team Fortress 2 on virtual reality is a real thing; you can try it out if you happen to have an Oculus Rift developer kit. Since playing games on virtual reality will be new for most of us, players will likely have to undergo an adjustment period in order to avoid a possibly disorienting experience.


Dishonored’s Many Settings: How Japan Became London, Which Turned Into Dunwall

The blank canvas of creating an original game can be daunting, so relying on a few tried-and-true mechanics or a dependable setting is common. Even then, nailing the perfect environment for the player to experience can be an iterative process, as Arkane Studios found when creating the world of Dishonored.


World of Servers