GDC News and Information Blog

GDC Europe 2013 organizers have announced new talks for its August event, with Steven Masters on Assassin's Creed III's design, luminary Don Daglow on the 'treasures and traps' of next-gen, and Epic's James Brown on empowering the player in storytelling.

These talks are part of the design and business tracks in GDC Europe 2013, which will take place Monday through Wednesday, August 19th-21st at the Cologne Congress-Centrum Ost in Cologne, Germany - just ahead of (and co-located with) the massive 275,000 person Gamescom event.

For the Design Track Keynote, Ubisoft Montreal's Steven Masters will discuss how he organized the work of 600 people across 3 years in 'Designing Assassins Creed 3.'

Ubisoft's GDC 2013 production panel, 'Three Years of Collaboration on Assassin's Creed III' focused on handling the large-scale collaboration for the massive hit franchise. However, Masters' talk at GDC Europe 2013 will detail how Ubisoft reinvigorated the core gameplay, including the use of frequent playtesting to refine the multi-million selling title.

Continue reading "GDC Europe adds Assassin's Creed III, Daglow, Epic level design talks " »

Posted by Staff at 8:56 AM | Permalink

Organizers of GDC Europe have announced their first set of selected talks, which include lectures on Capcom & Dontnod's Remember Me (pictured), scalability for Double Fine's upcoming Broken Age, and insight from streaming game video provider Twitch.tv.

These talks are part of the programming and business tracks in GDC Europe 2013, which will take place Monday through Wednesday, August 19th-21st at the Cologne Congress-Centrum Ost in Cologne, Germany - just ahead of (and co-located with) the massive 275,000 person Gamescom event.

First revealed is Oliver Franzke of Double Fine Productions' talk, 'Broken Age's Approach to Scalability.' It will focus on authoring and rendering techniques for characters and environments used to target five platforms simultaneously, including PC and mobile.

The talk about the much-anticipated, multi-million dollar funded Kickstarter project will also cover run-time techniques such as rendering tricks and fast deployment for rapid iteration and debugging.

Continue reading "GDC Europe 2013's first talks feature Broken Age, Remember Me" »

Posted by Staff at 3:18 PM | Permalink

Organizers of this August's GDC Europe, the leading and largest European game development conference, have announced a record number of talk submissions for the 2013 show, with more than 275 talks, up 25% on last year's total.

GDC Europe continues to expands, covering vital trends in free to play, new game hardware and the very best design, business, programming and art talks - many of them debuting for the first time at the show.

The submissions, from many of Europe and the world's leading companies, were evaluated over the past few weeks by the GDC Europe advisory board.

This active board is filled with practitioners and influencers from Europe's top game firms. Using GDC's custom-created submission system, each talk was rated multiple times by the advisory board and ranked.

Following this, a special in-person Advisory Board meeting took place in The Netherlands last week, talks were discussed and approved in person, and tens of submitted talks are in the process of being approved, with approvals and declines going out over the next couple of weeks.

Continue reading "GDC Europe sees 25% submission boost, adds Crytek, CD Projekt board members" »

Posted by Staff at 9:58 AM | Permalink

GDC Vault, the most comprehensive collection of talks and slides from game industry thought leaders, has gone live with all Game Developers Conference 2013 content on the newly-redesigned website.

Updates to GDC Vault include mobile compatibility and features that will help users find content more easily within the online archive, which contains material from over 20 years of the worldwide Game Developers Conferences.

Easier to enjoy, share

New features and functionality make casual exploring of GDC Vault easier and more elegant than ever before. The site now incorporates a vastly-improved interface that gives users the option to browse by event, media type, and category, while a search function allows visitors to find specific tracks. Along with these options, GDC Vault will recommend additional videos listed by session.

The GDC Vault website is also more appealing for frequent visits, as it now features an animated carousel that will dynamically change throughout the year, highlighting featured sessions that have been curated by the organizers of GDC.

Sharing content on Vault is greatly simplified, with integrated social media sharing options for free videos. Visitors can use the new widgets below each video to share interesting lectures on Facebook and Twitter, so followers, friends, and co-workers can learn along with you.

Continue reading "All GDC 2013 content live and mobile-ready on the Vault" »

Posted by Staff at 8:31 AM | Permalink

Game Developers Conference organizers UBM Tech have announced that outgoing Game Developer magazine Editor-in-Chief Patrick Miller will be moving to a new role as Director of Online Community for the GDC and ADC events, effective July 1st.

This move will reinforce the Game Developer Conferences year-round role in delivering the best quality content to video game professionals. Miller will oversee the online presence of Game Developers Conference from a community-centric editorial perspective.

His work will expand the current event news pages (http://www.gdconf.com/news) to include more in-depth content reveals and detailed interviews and analysis with GDC speakers and advisory board members.

The site will also unveil fresh video and audio highlights from previous shows available via GDC Vault, linking today's major trends to pioneering talks recorded over almost 20 years.

He will also spool up new interactions with the community via the website and social media, allowing a two-way conversation about today's big game industry issues before and after the four worldwide Game Developers Conference shows (as well as the soon-to-launch App Developers Conference). Miller will also enable the community to pass along information to GDC and ADC's market-leading advisory boards in order to shape future shows.

Alongside this transition, Miller - who will oversee longterm contributor John Polson in his GDC work - will also become a Contributing Editor to sister site Gamasutra.com, where he will also post much of his GDC-related news and analysis, and create select Gamasutra-exclusive stories on the art and business of games.

Posted by Staff at 11:20 AM | Permalink

The call for English and Mandarin submissions to present talks for the 2013 Game Developers Conference China ends May 10, officials are reminding.

Organized by UBM Tech Game Network, GDC China, now in its sixth year, will run September 15-17 at the Shanghai International Convention Center in Shanghai, China.

Submissions will be accepted until May 10th for papers on Game Design, Production, Business & Marketing, Smartphone & Tablet Games, and Independent Games.

As always for the GDC shows, organizers are looking for leading industry practitioners to propose lectures and panels with significant, applicable takeaways for today's video game community.

GDC China continues to be the premier professional conference for the creators of games and interactive entertainment in Asia. Chosen speakers can join the world's leading developers to exchange ideas, be inspired, and to further advance the business, knowledge and technology behind game creation in Asia.

Continue reading "Reminder: GDC China 2013 talk submissions due Friday" »

Posted by Staff at 9:41 AM | Permalink

UBM Tech is announcing a call to present lectures, roundtables and panels at the inaugural App Developers Conference (ADC) and the inaugural Game Developers Conference Next (GDC Next) - with submissions open from now through Wednesday, May 29th.

ADC and GDC Next, which aim to highlight the 'state of the art' for apps and the future of video games, are taking place simultaneously on November 5th-7th, 2013 at the Los Angeles Convention Center.

The inaugural Game Developers Conference Next (GDC Next) will feature detailed content about creating the game experiences of the future.

The conference organizers and advisory board are programming this spiritual successor to the long-running GDC Online shows, and are striving to bring the creators of tomorrow's biggest and most innovative video games and game platforms together in one location.

Those who submit talks are being asked to present best practices across six tracks: The Future of Gaming, Next Generation Game Platforms, Free-to-Play & New Business Models, Smartphone and & Tablet Games, Cloud Gaming and Independent Games.

GDC Next organizers and its esteemed advisory board, separate and unique from the ADC advisory board, will be accepting submissions now through May 29th.

Continue reading "November's GDC Next, App Developers Conference open for talk submissions" »

Posted by Staff at 7:27 AM | Permalink

The Independent Games Festival China - which will take place alongside this September's GDC China in Shanghai - has opened its call for submissions and is accepting indie game entries from the pan-Pacific area from now through July 19.

Following its success from previous years, GDC China will once again host all three main elements of IGF China, including the Independent Games Summit, the IGF Pavilion, and the prestigious IGF China Awards.

Now in its fifth year, the IGF Summit at GDC China will feature sessions from some of the world's top developers, while the IGF Pavilion will showcase some of the region's best independent and student games.

And of course the IGF China Awards - which are split into both Main and Student competitions - will honor the many talented developers in the pan-Pacific area.

Last year's event saw 159 high-quality entries from regions including Mainland China, Taiwan, Singapore, Japan, Indonesia, Thailand, India, Serbia, Montenegro, and more.

Last year's recipients included the Best Game winner, the retro-inspired puzzler Cubetractor, and abstract action Best Student Game winner, Fish - and other previously honored games (from 2011 and before) include acclaimed strategy title FTL: Faster Than Light and unconventional retro game Pixel May Cry.

Continue reading "IGF China seeking pan-Pacific indie game submissions for 2013 event" »

Posted by Staff at 9:11 AM | Permalink

GDC Europe organizers are reminding that the call for submissions deadline is rapidly approaching, with all entries needed by Monday, April 22 at 11:59 PM PDT.

Those selected will present at the 2013 Game Developers Conference Europe, which will run Monday through Wednesday, August 19-21 at the Cologne Congress-Centrum Ost in Cologne, Germany.

Taking place ahead of Europe's leading 250,000-person gamescom trade fair, GDC Europe 2013 will again provide the essential pan-European perspective on what's hot - and not - in today's video game market, with in-depth talks packed with takeaway on the latest learning and trends.

Submissions are still being accepted for Main Conference tracks in Business, Marketing & Management, Design, Production, Programming, and Visual Arts.

Content submissions are also being accepted for the three Summits taking place during GDC Europe 2013: the Free to Play Design & Business Summit, the Smartphone & Tablet Games Summit and the Independent Games Summit.

Continue reading "Call for GDC Europe 2013 talks closes on Monday - submit now!" »

Posted by Staff at 11:00 AM | Permalink

The call for Mandarin and English submissions to present talks for the 2013 Game Developers Conference China is now open until May 10.

Organized by UBM Tech Game Network, GDC China, now in its sixth year, will move up to September this year, running the 15th to the 17th at the Shanghai International Convention Center in Shanghai, China.

Submissions will be accepted until May 10th for papers on Game Design, Production, Business & Marketing, Smartphone & Tablet Games, and Independent Games.

As ever for the GDC shows, organizers are looking for leading industry practitioners to propose lectures and panels with significant, applicable takeaways for today's video game community.

GDC China continues to be the premier professional conference for the creators of games and interactive entertainment in Asia. Chosen speakers can join the world's leading developers to exchange ideas, be inspired, and to further advance the business, knowledge and technology behind game creation in Asia.

Continue reading "GDC China 2013 announced for Sept 15-17th: call for talks now open" »

Posted by Staff at 9:37 AM | Permalink