GDC 2011 in some strange words

The Game Developers Conference (GDC), held in San Francisco in early March is the conference highlight of the year for a lot of people in the industry. I see quite a strange side of it, being cooped up in business meetings for nearly the entirety of the week. I've been going to the show since 2004 and have yet to attend a session. That doesn't mean that the show isn't a huge amount of fun. Meeting after meeting does wear you down but the excitement of never knowing quite what the next half hour will hold drives me on.

I'm also lucky to work in an industry that doesn't take itself too seriously and which is full of people with a somewhat warped sense of humour. In the course of this year's week in SF a number of interesting phrases were coined and I felt I should share them here.

"Money Fight" - what you do to amuse yourself when your product has brought in an absolutely sickening amount of cash. You grab bundles of banknotes and just hurl them at each other. Notch and the guys at Mojang probably have money fights most days of the week. Bill Gates undoubtedly has a subterranean money fight arena (think a Mayan ball game court with better floodlights) for his monthly match against Steve Jobs.

"Legally Binding Twix" - delicious bite-sized snack bar which, when eaten, irrevocably commits you to publishing the game of the person who provided it.

"Filipino Candy" - nice sweets from the Philippines. Usually fruity. Just *sounds* dodgy.

"Not the best selling rabbit" - they may look cute but Mindscape's Karotz are unlikely to outsell the current favourite rabbit.

"Small Penis Laptop" - a "gaming laptop" that's twice as big as a laptop should be, with coloured lights and large fans. The Toshiba Qosmio would be an example. Suggests that the owner may be overcompensating for something.

"Imperial Beef" - dish offered by the food vendors at Game Connection that sounds scary yet is so beguilingly named that I ended up trying it - partly as it reminded me of the 'Imperial Hot' meme. The food? A generous helping of tasty beef teriyaki.

"Trained in business. Bred to reject." - the tagline to the definitive action movie about videogame acquisitions managers. Which is sadly yet to be made.

"Accountancy Party" - at the superb Killscreen party, you played cool indie games on huge screens in a warehouse, cheered on by your drunken peers. Accountants have similar parties except they are reconciling Excel sheets to whoops of encouragement.

That's it for the words of the show. What else?

Best proper food of the week: a superb Beef Brisket with roast potatoes and brussel sprouts at Magnolia.

Best junk food of the week: I discovered a "Make your own frozen yoghurt sundae" place in the Westfield mall and made myself a concoction that included chocolate, vanilla and strawberry frozen yoghurt, whole blackberries, choc chips, sprinkles and a couple of sauces. It was amazing and cost less than $7.

Best drink of the week: Nearly everything on the list at the 21st Amendment Brewery. I bought the t-shirt. And a hat.

Best party: I didn't get to many but the Killscreen indie party was great. Danes know how to party. I had a laugh playing Jesus vs Dinosaurs and ended up drinking aquavit forfeits after losing a dance-off. For a Brit, there was also the novelty of drinking out of the iconic red cups, which we only see in American movies being used for beer pong. I was even briefly a hipster as I was drinking Pabst Blue Ribbon at a warehouse party. For shame.

GDC stuff: Layton's apprentice saves the day!

As planned, immediately after arriving in San Francisco, I went and picked up a copy of Professor Layton and the Curious Village. I was chuffed to find it sitting next to Prism: Light the Way and Pony Friends, both of which, friends of mine worked on.


Nintendo were pushing the game hard, which was very pleasing to see, especially as I would not have considered it a 'first rank' title for them. Apart from bus stop adverts and ones plastered directly onto the sidewalk, they also had these fellows roaming the area handing out postcards (pic courtesy of Ricky)

Ricky has a detailed review of the game up over on Dinomo, so I recommend you check that out. His opening paragraph is about as close to a perfect description of the art style of the game as you are going to get. I got very hooked on it and I finished the game before I left SF for the UK. The art is wonderful, the puzzles are wonderfully varied and the difficulty curve is spot on. "Lovingly crafted" covers pretty much everything in the game. It's well worth importing a copy and I am sure the game will be in my top ten games of 2008 come the end of the year.

The game also caught the imagination of many of the gaming web comics and here are some of their takes on Professor Layton.

Penny Arcade
God Mode Online
Dueling Analogs

If you too enjoyed the game, there is good news on the horizon with the sequel, Professor Layton and the Devil's Box, apparently due for release in Japan in November. Nintendic also have a nifty photo of a less than 100% English and rather more excitable Layton from the Japanese TV ad.

GDC stuff: IGF finalists

One thing that I found particularly pleasing at GDC was the vibrancy and rude health of the Independent Games Festival. The IGF finalists had a section of the North Hall devoted to them and you could walk along the lines of demo pods and try a great variety of interesting games, while chatting to their creators. Ricky spent even longer there than I did and we spent a lot of time at the weekend comparing notes and discussing the games. You can find the full list of finalists on the IGF website, along with download links for many of the games. Which are your favourites?

I'm looking forward to playing the full versions of Iron Dukes and Crayon Physics in particular. I was really excited by Battelships Forever, but having played it, I think it could do with being slowed down considerably so that you can use your tactical options in a more considered fashion. I'd already played Fret Nice, Cinnamon Beats and Globulos before GDC (through my work) and they are all worth checking out. Ricky highly recommends Ookiblocks and The Misadventures of P.J. Winterbottom.

GDC stuff: "Unannounced: The Game"

I mentioned that Kyle Gray was rumoured to be announcing his new DS project at GDC and indeed, he did, referring to it as "Unannounced: The Game". I won't bother describing it as I advise you to check out the videos below for yourself and make your own mind up.

Here's the footage - I suggest that it is best to the view the videos in this order:

http://gamevideos.com/video/id/17596
http://gamevideos.com/video/id/17595
http://gamevideos.com/video/id/17593

“And then you go on a killing rampage, because that’s what English people in giant mechs do.” Awesome.

Other coverage of the "Tale of Two Kyles" talk can be found at these news outlets:

http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3166364

http://www.gamedev.net/columns/events/gdc2008/article.asp?id=1126

GDC stuff: Pick a card, any card

This year I caught up (once again) with Randy Pitchford, head of Gearbox Software. Apart from being a great guy to talk business with, Randy is also an accomplished magician. He was inspired to take up magic by the fact that his great uncle was the celebrated magician, Cardini.


He always has a pack of cards in his pocket and if you ask nicely, he's happy to bust out a few tricks, which is a refreshing break from the endless grind of commercial meetings. I love talents/skills that people can take anywhere with them and it's great to be utterly bemused by simple sleight of hand now and then.


Also, Gearbox are doing some interesting projects at the moment - Borderlands, Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway and a game based on a movie you might have heard of.

GDC stuff: No-one's gonna eat your eyes

The highlight of my week at GDC was seeing Jonathan Coulton perform live at the Steam party.

The set list was (as I recall) :

The Future Soon
Code Monkey
I Feel Fantastic
Re: Your Brains (a great singalong - I can sing as a zombie!)
Skullcrusher Mountain

and...

...culminated in a rousing performance of Still Alive inside Rock Band, ably supported by Harmonix dudes on guitar, bass and drums, and cheered on by pretty much everyone in the place.

GLaDOS would have been proud. Give that man some cake.

GDC stuff: Naming

The best possible name for an outsourcing studio specialising in graphical assets for FPS games is ALREADY TAKEN.

Out there having fun, in the warm California sun

Tomorrow morning, I'm off to the Games Developers Conference in San Francisco. As usual, I've not begun packing until the last minute, choosing instead to play Mercury Meltdown Revolution and Zendoku.

I don't get to attend any of the talks at the conference as I'm stuck in meetings all day every day, but I was intrigued by the following rumour on Surfer Girl Reviews Star Wars regarding an announcement by Kyle Gray regarding the new original DS title he is working on. Kyle Gray is the founder of The Experimental Gameplay Project so he knows his gameplay onions. He now works for EA Tiburon in Florida.

Surfer Girl wrote the following:

"The title Kyle Gray is toiling on over at Tiburon is not just good, is not just addictive and utterly intoxicating, it is a sublime experience that is the best DS game coming out this year. Maybe he'll say something about it next week, maybe Tuesday, maybe between 10 and 11 AM. "

Always good to see more original titles for DS. Speaking of which, I'll be picking up Professor Layton and the Curious Village as soon as I arrive in SF.