GDC SF 2013 Video: Fixing toxic online behavior in League of Legends

posted May 21 2013

Courtesy of the GDC Vault, this free GDC 2013 lecture features Riot Games' Jeffery Lin exploring how to correct toxic online behavior, and how to avoid losing League of Legends players to this bad behavior. Riot gathered a team of specialists and researchers to analyze the problem and implement several experiments designed to improve players' experiences. 

Session Name: The Science Behind Shaping Player Behavior in Online Games

Speaker(s): Jeffrey Lin

Company Name(s): Riot Games

Track / Format: Design

Overview: The player behavior team at Riot uses science to understand toxic player behavior. During this session, Jeffrey "Dr. Lyte" Lin discusses what Riot's statisticians, scientists, and developers are doing with the latest research in behavioral, social, and cognitive psychology to solve one of the biggest problems in online gaming today. From the player-driven Tribunal to the Honor Initiative, Jeff Lin talks about how science can reform toxic players, and reinforce positive player behavior.

About the GDC Vault

In addition to this presentation, the GDC Vault offers numerous other free videos, audio recordings, and slides from many of the recent GDC events, and the service offers even more members-only content for GDC Vault subscribers. Those who purchased All Access passes to events like GDC, GDC Europe, and GDC China already have full access to GDC Vault, and interested parties can apply for the individual subscriptions via a GDC Vault inquiry form.

Group subscriptions are also available: game-related schools and development studios who sign up for GDC Vault Studio Subscriptions can receive access for their entire office or company. More information on this option is available via an online demonstration, and interested parties can find out more here. In addition, current subscribers with access issues can contact GDC Vault admins.

Be sure to keep an eye on GDC Vault for even more new content, as GDC organizers will also archive videos, audio, and slides from other events like GDC China and GDC 2013. To stay abreast of all the latest updates to GDC Vault, be sure to check out the news feed on the official GDC website, or subscribe to updates via Twitter, Facebook, or RSS.

GDC SF 2013 Video: GDC's weird and wild Experimental Gameplay Workshop

posted May 20 2013

Over 20 demos of some of the most innovative game designs were on display during the 11th annual Experimental Gameplay Workshop, as shown in this free GDC 2013 video.

Courtesy of the GDC Vault, all of these fascinating micro-demonstrations are now available to view and learn from, including Brenda Romero's bold restaurant research forMexican Kitchen Workers, Keita Takahashi's Tenya Wanya Teens with an LED-lit, 16-button controller; Itay Keren's Indie Funded, indirect side-scroller Mushroom 11; and game design challenge grand champion winner Jason Rohrer with home defense MMO The Castle Doctrine.

Session Name: Experimental Gameplay Workshop

Speaker(s): Brenda Romero, Robin Hunicke, Richard Lemarchand, Chelsea Howe, Ben Esposito, Alexander Martin, Ezra Hanson-White, Daniel Benmergui, Eric Zimmerman, Henry Smith, Itay Keren, Jason Meisel, Jason Rohrer, Jongmin Jerome Baek, Kaho Abe, Kevin Cancienne, Marc ten Bosch, Margaret Robertson, Martin Middleton, Michael Brough, Michael Molinari, Pohung Chen, Ryan Pelcz, Sun Park, Adnan Agha, Emily Short, Richard Evans, Keita Takahashi, Ricky Haggett

Company Name(s): UC Santa Cruz, Funomena, School of Cinematic Arts, University of Southern California, TinyCo, Independent, Droqen, Independent, Independent, Independent, Independent, Independent, Independent, Independent, PokPoong Games, Independent, Independent, Independent, Hide&Seek, Funomena, Independent, Independent, Perspective, Independent, Turtle Cream, Hide&Seek, Linden Labs, Linden Labs, Uvula, Honeyslug

Track / Format: Design

Overview: The Experimental Gameplay Session, which debuted games like Katamari Damacy, flOw, Braid, Portal and Storyteller is back for its 11th year at GDC! In this fast-paced, game-packed session we will showcase a selection of surprising and intriguing prototypes made by innovation-minded game developers from all over the world. By demonstrating games that defying conventions and traditions in search for of new genres and ideas, this session aims to ignite the imagination of all game makers. Come see what's happening on in the world of Experimental Gameplay... and be inspired!

GDC SF 2013 Video: Curating the do-it-yourself revolution

posted May 17 2013

Developers Terry Cavanagh (Super Hexagon) and Porpentine (Howling Dogs) call for other developers to highlight interesting games, as they have been on their Free Indie Games blog, in this talk from GDC 2013.

Courtesy of the GDC Vault, this 30-minute session focuses primarily on the innovation in a large list of games, including Merritt Kopas' Lim, which deals with the gender topic of passing, and Droqen's platformer Asphyx, which asks the player not to breathe in real life whenever their avatar is underwater.

Session Name: Free Indie Games: Curating the DIY Revolution

Speaker(s): Terry Cavanagh, Porpentine

Company Name(s): Independent 

Track / Format: Independent Games Summit

Overview: By hunting down and curating games that defy convention on both cultural and technical axes, Free Indie Games is one of today's most important game-related sites. In this presentation, Porpentine will describe how outsider voices are challenging and redefining the nature of games, talk about Free Indie Games as a response to the huge growth in indie DIY, and present some of the best, most overlooked indie games of 2012.

GDC SF 2013 Video: Game Design Challenge determines humanity's last game

posted May 16 2013

Some of the brightest minds behind video games, including former Uncharted lead Richard Lemarchand, The Sims' Will Wright, and Journey's Jenova Chen, took to the stage at GDC 2013 to share their ideas for humanity's last game, as part of the final Game Design Challenge. 

Courtesy of the GDC Vault, this 90-minute panel was the final Game Design Challenge. Ideas include a card-like game where people's memories battle each other and serve as education for aliens about humans, an augmented reality game that consumes reality and leads to nuclear bombing, and an actual game that was built and buried in the Nevada desert for one person to find.

Session Name: Humanity's Last Game: The Game Design Challenge Final Championship

Speaker(s): Richard Lemarchand, Jenova Chen, Harvey Smith, Eric Zimmerman, Jason Rohrer, Steve Meretzky, Erin Robinson, Will Wright

Company Name(s): School of Cinematic Arts, University of Southern California, thatgamecompany, Arkane Studios, Independent, Independent, Playdom, Ivy Games, Stupid Fun Club

Track / Format: Design

Overview: The 10th and final Game Design Challenge brings together winners from the past for an ultimate, final showdown. Over the years, we have seen challenges that range from creating a game that expresses the poetry of Emily Dickenson to a game that uses needle and thread as an interface to a game that tells the story of the designer's first sexual experience. 

This year, for the final Game Design Challenge, panelists must design the last game that humanity will ever play. Is it a game that goes on forever? Or perhaps a game that leads to the extinction of humanity? Or a game that brings humanity immortality? Winners from the last 10 years of the Game Design Challenge will each present a unique solution to this game design problem. As always, you will play a crucial role. After the panelists present, the audience will vote to see who will become the winner of the Game Design Challenge Final Championship.

GDC SF 2013 Video: Quick-fire talks from GDC's localization summit

posted May 15 2013

The second year of the Localization Microtalks at GDC offers six more quick-fire talks, including issues on launching games on Windows 8.

In this free GDC 2013 video, courtesy of the GDC Vault, you'll see how each talk is jam-packed with information. For instance, Oded Sharon explains Dragonplay's trials with Gun N' Bladeincluded simplifying the interface, shortening the tutorials, and adding Facebook integration, while minding the differences of where the game was developed (Korea) and where the game was headed (North America and Europe).

Session Name: Localization Microtalks: Around the World in Sixty Minutes

Speaker(s): Oded Sharon, Luis Wong, David Kim, Fabio Ravetto, Paul Chavez, Liesl Leary

Company Name(s): Dragonplay, IGDA Peru, Animoca, Binari Sonori Srl, Independent, SDL

Track / Format: Localization Summit

Overview: Returning for a second time at the Localization Summit, this special session will present a diversity of topics pertaining to current issues in game localization in a quick-paced format. If you're seeking to gain insights across a broad range of localization topics, this is a must-attend session! The topics will include: Smack Talk, Big Data, and Localization by Liesl Leary (SDL) Why You Should Care About Latin America by Luis Wong (IGDA Peru) Windows 8 Launch Games - Localizing 40 Languages on a New Platform by Paul Chavez (Independent) Stitching. A. Few. Tips. To. Achieve. Smooth. Results by Fabio Ravetto (Binari Sonori Srl), Localization Case Study: How Pretty Pets Became an International Franchise by David Kim (Animoca)

Tales from the Vault 2004 Video: The Legend of Zelda's evolution, from Nintendo's Aonuma

posted May 14 2013

The Tales from the GDC Vault returns with a special session from GDC 2004, featuring Nintendo's Eiji Aonuma on the evolution of The Legend of Zelda franchise.

Here, Aonuma shares what he disliked in the original 8-bit Zelda and what won his affection inA Link to the Past. The latter inspired him to create Japan-only action-adventure Marvelous,which caught Shigeru Miyamoto's attention and earned Aonuma his role in creating Zelda.

Along with evolving the franchise internally, Aonuma applauds outside development teams expanding Zelda. He recalls Capcom's Zelda: Oracle of Ages/Seasons entries, HAL's Super Smash Bros., and Link's appearance in Namco'sSoul Caliber II as all important developments for the series.

To hear how Zelda development has progressed from Aonuma's perspective, including often dealing with what he calls the "Miyamoto Test,"check out this free GDC Vault video.

Session Name: The Evolution of a Franchise: The Legend of Zelda

Speaker(s): Eiji Aonuma

Company Name(s): Nintendo Co., Ltd.

Track / Format: Game Design

GDC SF 2013 Video: What game developers can do for NASA

posted May 13 2013

At GDC 2013, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory researchers discussed their Kinect- and Leap Motion-controlled experiments -- the first steps in using game development techniques to help immerse everyone in space exploration. 

In this free video, courtesy of the GDC Vault, NASA's Jeff Norris and Victor Luo looked at the growing relationship between their research and video games, citing examples from 1979's Lunar Lander to the modern EVE Online. The duo also shared lessons learned in creating the Kinect-enabled Xbox 360 free game, Mars Rover Landing. The talk ended with a live demo of a one-ton robot controlled remotely by a Leap Motion controller.

Session Name: We Are the Space Invaders (Presented by NASA)

Speaker(s): Jeff Norris, Victor Luo

Company Name(s): NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Track / Format: Design

Overview: NASA landed a two-ton Martian mega-rover and shared it with the world through the space agency's first console video game. Meanwhile, the same NASA team is driving giant spider robots and humanoids with video game technologies that may revolutionize the future of space exploration. These endeavors are fueled by ground-breaking partnerships with key players in the game industry. The rocket scientists leading these projects will share the surprising crossover between video games and the systems that command real spacecraft. Packed with live demos, this talk will challenge the way you think about the future of games and space exploration.

GDC SF 2013 Video: The Unfinished Swan - From student prototype to PS3 exclusive

posted May 10 2013

Prototypes make excellent "tools for thinking." That's just one of the lessons The Unfinished Swan taught Giant Sparrow creative director Ian Dallas.

In this free GDC 2013 video, courtesy of the GDC Vault, Dallas recalls what he learned while studying at USC, and what he wish he knew while he was making the PlayStation Network game.

Session Name: The Unfinished Swan: From Student Prototype to Commercial Game

Speaker(s): Ian Dallas

Company Name(s):Giant Sparrow

Track / Format: GDC Education Summit

Overview: This is the life story of our company and our first game, The Unfinished Swan, which we released in October for the PlayStation 3. We'll talk about how we took a graduate student prototype, submitted it to festivals, negotiated a publishing contract with Sony, and spent the next 3 years figuring out how to make our game and run our company, which grew from a team of 2 to 12 by the time we shipped. Many mistakes were made, some lessons were learned, all will be revealed.

All GDC 2013 content live and mobile-ready on the Vault!

posted May 09 2013

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.

GDC SF 2013 Video: Diverse Game Characters - Write Them Now!

posted May 08 2013

Ubisoft scriptwriter Jill Murray shares practical advice on writing the French Creole female protagonist Aveline de Grandpre from Assassin's Creed III: Liberation in this GDC 2013 lecture. The video is now free, courtesy of the GDC Vault.

"The more stereotypical characters we create, the more we write ourselves into corners," warns Murray. To avoid this, she offers several tips and tools for more diverse characters.

Session Name: Diverse Game Characters: Write Them Now!

Speaker(s): Jill Murray

Company Name(s):Ubisoft

Track / Format: Advocacy

Overview: Variety is the spice of life. Games are a playful exploration of life. Clearly the two are made for each other. For writers and narrative designers, this means building diversity into the cast of characters with whom we populate game worlds. This requires research, imagination, consideration, and yes, the risk of getting it wrong. But attention paid to diversity strengthens every aspect of writing, and opens us to new narrative possibilities and gameplay paradigms. This session is a diversity bootcamp covering everything from "sensitive topics" to finding the nugget of commonality we share with each character we invent.

GDC SF 2013 Video: The ethics and psychology of the 'freemium' model

posted May 07 2013

Courtesy of the GDC Vault is a live recording of popular mobile developer podcast Walled Garden Weekly at GDC 2013, with guests Eli Hodapp of Touch Arcade and Keith Shepherd ofTemple Run debating the merits of free-to-play (F2P) mobile games.

Walled Garden hosts Arash Keshmirian and Kevin Pazirandeh facilitated the live podcast with several topics, such as exploring how F2P works regionally versus worldwide, whether F2P is ruining games, and whether F2P is the only right way to design mobile games.

Session Name: Walled Garden Weekly: LIVE

Speaker(s): Eli Hodapp, Arash Keshmirian, Kevin Pazirandeh, Keith Shepherd

Company Name(s): TouchArcade, LIMBIC, Auxbrain, Imangi Studios

Track / Format: Smartphone & Tablet Games Summit

Overview:Arash Keshmirian and Kevin Pazirandeh, the duo from the highly-popular iOS developer podcast, Walled Garden Weekly, come to the GDC stage bringing with them two guests: Keith Shepherd of Temple Run, and Eli Hodapp, the editor in chief of the Internet's premiere iOS gaming site: TouchArcade. 

Together, they have reached hundreds of millions of mobile gamers. They will explore the ethical and strategic challenges facing all games on the freemium-premium spectrum by examining benchmark titles such as Clash of Clans, CSR Racing, and even their own games. Attendees are invited to take part in what is certain to be an entertaining and thought provoking conversation.

GDC SF 2013 Video: 'Hothead Developers' Rant

posted May 06 2013

The tradition of developer rants at GDC continues, with 2013's edition including OUYA head of developer relations Kellee Santiago, Eidos turned indie dev Anna Marsh, and Chris Hecker sharing what they feel is wrong with the industry.

Courtesy of the GDC Vault, this free, hour-long panel shows Santiago suggesting a Renaissance-like approach to help better and richer games to be made by people who could otherwise not afford to do so. Lady Shotgun's Marsh encourages more pre-production efforts to avoid crunch and says developers should experience life outside games to avoid otherwise incestuous ideas.

For all the hothead rants, including Chris Hecker's now famous wordless rant, check out the free video above.

Session Name: Mad as Hell: Hothead Developers Rant Back

Speaker(s): Eric Zimmerman, Margaret Robertson, Anna Anthropy, Jason Della Rocca, Kellee Santiago, Anna Marsh, Naomi Clark, Mitu Khandaker, Karen Sideman

Company Name(s): Independent, Hide&Seek, Auntie Pixelante, Execution Labs (Moderator), Independent Developer, Lady Shotgun, Brooklyn Game Ensemble, The Tiniest Shark, GameLike

Track / Format: Design

Overview: Each year the rant session brings together a panel of game developers to b*#%h about whatever the hell they want. In the past, we've heard from angry game publishers and pissed-off game journalists. This year we will blow the doors off the hinges with a panel of the angriest game developer hotheads we could find. So get ready to be schooled in what is truly f@$ked up about our industry. Cutting through the clutter of polite industry chit-chat, the rant session takes on the issues that matter to developers in a no-holds-barred format. 

Fasten your seat belts, and prepare for strong opinions from some of the game industry's most distinguished and dissatisfied game developers. The invited panelists will be given free reign. You have been warned. Co-hosted by Jason Della Roca and Eric Zimmerman, the rant session is about identifying solutions as well as problems. The audience will have a chance to respond to the rants and join in the discussion. Topics will address issues of concrete importance to the game industry. And we may catch a glimpse of a better future for us all.

GDC SF 2013 Video: Bungie's world of Destiny, from concept to production

posted May 03 2013

Courtesy of the GDC Vault, Bungie's GDC 2013 talk is now free, and you can hear art director Christopher Barrett and design director Joe Staten explain the four pillars that inform their world-building for upcoming action shooterDestiny.

Along with these pillars, they discuss challenges they had to overcome such as defining the game world and transitioning teams from concept to production.

Session Name: Brave New World: New Bungie IP

Speaker(s): Christopher Barrett, Joe Staten 

Company Name(s): Bungie, Bungie

Track / Format: Visual arts, Design

Overview:Two decades of success in the gaming industry is no small feat, but after ten years of Halo, Bungie found themselves faced with a tremendous challenge: to build a whole new world, filled with even more amazing mysteries, places, creatures, and opportunities for player investment. For the first time ever, Bungie creative directors will discuss their world building techniques, from concept to production. 

Bungie's directors will also offer key insights into its battle-tested design process. They'll give a glimpse of the brave new world that has been built, a place where the next ten years of great Bungie adventures will unfold.

GDC SF 2013 Video: #1ReasonToBe panel inspires industry

posted May 02 2013

Inspired by the #1ReasonWhy and #1ReasonToBe Twitter movement, this GDC 2013 panel shows six game developers and critics who discuss what it means to be a woman in the industry, and what can be done for better inclusiveness.

Courtesy of the GDC Vault, this free video includes experience and advice from Brenda Romero (Wizardry 8 developer), Robin Hunicke (Journey executive producer), Leigh Alexander (Gamasutra editor), Kim McAuliffe (Microsoft Game Studios game designer), Elizabeth Sampat (Storm8 designer), and Mattie Brice (game critic, San Francisco State University master student).

Session Name: #1ReasonToBe

Speaker(s): Brenda Romero, Robin Hunicke, Elizabeth Sampat, Mattie Brice, Leigh Alexander, Kim McAuliffe

Company Name(s): UC Santa Cruz, Funomena, Storm8, San Francisco State University, Gamasutra, Microsoft Studios

Track / Format: Advocacy

Overview: Inspired by the #1ReasonWhy and #1ReasonToBe hashtag discussion, join us for a rapid, fun microtalk-style celebration and exploration of what it means to be a woman in games. Each panelist will share her experience, its highs and lows, and explore a vision for a future industry that is inclusive for all. Panelists include Brenda Romero (Game Designer in Residence, University of California at Santa Cruz), Robin Hunicke (Co-Founder, Funomena!), Leigh Alexander (Editor at Large, Gamasutra), Elizabeth Sampat (Game Designer, Storm 8), Kim McAuliffe (Microsoft Studios) and Mattie Brice (MA Student, Creative Writing, San Francisco State University).

GDC SF 2011 Video: Remembering LucasArts' groundbreaking Maniac Mansion

posted May 01 2013

GDC Europe 2012 Video: How game publishers must adapt in the new digital world

posted Apr 30 2013

The role of video game publisher has been in a constantly evolving state since the birth of the industry, but in the age of Kickstarter, iOS and Steam, that role is in more of a flux than ever.

At GDC Europe 2012, a panel of publishers from Konami, Microsoft and Capcom, along with investment firm CFC Capital, met to discuss where publishing is headed, why there are fewer bets being made in triple-A, and why publishers are still necessary even in an age where self-publishing is easier than ever.

The panel, Ask the Publishers: Adapting and Succeeding in a Changing Games Industry, is presented in its entirety above for free courtesy of the GDC Vault.

Speakers: Matias Myllyrinne, Careen Yapp, Zack Karlsson, Noah Musler, Dan Sherman

Track / Format: Business, Marketing and Management / Panel

Overview: This industry is undergoing dramatic change. How do the publishers adapt and succeed in such a landscape? On one hand, what do they see as the lasting trends? On the other, how have their thinking and actions evolved to take these into account? The traditional market of AAA console publishing is a space where publishers have placed fewer and fewer bets as the budgets of AAA console games have escalated to new heights. Are these bets they continue to make - if so, how? The value chain is being redefined as digital distribution gains on retail and new business models are disrupting the industry with free to play. How does a publisher role change to add value to developers on platforms such as the ipad or services such as Steam, PSN or XBLA? How do publishers view the new forms of financing keep emerging - from Kickstarters, to completion bonding and investment funds. Are these competitors or substitutes for traditional publishers? The panel will go through these and other shifts in our industry and how they see one can best seize these opportunities and avoid the threats.

GDC Online 2012 Video: Guild Wars 2's programming tricks revealed

posted Apr 29 2013

Courtesy of the GDC Vault is another free video from its extensive archive of recorded GDC sessions. 

This time, ArenaNet's Cameron Dunn talks about the programming challenges of shipping its ambitious MMO Guild Wars 2 in "Guild Wars 2: Programming the Next Generation Online World," from GDC Online 2012.

Speakers: Cameron Dunn

Track / Format: Programming / Lecture

Overview: During this session we'll discuss some of the key technical challenges we encountered while developing Guild Wars 2. All modern MMOs uses an enormous range of technologies - from the server backend, to the client graphics engine, to the web hosting infrastructure. The gameplay innovations of Guild Wars 2 - dynamic events, World vs. World, and our agile combat system - come with their own unique technology demands, which we'll discuss. We'll also talk about Guild Wars 2's patching system, which allows us to roll out new builds in a matter of minutes without requiring downtime. 

GDC 2013 Video: The Myst 'Classic Postmortem'

posted Apr 26 2013

GDC Europe 2012 Video: Managing a game studio doesn't have to be like herding cats

posted Apr 25 2013

Managing a game studio is never easy, regardless of your team's talent or experience. As Sproing CEO Harald Riegler puts it, leading a group of passionate and diverse developers can sometimes feel like herding cats -- but it doesn't have to be that way.

Riegler, whose credits include games like Silent Hunter Online and Skyrama, has been overseeing dev teams for more than a decade, and at this year's GDC Europe, he explained that the best way to lead a company is to establish a strong sense of studio culture.

Creating that culture takes time, patience, and a lot of effort, but Riegler has found when developers work under a set of unified, guiding principles, they tend to work better as a group, and are happier doing so.

"Why do we need a good company culture?... Every studio has some kind of culture, whether its a good one or bad one, and that culture will largely decide the success of a studio or a team," he said.

Throughout his GDC Europe presentation, Riegler discussed his own management style, and offered a number of tips to help studios establish a healthier and more productive development environment. You can check out his advice for yourself by watching the full video of his talk.

GDC Europe 2012 Video: Identifying your mobile player's habits

posted Apr 24 2013

Given the rapid growth of today's mobile market, it's become increasingly important for developers to keep an eye on the space's latest trends. Platforms, business models, and even audiences are evolving at an extremely fast pace, and those of you looking to succeed on mobile will want to keep a close eye on how the market has changed.

Some companies, like Flurry Analytics, work to help developers keep track of those changes, and at this year's GDC Europe, Flurry's Richard Firminger gave an in-depth talk examining the latest data on today's mobile users, games, and business models.

His talk covered everything from app distribution, player demographics, game usage, and more, giving developers the knowledge they need to make informed decisions about their next mobile game. For instance, Firminger offered a breakdown of player spending habits, noting that older players are much more likely to spend money to unlock content in free-to-play games.

"If we look at who pays, Generation Y [age 30 or younger] plays, while Generation X [over age 30] pays. As we get older, we get less patient, we have less time, and we're much more prepared to pay our way through the game," he said. It's useful information, particularly if you're looking for the best target audience for a microtransaction-based game.

Of course, Firminger's presentation was full of even more data on today's mobile market, and you can check out the entire talk for yourself by watching the above video, courtesy of the GDC Vault.

GDC 2012 Video: Scaling Words With Friends' sudden enormous success

posted Apr 23 2013

While it's now one of the most popular games on mobile devices, the Zynga-published Words With Friends experienced some real growing pains as it climbed its way to the top of the charts.

Zynga With Friends CTO Vijay Thakkar took a moment to reflect on the game's production at this year's Game Developers Conference in San Francisco, and explained that the game's sudden success and unforeseen hiccups taught its developers quite a bit about operating games on a large scale.

One of the biggest challenges, Thakkar explained, emerged because of the game's rapid growth. Shortly before Words With Friends -- and its developer Newtoy -- were acquired by Zynga in 2010, the game's user numbers were increasing at an incredible pace, and the dev team wasn't prepared to keep up with that massive jump in scale.

"We got to the point... where our servers were struggling," Thakkar said. "We were building Band-Aids on top on Band-Aids on top of Band-Aids, and they were all scalable solutions, and we were growing, but we needed to make sure we were planning for the future."

To solve the problem, a team of 20 engineers set out to create some brand new server architecture for the game. After working on the reboot for more than two months, however, the team realized its approach was far too complicated, and that it had overlooked a far easier, and much simpler solution. It was a touch decision, but the team chose to put aside all that work and started over from scratch.

"The most inspiring part of that for me is the lesson that you should never, ever, ever be afraid to take a step back, look at your game, look at your development team, look at what you're doing, and consider a pivot," Thakkar said.

That's not to say developers should change direction whenever something isn't working, but Thakkar explained that it's important to re-evaluate your plans once in a while to keep your team from developing tunnel vision. If you're too committed to your original plans, it's easy to overlook some helpful alternatives.

For even more lessons from Word With Friends' development, you can watch Thakkar's presentation here on GDC Vault: http://gdcvault.com/play/1015675/Words-With-Friends-Building-and

GDC 2013 Video: The ethics and psychology of the 'freemium' model

posted Apr 22 2013

Session Name: Walled Garden Weekly: LIVE


Company Name(s): TouchArcade, LIMBIC, Auxbrain, Imangi Studios

Track / Format: Smartphone & Tablet Games Summit

Overview:Arash Keshmirian and Kevin Pazirandeh, the duo from the highly-popular iOS developer podcast, Walled Garden Weekly, come to the GDC stage bringing with them two guests: Keith Shepherd of Temple Run, and Eli Hodapp, the editor in chief of the Internet's premiere iOS gaming site: TouchArcade. 

Together, they have reached hundreds of millions of mobile gamers. They will explore the ethical and strategic challenges facing all games on the freemium-premium spectrum by examining benchmark titles such as Clash of Clans, CSR Racing, and even their own games. Attendees are invited to take part in what is certain to be an entertaining and thought provoking conversation.

GDC 2012 Video: Creating the audio for Bastion

posted Apr 19 2013

If there's one thing the industry will remember about Supergiant Games' Bastion, chances are it'll be its audio. The game's rich, ethereal score and iconic narration gave the game a very unique tone, and went a long way toward establishing its striking aesthetic.

And at the 2012 Game Developer Conference,Bastion's audio and music designer, Darren Korb, discussed the ins and outs of how he made the game's sound stand out from the pack.

Of course, there were plenty of factors at play, but one of the game's most successful elements, Korb explains, was its narration. It allowed the game to tell its story without ever interrupting gameplay, and as it turns out, this iconic feature only came about due to a stroke of luck.

When he began working on Bastion, Korb happened to live with his childhood friend and actor Logan Cunningham, and his voice acting skills helped inspire Korb to give in-game narration a shot.

He explains, "[Supergiant was] kind of experimenting with different narrative techniques that allowed us to give the player a story without making them stop and doing the wall of text thing...And the fact that Logan was a talented actor and was my roommate made me think, 'Well, hey, let's just try narration!'"

After just a few voiceover sessions, the team knew it was the right direction to take. As the project went on, Korb learned even more about working with game audio, as he outlines in the  presentation.

Video: How Double Fine's 'Amnesia Fortnight' turned terror into triumph

posted Apr 18 2013

According to Double Fine's Tim Schafer, "we live in crazy times." The game industry is being pulled in two directions, where big publishers are growing more enormous by the day, while independent teams are finding new ways to subvert the limitations of traditional businesses.

Mid-sized companies like Double Fine, then, are put in an awkward position, as they don't have the size to compete with the huge juggernauts, and lack the flexibility of the smaller indies. There's just less and less room for those in-between to find success, and just a few years ago, Schafer's studio realized it needed to try something new.

And at GDC 2012, Schafer and numerous other Double Fine employees hosted a presentation on a new approach to game production, dubbed "Amnesia Fortnight," which forgoes large-scale production in favor of something more suitable for a mid-sized team.

"We spent ten years as a one-team studio making one game at a time.. and it was very entrenched into our culture that that's the way we did things, but we managed to 'turn the battleship'... into a fleet of tugboats," Schafer said.

By splitting the studio into smaller, more agile teams, Double Fine was able to avoid the creative pitfalls of large-scale development, and release unusual downloadable titles like Costume Quest,Stacking, and Iron Brigade. These games were a drastic departure from full-scale console titles likePsychonauts or Brutal Legend, but they were essential in keeping Double Fine on its feet.

To learn more about Double Fine's new approach to development, be sure to check out the studio's full presentation, courtesy of GDC Vault.

Video: Building browser-based games using HTML5

posted Apr 17 2013

Now that HTML5 is ubiquitous across desktops, tablets, and smartphones, it seems reasonable to assume that it would be a great solution for launching easily accessible games that don't require installs or third party plugins.

It's a nice idea in theory, but Swrve programmer Marc O'Morain claims that learning to use HTML5 for game development is more difficult than it sounds. Luckily, he already has plenty of experience working with HTML5, and at GDC 2012 he shared his knowledge to help other developers understand and adopt this emerging web standard.

During his session, O'Morain explained that if you really want to create multiplatform games with a single code base, HTML5 is going to be your best bet, as no other technology offers the same functionality.

"[18 months ago], we wanted to see if we could make a game that would work across browsers, and in tablets and phones, so Flash was out of the question for us, and HTML5 was really the technology there. We wanted not to be writing native code, we wanted to write a cross platform code base that would work across devices," he said.

"But when I started working with the technology, I found it very difficult to find information about how to build a game in HTML5, and I want this talk to be the talk that I would have liked to have gone to 18 months ago so I could have learned this stuff."

To see O'Morain's presentation for yourself and to learn how to make your very own HTML5 browser game, simply watch the video.

Video: How developers are still fighting their arcade heritage 30 years later

posted Apr 16 2013

The industry needs to "unlearn" how it defines games, argued veteran game designer Mark Cerny at last year's GDC Europe while discussing the rise of social and mobile games.

He's had more than a little experience with transitions in the industry, having gone from making classic arcade games like Marble Madness, to working on console platformers likeSonic the Hedgehog 2, and even lending a hand to modern blockbusters like Resistance andUncharted.

"Unlearning is where you take the lessons that you paid for in blood, and you throw them out and you start all over again," said Cerny. "it's very hard to do. And we now have to do that with what we believe a game to be, those of us who are making those triple-a console titles.

Cerny expects it's going to take developers 20 years to unlearn their current preconceptions of what makes a game (e.g. narrative, death, endings, chances to fail). Why so long? The industry is slow to change, and he says that many developers are still unlearning the lessons of the golden age of the arcade 30 years later.

For example, many of those games were distinguished by being notoriously difficult and killing players willy-nilly. "You had to kill the player once a minute. ... Marble Madness was four minutes long. We needed players to earn that over the course of several months. So that level of difficulty was just required."

He said that because of that mindset, developers would add features in games just to make them harder, and continued making them needlessly difficult or punishing even as games became longer. "The idea is still, for no reason at all, if you aren't dying, it's not a game," Cerny added.

To learn more about Cerny's thoughts on how the industry is changing and needs to change, be sure to watch his full presentation above, courtesy of GDC Vault. Note that GDC Europe will return soon to Cologne, Germany this August -- more details on the event and registering online are available here

Video: Are some subjects too complex for video games?

posted Apr 15 2013

If you're reading this site, chances are you believe in the potential of video games - that they can evoke powerful emotions, and deeply affect the people who play them. Plenty of games have already proven that the medium is capable of dealing with complex issues, but are there subjects that video games just aren't equipped to handle?

Margaret Robertson of the experimental game studio Hide&Seek explored this very question at GDC 2012, as she and her team ran into some real trouble when working on their interactive media experiment, Dreams of Your Life.

The project was originally planned as a game that explored the death of Joyce Vincent, a woman who went unnoticed for three years after she perished in her London flat. Hide&Seek wanted to create a game that explored the complexities of death, and how someone like Vincent could slip through the cracks and become forgotten by society.

The only problem was that making a game that captured those themes proved too great a feat. "We really tried, but we couldn't find a game that fit within the things that [the team] talked about," Robertson said.

In the end, the team created an interactive online story that satisfied their goals, but the fact that a game never came together really concerned Robertson. She admits the fault could lie with the team itself, but what if there's a larger issue? What if games just aren't capable of dealing with certain complex themes?

"The scary thing is: Maybe this just doesn't work. The reason I love making games is that I see them transform people in this really incredible way... but it feels so much to me that the reason games manage to accomplish that has a lot to do with the fact that the constraints the games set up are temporary and arbitrary," she said.

"The minute you bolt those structures onto something [like death] that's real and enduring and ongoing, there is a tension."

For more from Robertson's thoughtful - and surprisingly positive - GDC presentation, simply click the Play button on the above video, courtesy of the GDC Vault.

GDC 2011 Video: Pitfall! Postmortem: The making of an Atari 2600 classic

posted Apr 12 2013

Pitfall!, Activision's classic platformer, isn't just one of the most successful releases of the Atari 2600, it's also one of the most iconic and revered games from the early 1980s.

The title was the top selling game for the console for an impressive 64 weeks, and is so fondly remembered that Activision co-founder and Pitfall! creator David Crane recently set out to fund its spiritual successor via Kickstarter. And at the 2011 Game Developers Conference, Crane took a moment to reflect on how his popular action title came to be.

During his classic postmortem, Crane explained that Pitfall! arose because he was growing weary of the types of games that were appearing on the Atari 2600. In the early '80s, the console boasted plenty of vehicular combat games, Pong-derivatives, and other simple titles, and Crane was looking to make something a bit more dynamic.

"I didn't want to make every game I did out of jets and airplanes and tanks and things. I really liked the idea of trying to get an animated character into a game... But every time I tried to figure out a game to make out of it, nothing came to mind," Crane said.

"So I sat down with a blank sheet of paper and I drew a little running man, looked at it, and said, 'Well, he's running, so let's give him a path to run on... let's put the path through a jungle... In literally 10 minutes, or 15 minutes max, I had the design document. That's it!"

With the simple design document in hand, Crane says it then took about 1,000 hours of programming to bring Pitfall! to life.

To learn more about the whole process, as well as the challenges Crane faced along the way, check out his full classic postmortem in the above video, courtesy of GDC Vault.

GDC 2013 Video: How Assassin's Creed III's many studios collaborated

posted Apr 11 2013

Courtesy of the GDC Vault, this free GDC 2013 production panel features five Ubisoft studio leads who discuss the different models used to encourage three years of positive collaboration on a large scale for Assassin's Creed III.

Co-development can bring teams several benefits, game director Marc-Alexis Cote shared. Focusing on a limited amount of features allows for a high level of polish which shines through, working on a popular product can be very motivating, and working with and learning from top talent can be personally and professionally rewarding.

One of the improvements that Cote suggested was to have talent embraced by every studio, regardless of hierarchy. When one team offers to help with something the lead studio typically handles or planned on handling, that suggestion should be considered rather than rejected up front. 

To hear more of Ubisoft's lessons that Cote believes unlock some of the keys to next-gen development, click on the above lecture.

Session Name: Three Years of Collaboration onAssassin's Creed III

Speaker(s): Marc-Alexis Cote, Alexander Hutchinson, Damien Kieken, Francois Pelland, Hugues Ricour

Company Name(s): Ubisoft Quebec, Ubisoft, Ubisoft, Ubisoft Montreal, Ubisoft Singapore

Track / Format: Production

Overview: Building the Assassin's Creed experience requires the creativity of hundreds of people. Ubisoft has leveraged the power of its studio network in the hopes of improving the quality of its games, and to create new ideas and distribute risk. This session will feature a panel formed by the five studio leads of Assassin's Creed III. 

The panel will aim to brief the audience on the challenges of distributing the creation of the game, and on the different models that were tried over time. Each panelist will share his experience of working in such a way, as well as the advantages and hardships it can bring.

GDC 2013 Video: Making the Atari coin-op classic Crystal Castles

posted Apr 10 2013

Courtesy of the GDC Vault, Franz Lanzinger's hour-long GDC 2013 lecture is now free and features a postmortem of Atari arcade gameCrystal Castles with an unplugged session of Lanzinger himself playing the game's music live.

The music that was so recognizable in-game was because Atari then had no system in place to license music. That didn't stop Lanzinger from giving a live piano jam session at GDC, featuring OST snippets that were borrowed from Beethovan and Tschaikovsky.

Afterward, Lanzinger reflected on what he felt went right and wrong with the game itself. He was satisfied with the level warp system, non-violent but exciting gameplay, and trackball controls. 

However, he admitted those controls also limited the sales of the game. He also lamented not writing a cohesive storyline and not preserving code from early field tests, which were regrettably lost forever.

He later shared his relationship with Atari. He recalled being against programming in joystick controls in the game home release. He also had to write a long essay about why his game needed to have an ending, which was against the grain for arcade games at the time. 

Lastly, the other original team members behind Crystal Castles joined the stage for a special Q&A wrapping up a memorable, 60-minute postmortem at GDC 2013.

Session Name: Classic Game Postmortem: Crystal Castles

Speaker(s): Franz Lanzinger

Company Name(s): Actual Entertainment, Inc.

Track / Format: Design

Overview: Why was Atari coin-op so successful at creating dozens of original and highly influential games in just a few years, many that still sell today? In this 30-year anniversary classic postmortem Franz Lanzinger, the original programmer and designer, will analyze, review, and spill the secrets of Atari's classic arcade game, Crystal Castles. Featuring Bentley Bear picking up gems and getting chased by trees and bees, Crystal Castles broke ground as a fast-paced, yet nonviolent, 3D isometric game. 

It was Atari's first arcade character game with an ending and included an ingenious secret warp system. Franz, also a professional pianist, will perform the music on his stage piano with the audience getting a live, close-up view. The talk will feature rare documents, sketches, photos, videos, and even actual 6502 code from the heyday of Atari coin-op, defiantly known as "Coin-op, the real Atari."

Video: Anna Kipnis' GDC 2013 talk on MolyJam

posted Apr 09 2013

At GDC 2013, Double Fine's Anna Kipnis discusses how fake Twitter account @PeterMolydeux inspired the Molyjam game jam, which had more than 1,000 participants including the real Peter Molyneux. This free lecture, courtesy of the GDC Vault, is about how the jam was invented, organized, and became viral so quickly. The @PeterMolydeux account was created as a parody for Peter Molyneux's "fantastically ambitious game ideas." In two weeks, Kipnis' local game jam based on the account's tweets quickly caught the attention of international press and developers.  Session Name: Molyjam: How Twitter Jokes Can Save Video Games Speaker(s): Anna Kipnis  Company Name(s): Programmer, Double Fine Productions Track / Format: Independent Games Summit Overview: Fake Twitter account, @PeterMolydeux, has been lovingly parodying Peter Molyneux's fantastically ambitious game ideas. In two weeks, our modest plan for a local game jam based on these tweets exploded into an international event, with over a thousand people participating in more than thirty cities worldwide. This story is about how Molyjam was invented, organized, and became viral in such a short time. It's about why jams like Molyjam are important to stave off creative stagnation in our industry, and (best of all) the kind of bizarre, preposterous games that resulted from this exercise.

Video: How social games evolved between FarmVille and CityVille

posted Apr 08 2013

Courtesy of the GDC Vault is another free video from its extensive archive of recorded GDC sessions.

This time, Zynga's Mark Skaggs discusses his lessons learned between launching FarmVille and CityVille, in a case study that shows how far social games have evolved in just a few short years from GDC Online 2012.

Speakers: Mark Skaggs

Track / Format: Design / Lecture

Overview: The evolution that occurred in social games between the 18 months from the launch of FarmVille and CityVille represented a new "generation" of social games. In many cases, a traditional game would still be in development over that period of time. Hear Mark Skaggs, SVP of Games at Zynga, and creator of FarmVille and CityVille describe his top lessons learned from creating break out social games. Learn about Mark's new mindset on creating games today, how to tackle the challenge of making data-driven decisions, things that went wrong over various projects and what the "next generation" of games will bring.

Video: Dead Space 2's art director goes 'beyond horror'

posted Apr 05 2013

Courtesy of the GDC Vault is a free lecture given at the Game Developers Conference 2011 byDead Space 2 art director Ian Milham on taking EA's sci-fi action sequel "beyond horror."

Where Dead Space was accessible, believable, relatable, and immersive, Milham shares thatDead Space 2 team sought to add variety, memorability, and more character. The team did this by mixing up the colors used and adding dramatically different environment designs, enemies and "epic moments" that players would talk about and remember distinctly after the game.

Session Name: Beyond Horror: Art DirectingDead Space 2

Speaker(s): Ian Milham 

Company Name(s): Electronic Arts Redwood Shores

Track / Format:Visual Arts

Video: How Habbo kept players engaged with smartphone spin-offs

posted Apr 04 2013

Paul LaFontaine, then CEO of Habbo developer Sulake, discusses keeping players engaged in a game world as they move across platforms in this free video lecture from GDC 2012, courtesy of the GDC Vault.

He shares that one problem Sulake has is the split attention span of its core, teen players that is frequently diverted by several devices. To recapture their attention, while allowing them to move across platforms, the studio created two mobile adventure games to complement Habbo's online world.

Niko awarded badges that displayed in Habboplayer profiles, and Lost Monkey awarded players a pet they could bring back to the Habboworld. One game was downloaded twice as many times as the other. Find out which and why in this free lecture.

Session Name: Moving Audiences Across Platforms

Speaker(s): Paul LaFontaine

Company Name(s): Sulake Oy

Track / Format: Social and Online Games Summit

Overview:It used to be said that getting a new customer was harder than keeping an existing one. Not so with closed online social networks, mobile platforms and competing devices. Now the harder task is keeping the attention and loyalty of a customer whose interests span Facebook, smartphones, and open web. This session is for game designers faced with difficult platform marketing challenges and aims to share practical field lessons on techniques that work.

The session is broken into sections that cover the ecosystem, the marketing problem, techniques that tie games together and ways of adapting gameplay. Data will be shared regarding techniques that worked, and those that did not.

GDC 2012 Video: Valve on Portal 2, the 'sequel to a game that doesn't need one'

posted Apr 03 2013

Valve writers Chet Faliszek and Erik Wolpaw reveal in this free lecture from GDC 2012 their creative process behind Portal 2, sharing an early experiment that didn't have Chell, GLaDOS, or even portals.

Courtesy of the GDC Vault, this video shows Faliszek and Wolpaw discussing how Valve iterated and eventually decided upon the sequel to Portal, even though popular opinion often suggested it didn't need one. This lecture provides a glimpse at an alternate, 1980s era Aperture Science where a mysterious mechanic known as "F-STOP" propelled the gameplay and where we hear Chell's first and only spoken dialogue.

Session Name: Creating a Sequel to a Game That Doesn't Need One

Speaker(s): Chet Faliszek, Erik Wolpaw

Company Name(s): Valve

Track / Format: Game Design

Overview:Erik and Chet will discuss how Valve created Portal 2, the sequel to the beloved game nobody thought needed a sequel. The talk covers the entire process from inception to the completion and reception of the game.

Video: What comic books can teach video games about storytelling

posted Apr 02 2013

Courtesy of the GDC Vault comes a free lecture from comics and games writer Antony Johnston, who has worked on games from EA and Sega, in which he explores what these two mediums can learn from the other.

Given at GDC Online 2010, he discusses an economic approach similar to editing comics to cut down the dialogue, exposition and scene duration for games. He recreates scenes from Alan Wake and Mass Effect to show how scenes can be made even more effective with this technique.

The session is available here.

Session Name: From Comics to Consoles

Speaker(s): Antony Johnston

Company Name(s): Freelance

Track / Format: Game Narrative Summit

Overview:Comics and games: a match made in heaven? What can games learn from comics, and how do the skills of one medium translate to the other? Veteran comics writer Antony Johnston, who has also written games for EA and Sega, discusses the similarities and differences between comics and games, the effect of transmedia on both media, and what games writers can learn from studying -- and writing --comics.

Video: A fireside chat with Minecraft creator Notch

posted Apr 01 2013

Chris Hecker (SpyParty) asks Mojang's Markus Persson about the creation and growth of Minecraft and about his personal and professional growth alongside the game in an intimate, virtual fireside chat from GDC 2012, now free courtesy of the GDC Vault.

Over the hour-long Q&A, Persson tackles balancing realism and abstraction in Minecraft, his approach to designing mechanics on a large-scale first, and the importance of maintaining a consistent theme. Persson also addresses piracy, which he views opportunistically.

Session Name: A Fireside Chat with Markus 'Notch' Persson

Speaker(s): Markus Persson, Chris Hecker

Company Name(s): Mojang, definition six, inc.

Track / Format: Game Design

Overview:Okay, so there won't be a real fire. However, there will be an HDTV on stage showing a video of a fire, along with some in-depth discussion of Minecraft the game, Minecraft the phenomenon, games and game design both indie and not, and any other interesting topics into which we meander. There will be a Q&A throughout, however the Q's are going to be solicited over twitter sometime in February, so we can choose the best and most thought-provoking questions in advance.

Video: Bungie looks back at the original Halo

posted Mar 29 2013

GDC Vault organizers highlight a special, free lecture from some of the minds behind Bungie's seminal Halo title from the 2003 Game Developers Conference.

Marty O'Donnell, Jaime Griesemer, and Mat Noguchi from Bungie speak about how experimentation and communication were key to designing, engineering and scoring the first Halo. They describe how they rapidly iterated on level, character, and gameplay designs to figure out which direction they wanted to go. 

The team even touches on some development lore, discussing how Halo was a real-time strategy game and third-person title before it finally became a first-person shooter. 

This free video is available here.

Session Name: Halo: Development Evolved

Speaker(s): Marty O'Donnell, Jaime Griesemer, Mat Noguchi

Company Name(s): Bungie

Track / Format: Localization Summit

Video: Jon Blow on 'The Truth in Game Design'

posted Mar 28 2013

Courtesy of the GDC Vault is this free lecture by Jonathan Blow from the Game Developers Conference Europe 2011. Here he looks at Conway's Game of Life and his own games, Braidand the upcoming The Witness, to explore a different way to approach game design.

More ideas came out of the development process and ended up in Braid than what was put into it, says Blow. By leaving it up to the system of the game to answer the questions behind Braid, starting with what happens when the player can reverse time, he was able to observe what interesting things could happen rather than force predetermined things to happen.

Session Name: Truth in Game Design

Speaker(s): Jonathan Blow

Company Name(s): Number None, Inc.

Track / Format: Game Design

Overview:We illustrate that games, being algorithmic systems implemented on computers, are biased toward revealing truth, so long as we do not quash the truth in order to force our own high-level wishes into the design. We can use games as instruments, like telescopes or elec-tron microscopes, to observe aspects of the universe that we would not normally have access to.

Video: The 5 best - and 5 worst - ways to network for a game job

posted Mar 27 2013

GDC Vault highlights from the 2012 Game Developers Conference a free lecture on the 5 best and worst practices to network for jobs, presented by now senior recruiter for Crystal Dynamics, Lindsey McQueeney.

Some of McQueeney's tips for job match-making success include online networking, local groups and communities, conferences and events, and friends. She also offers practical examples for each, such as joining a local IGDA chapter and volunteering.

Session Name: gHarmony: Networking Your Way into Acquiring Your True Love Job Match in the Game Development Industry

Speaker(s): Lindsey McQueeney

Company Name(s): then 38 Studios/Big Huge Games, now Crystal Dynamics

Track / Format: Game Career Seminar

Overview:Feeling unwanted or ignored? Having trouble forging lasting relationships with game studios and developers? Concerned that it's your breath, your BO, or worse?
Join senior games industry recruiter, Lindsey McQueeney as she addresses the top 5 best and worst ways to make an impression, with a focus on appropriate networking, as well as provides actual Developer anecdotes regarding their first forays into networking their way into the industry.

Video: Designing puzzles that make players feel smart

posted Mar 26 2013

GDC Vault offers for free a lecture from the 2009 Game Developers Conference on how to design puzzles effectively to help players feel smart, given by Tiger Style's Randy Smith. 

Rather than providing too much advance information or dumbing the challenge down, Smith argues for user-centered puzzles that provide "guidance on demand." He shows Tomb Raider and Portal puzzles as excellent examples that scale to the players' needs and provide more hints only if necessary.

In this presentation, Smith covers puzzle structure along with six principles of user-centered design: visibility, affordances, mapping, visual language, feedback, and conceptual models.

Check out the free video here. 

Session Name: Helping Your Players Feel Smart: Puzzles as User Interface

Speaker(s): Randy Smith

Company Name(s): Tiger Style

Track / Format: Game Design

Video: The strain of keeping 150M Club Penguin players happy

posted Mar 25 2013

GDC Vault highlights from the Game Developers Conference Online 2011 a free lecture featuring Nicole Thompson on Disney's MMO for kids, Club Penguin.

Thompson, then executive producer of Disney'sClub Penguin, discusses best practices for fostering a successful online community with over 150 million accounts, including how to provide safety, authenticity, connectivity, and fun for users in and out of the game.

Session Name: 150 Million Penguins Can't Be Wrong: Managing the Virtual World of Disney'sClub Penguin

Speaker(s): Nicole Thompson

Company Name(s): Disney's Club Penguin

Track / Format: Customer Experience

Overview:Nicole Thompson, executive producer of Disney's Club Penguin, offers a behind-the-scenes look at how the Internet's largest virtual world for kids manages and cultivates its community by putting them at the center of every decision made on the snow-capped island of Club Penguin. This talk will explore how theClub Penguin community plays a leading role in the development of products, characters, storylines throughout the virtual world, the practices in place for communicating with players - inside and out of the game - and the unique philosophy that has helped build and shape one of the largest online communities on the Internet.

Video: Spec Ops: The Line's unique visual effects pipeline

posted Mar 22 2013

Courtesy of the GDC Vault is a free lecture lecture about rapidly iterating on the visual effects for Spec Ops: The Line, given at the Game Developers Conference Europe 2012. 

Yager Development's lead FX artist Florian Zender suggests creating a basic functioning asset first instead of using all of the development time in the beginning for something polished. The artist then has the time later to make it larger, cheaper, and prettier to meet other team members' evolving technical specifications.

Session Name: Bringing Home the Bacon- Developing the VFX of Spec Ops: The Line as Thin Slices

Speaker(s): Florian Zender

Company Name(s): Yager Development

Track / Format: Visual Arts

Overview:The current workflow we use in the VFX production of Spec Ops: The Line has been dubbed "Thin Slices" due to its quick and highly iterative approach. We use it to get a better handle on the issues presented by the interdisciplinary work and leverage as much potential as possible. The topic focuses on how this principle allowed us to cope with a quickly growing team, buffer various schedule changes and keep morale high when finalising the project.

Video: How to function as a depressed, solo game developer

posted Mar 21 2013

Courtesy of the GDC Vault is a free lecture given at the Game Developers Conference 2011 on minimizing depression's adverse effects and maximizing productivity and creativity.

Developer Michael Todd suggests those who work solo or remotely and are prone to depression need to be proactive about the work they select. Finding projects that are highly rewarding, suit your needs, and match your abilities will help keep you inspired and productive. 

Some tips he offers are to get other people to play your game and to discuss online or in person its potential flaws, instead of trying to work through development alone. He also says to play demos to realign your reality with what games are currently offering. Additionally, he suggests for self-evaluation and motivation that carefully track how much time you spend on work is better than merely estimating.

Session Name: Turning Depression into Inspiration

Speaker(s): Michael Todd

Company Name(s): then Spyeart.com, now Michael Todd Games

Track / Format: Independent Games Summit

Video: How to be creative when working with someone else's IP

posted Mar 20 2013

Video: How Plants vs. Zombies' designer got his mom to play

posted Mar 19 2013

Plants vs. Zombies designer George Fan shares techniques he used to teach game mechanics suitable to make hardcore players and non-gamers, like his mother, play through PopCap's tower defense title until the end.

In this GDC 2012 lecture, now free courtesy of the GDC Vault, Fan uses Plants vs. Zombies to illustrate these ten techniques, including using visuals and fewer words to teach. Along those lines, he believes in blending the tutorial into the game and having the player experiment in a controlled environment rather than just reading how to play.

Session Name: How I Got My Mom to Play Through Plants vs. Zombies

Speaker(s): George Fan

Company Name(s): PopCap

Track / Format: Game Design

Overview:The final boss of Plants vs. Zombieshas been conquered by gamers of all ages as well as people with no gaming background whatsoever. George Fan, designer of Plants vs. Zombies, will walk you through how he managed to get his Mom to play through a full-blown strategy game while not alienating hardcore gamers. He will present 10 techniques he uses to better teach game mechanics to players, using specific examples from Plants vs. Zombies to illustrate these concepts.

Video: Will Wright remembers his first game, Raid on Bungeling Bay

posted Mar 18 2013

Courtesy of the GDC Vault is the fascinating postmortem of Raid on Bungeling Bay given at the Game Developers Conference 2011. Will Wright may be best known for designing SimCity, but it was his first developed game that inspired creating the city builder. 

Wright shares here that his interest in Conway's Game of Life and a childhood fascination with helicopters led him to create to the action strategy game Raid on Bungeling Bay. During its development, Wright had written a map-building program to use on the Commodore 64 called Wedit, and his interest with this tool inspired him later to make the famous city-building sim.

In this lecture, Wright also looks at how piracy affected Raid on Bungeling Bay's sales on the Commodore 64 (20,000 units) compared to the NES version (800,000 units). He admits to spending a lot of time writing anti-piracy measures for the former but says the latter's cartridge-based format allowed the game to achieve much higher sales. 

Session Name: Classic Game Postmortem - Raid on Bungeling Bay

Speaker(s): Will Wright

Company Name(s): StupidFunClub

Track / Format: Game Design

Video: Brian Moriarty's 'Apology for Roger Ebert'

posted Mar 15 2013

Beyond Zork and Loom creator and Worcester Polytechnic Institute professor Brian Moriarty delivers a defense of Roger Ebert's industry-stirring sentiment that "video games can never be art," given in this newly free video lecture from GDC 2011 courtesy of the GDC Vault 

"This is an apology in the sense of a Greek apologia, the systematic defense of a position or opinion," explains Moriarty as he begins to share the context of Ebert's industry-stirring statements from 2005. The debates that followed had mostly subsided until a later TEDx lecture by Kellee Santiago, then co-founder and president of thatgamecompany, "Stop the Debate: Video Games are Art, So What's Next?" 

Santiago had offered examples Waco Resurrection, Braid and Flower, all of which Ebert later dismissed in a critique with the infamous headline "Video games can never be art." Although Moriarty never says video games are art, he explains in this lecture ways in which they could be, who could make it so, and the concepts critical to understanding the debate.

Brian Moriarty's 'An Apology for Roger Ebert' can be viewed above and can be read here.

Session Name: An Apology for Roger Ebert

Speaker(s): Brian Moriarty

Company Name(s): Worcester Polytechnic Institute

Track / Format:Game Design

Video: Clint Hocking discusses dynamics in games

posted Mar 14 2013

Courtesy of the GDC Vault is another free lecture from the Game Developers Conference 2011. 

Far Cry 2 and Splinter Cell designer Clint Hocking offers here his answer to the question SpyPartycreator Chris Hecker posed at a 2009 GDC lecture: "How do games mean?" That is, "How does meaning happen in our art form?"

Hocking says that games "mean via their dynamics." He goes on to explore the mechanics and dynamics of various games, starting with using the whip in Spelunky. In comparing Guitar Hero to antiquated player pianos, he also explores the complicated definition of what it means to "play" video games. He then examines the narrative of Tetris and the dynamics of competitive pressure found in player-versus-player games such as Street Fighter II.

Session Name: Dynamics: The State of the Art

Speaker(s): Clint Hocking

Company Name(s): then LucasArts, now Valve

Track / Format: Game Design

Video: How Double Fine's Joe Kowalski makes UI with personality

posted Mar 13 2013

Courtesy of the GDC Vault is a free lecture from the latest Game Developers Conference, GDC China 2012. Double Fine's Joe Kowalski discusses here how he found interesting ways to connect to players through the user interface he designed for Guitar Hero and Brutal Legend. 

Often the UI is the first interaction players have with the game. While Kowalski aims to create a UI that conveys easily digestible and interactive information, he says that creating a UI that evokes the game's personality can achieve greater emotional responses in players.

Getting some kind of response is better than nothing, he argues. "Even if they hate it, at least you gave them something to talk about." 

Check out the free video here.

Session Name: Working the Crowd: Engaging Players through the User Interface

Speaker(s): Joe Kowalski

Company Name(s): Double Fine Productions

Track / Format: Game Design