Session Name: | Reimagining Simulation Sports as an Independent Developer |
Speaker(s): | Peter Garcin |
Company Name(s): | HB Studios |
Track / Format: | Business, Marketing & Management |
Overview: | Simulation sports is a genre with a near-monopoly commercial situation and is deeply entrenched in licensed content and broadcast television emulation from a design standpoint. After nearly 15 years of working with EA Sports, in 2014 HB Studios launched its first fully independent title, The Golf Club, as part of a long-term vision to reimagine the simulation sports genre in a way that is sustainable for small developers. This talk covers the development of The Golf Club, including how we used procedural generation and user generated content to lower development costs, how we successfully implemented cross-platform sharing on consoles and PC, and how we integrated our community into our development process. We'll explore our vision for simulation sports and how design innovation and challenging established standards can allow small teams to be competitive in entrenched genres. |