Click Nothing

GDC09 - Part 2 - Improvisation presentation materials

So I promised a lot of people I would have the slides from my talk up by Monday, but then I got lazy. But finally, a whole 24 hours late, here they are. you want a quick overview of what the talk was about, Chris Remo recapped it pretty clearly here.

Here's some usability tips for those who aren't aware:

Download the big zip, and open and print the word document (or have it on a second monitor) then run the powerpoint in presentation mode (or have it on your main monitor), then - every time you see a bold word in the text of the word doc, you advance the slides. This will keep all the slides and text in synch and give you the full effect of the presentation.

Just reading the presentation alone will be confusing without the slides, and the slides themselves will be totally meaningless without the text - it's really the synchronization of the two that you need if you hope to follow it.

Also - for reference, you might want the following:

My GDC 2006 Intentionality talk is here.
Harvey Smith's Orthogonal Unit Differentiation talk is here.
Harvey Smith and Randy Smith's talk on emergent gameplay design is here.

Thanks - obviously - to Harvey and Randy for continuing to host the slides and making all this great stuff available for freeloaders like me (and hopefully now you) to cash in on.

GDC09 - Part 1 - GDW and Family Dynamics

Here begins my long slow recap of GDC wherein I will ultimately get around to posting all of my various slides and presentation materials, as well as different commentary on the sessions I saw and what I thought was valuable about GDC this year.

First up is my quick recap of the Game Design Workshop tutorial. The GDW this year was the best yet, even eclipsing last years. It seemed a little smaller, but that might just be because we (ie: Mahk) were better organized and there were some structural changes that made it run more smoothly (I think I foolishly resisted making those changes last year... my bad).

It's clear to me (and not just from GDC) that the quality of students, new grads and recently-employed game developers is going up rapidly. I am pretty sure the rest of the GDW 'faculty' agrees with me on this. It is humbling - even a little bit intimidating - to see these smart new people rolling in and showing us that they have already learned much (or all) of the theory that underpins the workshop... good thing it's not a talky thing - but rather a practical, hands-on thing, or we'd be outta business (whether we all end up out of business in the broader sense remains to be seen).

 

Speaking of practical and hands-on, above is one of the groups that signed up for my elective 'Family Dynamics'. Family Dynamics is an exercise that asks each team to take a random graph which represents the relationship between two unnamed variables (ie: a mechanic) and a random word from a heavily loaded list of things related to families (ie: an aesthetic) and attempt to join the two using limited materials and their own design sensibilities.

The above team made a game about 'impotence' using a two-part graph that plotted (what they defined as) fertility and a progression through three-stages of emotional and physical arousal to try and explore how it might feel to struggle to conceive a child under the pressures that can build up in a family relationship over time.

It was an excruciatingly difficult exercise, I think, and not all of the teams made it through. The point is not really to succeed, though - it's to learn and I hope everybody did. Either way, whatever I come up with next year will likely be a bit less insane.

If you have any interest in reviewing the exercise materials, or in replicating the exercise yourself, feel free to download the parts I am able to make available, over on the left.

My GDC Schedule

Honestly, as much as this is gonna look like a plug for all these interesting talks - mostly what this is, is easy access for me so I can see what talks I am going to and when becuase this is the easiest way to make this stuff quickly accessible from my phone.

Those of you who consequently get an endorsement - hey lucky you :)

(Parties, lunches and other stuff not listed for my own protection against the hordes of hot chicks who stalk me relentlessly, but also so I can crash your party without you knowing it in advance... that's right - I'm talkin' to you Microsoft!)

Monday, March 23rd, 2009

Game Design Workshop
Full Day Tutorial – (Two Days)
Date/Time: Monday (March 23, 2009), 10:00am — 6:00pm
Location (room): 2020, 2022, 2024

Tuesday, March 24th, 2009

Game Design Workshop
Full Day Tutorial – (Two Days)
Date/Time:  Tuesday (March 24, 2009)   10:00am — 6:00pm
Location (room): 2020, 2022, 2024

IGDA Members Party
Date: Tuesday, March 24th
Time: 8pm to 1am
Location: Westin Hotel, Metropolitan ballroom, 50 Third Street, San Francisco

Wednesday, March 25th, 2009

Fault Tolerance: From Intentionality to Improvisation
Speaker: Clint Hocking (Creative Director, Ubisoft)
Date/Time: Wednesday (March 25, 2009)   10:30am — 11:30am
Location (room): Room 2002, West Hall

Breathing LIFE into an Open World
Speaker: Scott Phillips (Design Architect/Lead Designer, THQ\Volition)
Date/Time: Wednesday (March 25, 2009)   12:00pm — 1:00pm
Location (room): Room 2020, West Hall

IGDA VIP Luncheon
Date: Wednesday, March 25th
Time: 1:15pm to 2:15pm
Location: Westin Hotel (aka The Argent), Metropolitan Ballroom III, 50 Third Street

Making Friends is Hard: Social Mechanics in Contemporary Design
Speaker: Alex Hutchinson (Creative Director, Electronic Arts Montreal)
Date/Time: Wednesday (March 25, 2009)   2:30pm — 3:30pm
Location (room): Room 131, North Hall

alternate
The Game Design Challenge: My First Time
Speaker: Panel
Date/Time: Wednesday (March 25, 2009) 2:30pm — 3:30pm
Location (room): Room 135, North Hall

Meaning, Aesthetics, and User-Generated Content
Speaker: Chris Hecker (Technology Fellow, Maxis/Electronic Arts)
Date/Time: Wednesday (March 25, 2009)   4:00pm — 5:00pm
Location (room): Room 135, North Hall

Nominee Reception
Date/Time: Wednesday, March 25, 2009, 5:30pm
Locations: Esplanade Room, South Hall, Moscone Center, San Francisco

9th Annual Game Developers Choice Awards
Date/Time: Wednesday (March 25, 2009)   6:30pm — 8:30pm
Location (room): Esplanade Room

 
Thursday, March 26th, 2009

GDC Microtalks - One Hour, Ten Speakers, Unlimited Ideas
Speaker: Panel
Date/Time: Thursday (March 26, 2009)   9:00am — 10:00am
Location (room): Room 2007, West Hall

From CS to L4D: Creating Replayable Coop Experiences
Speaker: Michael Booth (Game Designer/Developer, Valve)
Date/Time: Thursday (March 26, 2009)   1:30pm — 2:30pm
Location (room): Room 2007, West Hall

alternate
Physical Play: for Interaction, Collaboration and Creativity
Speaker: David Merrill (MIT Media Lab)
Date/Time: Thursday (March 26, 2009)   1:30pm — 2:30pm
Location (room): Room 130, North Hall

Helping Your Players Feel Smart: Puzzles as User Interface
Speaker: Randy Smith (Game Designer, EA)
Date/Time: Thursday (March 26, 2009)   3:00pm — 4:00pm
Location (room): Room 2014, West Hall

Post Mortem: Mission Architect for City of Heroes
Speaker: Joe Morrissey (Senior Game Designer, NCsoft)
Date/Time: Thursday (March 26, 2009)   4:30pm — 5:30pm
Location (room): Room 3007, West Hall

 
Friday, March 27th, 2009

Game Writers' Round Table: Techniques, Tips, and Concerns
Speaker: Richard Dansky (Manager of Design/Writer, Red Storm Entertainment)
Date/Time: Friday (March 27, 2009)   9:00am — 10:00am
Location (room): Room 110, North Hall

Beyond Balancing: Using Five Elements of Failure Design to Enhance Player Experiences
Speaker: Jesper Juul (Lecturer / Researcher, Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab)
Date/Time: Friday (March 27, 2009)   10:30am — 10:50am
Location (room): Room 2022, West Hall

Paper Prototypes of SPORE
Speaker: Stone Librande (Game Designer, EA/Maxis)
Date/Time: Friday (March 27, 2009)   11:10am — 11:30am
Location (room): Room 2022, West Hall

The Human Play Machine
Speaker: Chaim Gingold (Designer, Levity lab)
Date/Time: Friday (March 27, 2009)   12:00pm — 1:00pm
Location (room): Room 2020, West Hall

alternate
Vast Narratives and Open Worlds, Part Deux -- Big Huge Problems
Speaker: Ken Rolston (Lead Designer, Big Huge Games), Mark Nelson (Lead Designer, Big Huge Games)
Date/Time: Friday (March 27, 2009)   12:00pm — 1:00pm
Location (room): Room 2007, West Hall

Destruction of Design
Speaker: Luke Schneider (Designer, Volition Inc)
Date/Time: Friday (March 27, 2009)   4:00pm — 5:00pm
Location (room): Room 2004, West Hall

alternate
Games Have Feelings Too!
Speaker: E. Daniel Arey (Chief Creative Officer, VisionArey Entertainment)
Date/Time: Friday (March 27, 2009)   4:00pm — 5:00pm
Location (room): Room 2022, West Hall

The Well of Souls

This is awesome.

Somehow, someone dug up and posted the transcript of several days of discussion between George Lucas, Steven Spielberg and Lawrence Kasdan where they conceived and developed the story for Raiders of the Lost Ark.

I won't recap the post from the original blogger - get over there and read it. And then - if the post leaves you as fascinated as it left me, you can download the entire transcript of the meetings here.

(If the link breaks or is discontinued, contact me and I will point it somewhere else.)

Really, incredibly fascinating stuff. Must read for any writer or any creative working in the concept stage on anything.

The pen 2.0 is mightier than the pen 1.0 which was mightier than the sword 4.3.8

Pat sent me this. But since it is a year + a day since he updated his blog, I'll post it here for him (slacker).

I'm not much of a 'gadget' guy (yeah, yeah, ignore the phone). I am much more into general purpose stuff - a computer, a camera, a phone, etc. But as computing gets more and more embedded and ubiquitous, things that once were 'gadgets' now are cool-ass fully-functional parts of the computational collective that is devouring us all.

I like this.

I dislike - as any sane person would - the need for custom paper... but at a $150 price point it's kinda irrelevant. By the time we solve the paper problem (which is tricky, yeah) the price will be down to 1/64 what it is now.

By 2020 (or hell, even 2019) we'll be buying 8-packs of these the same way we buy Bics now (err - wait a minute... I can't remember the last time I bought a pen... where do they frikkin' come from??), and they'll be fully wireless and dumping their data to a PC in real time whether you're drawing with them on paper, on a white board or in the air.

So. Cool.