The Georgia Game Developers Association announced that Westwood College is sponsoring a college fair and a series of professional tutorials at the upcoming Southern Interactive Entertainment and Game Expo (SIEGE) in October.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Westwood College Sponsors Industry-Focused SIEGE Fair in Georgia
New Call of Duty: World at War Zombies Map Debuts Tomorrow
Activision announced that a new downloadable map will be released tomorrow for its popular iOS first-person shooter Call of Duty: World at War Zombies. The Der Riese (“Zombie Factory”) map, adapted from downloadable content originally released for the console editions of Call of Duty: World at War, will be available as a $4.99 in-app purchase [...]
GDC Online Reminds On Pass Deadline, Adds Parties, Summit Talks, Civ V Lecture
GDC Online organizers are reminding that this Friday is the final pre-show discount deadline for next week's Austin show, revealing a new Playboy/Bigpoint party and lectures from Civilization V creators along the way.
The Austin, Texas based conference -- formerly known as GDC Austin -- is sharply focused on the development of online games, including free-to-play titles, social network games, and traditional MMOs, with a veteran online game industry advisory board evaluating and selecting the lectures.
There are now more than 120 panels, lectures and tutorials currently scheduled for the October 5th-8th event. Highlights include the confirmation of a keynote from Zynga chief game designer Brian Reynolds (FrontierVille), and track keynotes from Blizzard's Greg Canessa (on Battle.net), Playdom's Raph Koster (on social mechanics), and Bigpoint's Heiko Hubertz (on the rise of Europe in online gaming).
Organizers are reminding that final registration discounts for the show, which kicks off next Tuesday, will run out this Friday, October 1st, with discounts of up to $200 still available for prospective attendees who register now, as opposed to doing so onsite.
At this late stage, several new announcements have debuted. Famed media brand Playboy, which recently announced a foray into digital gaming with partner Bigpoint, is co-hosting an official GDC party open to all GDC passholders at The Phoenix on Thursday, October 7th.
As previously mentioned, the rounded-out parties and networking opportunities at GDC Online include an Opening Night Party on October 6th sponsored by Unreal Engine creator Epic Games, plus on-site mixers from Hi5, Crytek, and a multitude of others.
In addition, the four Summits taking place at GDC Online on October 5th and 6th have rounded out their session content, with new lectures in the iPhone Summit, iPad Summit, 3D Stereoscopic Gaming Summit and the Game Narrative Summit from notable companies such as Obsidian, Booyah, Supergiant Games, Smoking Gun Interactive, OneBigGame and more.
Also rounded out are the full set of vendor-supported tutorials, open to all GDC Online pass holders excluding Game Career Seminar, having added specifics for the GameSpy-supported tutorial day, including a lecture called 'Tools for User Generated Content in Sid Meier?s Civilization V', laying out "an introduction to the modding tools developed for Civilization V that players have used to create dynamic new content for the next generation of Civilization games."
These final announcements join just-debuted talks with lessons from APB, Habbo and even Cow Clicker, with a full set of highlighted lectures including talks from KingsIsle, IMVU, Disney, Playdom, BioWare Austin, Hangout Industries, Broken Bulb Studios, CCP, Gaia Online, Playfish, InstantAction, Ubisoft and a host of other notable companies at the leading worldwide online game-specific conference.
One of the other major advantages of attending GDC Online is the comprehensive list of nearly 100 exhibitors with whom attendees are able to get product demonstrations, meet, and interact on the vibrant GDC Online Expo Floor. These include major firms like Epic, Rackspace, Gaikai, Offerpal, Vindicia, Trinigy, ARIN, Versant, Rixty, Softlayer, and many other large companies in the space.
GDC Online is operated by the UBM TechWeb Game Network, as is this website, and will take place October 5-8, 2010 at the Austin Convention Center in Austin, Texas. To learn more about lectures across all tracks and summits for the event, for which registration is still open, please visit GDC Online's official website.
GDC 2011 Announces Summit Line-Up, Calls For Social & Online Game Submissions
[Just as the official GDC website gets a retro-future makeover for the twenty-fifth anniversary next February, we're debuting call for papers for various Summits, including the Social & Online Games Summit - looking forward to your submissions.]
Game Developers Conference organizers have announced additional Summits for GDC 2011, including a new GDC Smartphone Summit and the return of the Social & Online Games Summit. The organizers have also opened up a call for Summit lecture submissions until October 14th.
The GDC Summits take place Monday, February 28th and Tuesday, March 1st, 2011, the first two days of the historic 25th annual Game Developers Conference. They offer deep-dive content on a variety of notable game industry topics, ahead of the main conference which runs Wednesday, March 2nd through Friday, March 4th.
This year, the conference is introducing the GDC Smartphone Summit, which brings top developers from around the world to share knowledge and concrete takeaways on the smartphone and related platforms.
These include breakout game platforms like Apple's iPhone, the iPad, Android OS phones and tablets, Blackberry and a variety of other notable handheld devices.
The summits also include the vibrant Social & Online Games Summit, with a packed agenda devoted to social network games, free-to-play web titles, and microtransaction-powered online games.
2011's GDC will also see the return of the signature Independent Games Summit, highlighting the top indie game creators and lessons. the Summit will run as part of the Independent Games Festival at the show.
In addition, the 2011 Serious Games Summit is being built around two themes, with day one focusing on health and healthcare, covering research and the many commercialized games in the health & wellness space that have launched the past few years. Day two will be devoted to the rising trend of 'gamification' -- the concept of building game-like incentives into non-game applications to address issues like productivity, health, and marketing.
The Summit roster is rounded out by the extremely popular AI (artificial intelligence) Summit, plus a revamped Game Education Summit, and the return of the Game Localization Summit -- with a number of notable Monday and Tuesday tutorials also to be announced in the near future.
Each individual GDC Summit has its own specialized set of expert advisors from that particular submarket, including notables like Playdom's Steve Meretzky (Social & Online Games Summit), the Institute for the Future's Jane McGonigal (Serious Games Summit), Disney Mobile/Tapulous' Bart Decrem (GDC Smartphone Summit), and Intrinsic Algorithm's Dave Mark (AI Summit).
The GDC Summit Advisory committees will be looking for submissions in the areas of:
- AI Summit
- Game Education Summit
- Game Localization Summit
- GDC Smartphone Summit
- Independent Games Summit
- Social & Online Games Summit
- Serious Games Summit
Organized by the UBM TechWeb Game Network, as is this website, GDC 2011 marks the 25th anniversary of the game industry?s most comprehensive professionals-only event, taking place February 28th - March 4th at the Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco, California. For more information regarding the submission phases and the guidelines for submissions for the GDC summits visit the official GDC Summits submission page.
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Hey You Guys: Remake For Datasoft's Goonies Released
Yes, another new Goonies game to celebrate the cult film's 25th anniversary this year! Unlike the completely new The Goonies 'R' Good Enough release for MSX that Kralizec released with its own cartridge and packaging, this title is a PC remake of Datasoft's ZX/C64/CPC/Atari/pple game, available to download for free.
While its based on the same material, this remake plays nothing like Konami's NES/MSX releases that more people are probably familiar with. In this version, players control two members from the Goonies gang, solving puzzles to reach the exit to the next screen. Each scene is based on sets from The Goonies film.
The remake, which was produced by Luis Barrachina and David Vassart (with Steve Fenton and Mihaly Horvath contributing to the soundtrack), features new graphics, music, and more. You can grab the full game or its demo here.
[Via Retro Remakes]
Gamasutra's Best Of The Week: September 26th
Every weekend, we'll be rounding up the top full-length features, news and blogs of the past week on 'art and business of gaming' site Gamasutra, plus the new pieces from sister site GameCareerGuide that debuted last week. This time, some of the highlights include interviews with Crytek, Valve, and Atari, plus analysis on cloud gaming, the heritage of older game titles, a neat IGF-winning student game postmortem, narrative analysis on Persona 4, and lots more. ...
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Interview: Longbow Games Talks Indie RTS Hegemony: Philip Of Macedon
Longbow Games' Hegemony: Philip of Macedon, which has been in development for several years, follows the rise of Alexander the Great's father, Philip of Macedon, allowing players to manage the leader's armies and empires as they progress through the game's campaign. The game features large-scale real time strategy battles based on historical events and conflicts. The game allows players to manipulate troops and systems outside of the battlefield, such as supply routes and trade networks. ...
Gamecaster Joins Epic Games? Unreal Engine 3 Integrated Partners Program
Gamecaster�, Inc. and Epic Games, Inc. today announced that Gamecaster?s GCS3� virtual camera hardware for video game, film and television production is now available to all licensees of Epic?s Unreal Engine 3 (UE3) and users of the Unreal Development Kit (UDK), the free edition of UE3 that gives users access to the award-winning integrated suite of game development tools. Gamecaster is the newest member of Epic?s unrivaled Unreal Engine 3 Integrated Partners Program (IPP).
The Gamecaster GCS3 virtual camera hardware enables game developers working within Unreal Matinee, UE3’s director-class, in-game cinematics and cut scene production software, to layout scenes the same way they would shoot live action – by panning, tilting, trucking and zooming Unreal Matinee’s virtual camera in real time with real-life camera hardware. What’s more, Unreal Matinee automatically keyframes the GCS3’s movements, reducing the amount of time spent “camera keyframing” during the game development process.
?GCS3 integration with Unreal Matinee makes it easier for game developers and cinematographers to achieve immediate, fantastic results in virtual filmmaking,” said Dr. Michael Capps, president of Epic Games. “With GCS3, developers can open the Unreal Editor, record live camera movement within a cinematic scene, and play back results instantly. It’s that simple and it can save a huge amount of time on tasks that usually require manual keyframing.”
The Gamecaster GCS3 virtual camera hardware has a stylized form factor, an HD LCD viewfinder, internal motion sensors and two proprietary thumbstick controls. The GCS3 can be mounted to a tripod or a shoulder mount for handheld operation, allowing game developers and digital filmmakers to be a part of the action as it happens.
?The ability to conduct real-time virtual cinematography within Unreal Matinee, and make shots feel alive and believable, is an instant benefit to game developers,? said David MacIntosh, president of Gamecaster. “We’re looking forward to watching the stunning in-game cinematics and cut scenes that UE3 licensees and UDK users will create with this powerful new feature.?
“GCS3 puts added creative control in our hands by enabling us to produce authentic feeling handheld camera shots for cinematics more easily and quickly than with traditional keyframing,” said Greg Mitchell, Epic’s cinematics director. “The hardware design is particularly intuitive to people who, like me, have a history behind the camera. GCS3 feels like a motion picture camera in my hands and can be used with support equipment available in the production business.”
Capps added, ?Our partners program ensures that our licensees have access to integration code for industry-leading tools and middleware maintained in step with Unreal Engine 3 as it advances. Unreal Engine 3 licensees benefit from having the best tools and 3D applications work seamlessly with the engine out of the box.?
For more information on Gamecaster, please visit http://www.gamecaster.com. To purchase the GCS3 virtual camera hardware, please e-mail GCS3@gamecaster.com.
About Unreal Engine 3
The award-winning Unreal Engine is known for cutting-edge graphics and its best-of-breed toolset. Unreal Engine 3 maintains those features in addition to multi-core processor support, Xbox 360� and Playstation�3 optimizations, massive world support, and a highly mature tool pipeline. Unreal Engine 3’s consistently evolving toolset is designed to accelerate developers’ productivity for PC and console games, visualization applications, training simulations, and linear animated content. Additional information on Unreal Engine can be obtained through the Unreal Technology website at http://www.unrealtechnology.com.
About Epic Games
Epic Games, Inc., based in Cary, N.C. and established in 1991, develops cutting-edge games and cross-platform game engine technology. The company has created multiple million-selling, award-winning titles in its ?Unreal? series, including ?Unreal Tournament 3? for PC, PlayStation�3 and Xbox 360�. Epic?s “Gears of War” series has sold over 12 million copies and won over 30 Game of the Year awards. Epic’s Unreal Engine 3 is the four-time winner of Game Developer magazine?s Best Engine Front Line Award and Hall of Fame inductee. Unreal Engine 3 has also been recognized as the number one game engine by Develop magazine. Additional information about Epic can be obtained through the Epic Games website at http://www.epicgames.com.
About Gamecaster
Gamecaster, Inc., headquartered in San Diego, California, is a designer, manufacturer and supplier of virtual camera control technology for the film, television and video game industries, and a producer of video game tournaments and related television programs for broadcast worldwide in multiple media. For more information about the company, please visit: http://www.gamecaster.com.
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IndieCade 2010 Finalists: Solace (One Man Down)
Not many more IndieCade 2010 finalists for us to look at! Next up is Solace, a bullet hell shmup that explores the five stages of grief. The game is available to download from the Solace site.
Created by a team of students at the DigiPen Institute of Technology, Solace uses dynamic audio in an attempt to capture the moody tone that the team were looking for. The game was also a PAX 10 finalist, so obviously there's something about it that is catching the judges' eyes!
Give it a download and see what you think.
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GDC 2011 Announces Summit Line-Up, Calls For Submissions
Game Developers Conference organizers have announced additional Summits for GDC 2011, including a new GDC Smartphone Summit and the return of the Social & Online Games Summit. The organizers have also opened up a call for Summit lecture submissions until October 14th.
The GDC Summits take place Monday, February 28th and Tuesday, March 1st, 2011, the first two days of the historic 25th annual Game Developers Conference. They offer deep-dive content on a variety of notable game industry topics, ahead of the main conference which runs Wednesday, March 2nd through Friday, March 4th.
This year, the conference is introducing the GDC Smartphone Summit, which brings top developers from around the world to share knowledge and concrete takeaways on the smartphone and related platforms.
These include breakout game platforms like Apple's iPhone, the iPad, Android OS phones and tablets, Blackberry and a variety of other notable handheld devices.
The summits also include the vibrant Social & Online Games Summit, with a packed agenda devoted to social network games, free-to-play web titles, and microtransaction-powered online games.
2011's GDC will also see the return of the signature Independent Games Summit, highlighting the top indie game creators and lessons. the Summit will run as part of the Independent Games Festival at the show.
PlayStation Move moves early to take on Wii
Retailers nationwide began selling Sony's new motion-control system ? PlayStation Move ? on Friday, two days ahead of schedule.
PlayStation Move moves early to take on Wii
Retailers nationwide began selling Sony's new motion-control system ? PlayStation Move ? on Friday, two days ahead of schedule.
MANHATTAN ASSOCIATES LSI LINEAR TECHNOLOGY . LEXMARK INTERNATIONAL
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
2010 GDC China Reveals BioWare, Volition, Slant Six Talks
This December's Game Developers Conference China is debuting its first Western speakers, including notables from BioWare, Volition, and Slant Six discussing key art and programming topics.
These initial announcements are part of the 'Global Game Development' track, one of the two main tracks at this December's Shanghai-based show, for which organizers recently opened registration.
The track, which is dedicated to excellence in worldwide game production, is featuring top Western talent discussing the practical art and business of making cutting-edge titles, and some of the the initial highlights include:
- BioWare development director Adriana Lopez (Mass Effect 2) will present 'The Art of Estimating Programming Tasks', explaining: "Have you ever been asked to provide an estimate for a task only to be horribly wrong, since it took you 2 to 10 times more than you expected?"
She adds: "We all have been there and the consequences are visible: projects missing dates, teams blocked by dependencies, and overtime, lots of overtime. The good news is that the battle is not over. With a couple of tools and a little bit of practice, each one of us can improve the quality of the estimates given for a project."
- In another notable lecture, Volition's senior technical artist and GDC San Francisco board member Jeff Hanna (Red Faction franchise) will present 'How to Train your Technical Artist', covering "a discussion of the skills that modern technical artists should possess" for cutting edge games. Topics will include programming skills, art knowledge, look development, problem solving, communication skills, and system design.
- Finally, 'Maximize your Production Effort - Efficient Content Authoring Tools and Pipeline for Inter-studio Asset Development' sees Slant Six studio tech director Paul Martin (SOCOM series) explain that: "With a trend towards outsourced development of game assets, there are additional considerations that are important for achieving optimal workflow between studios that are co-developing or sharing assets." The lecture will give insight into "how to create new content authoring tools and data transformation pipelines that promote efficient work flow for both internal and remote production teams."
OSR: Unhinged To Offer A Cheaper Trials Experience
If playing stunt racers like RedLynx's Trials HD and Hello Games' Joe Danger, you might want to try out Old School Racer: Unhinged when Riddlesoft releases the sidescrolling motorbike title to Xbox Live Indie Games.
One reason to check it out is it will probably be cheap as its predecessor, Old School Racer, which is available right not on XBLIG for 80 Points (with a free demo). It will also have a lot of elements/obstacles you'll recognize from Trials -- ramps that have you flipping across stages, spheres you can ride inside/on top of, and more.
There's no word on a release date for OSR: Unhinged, but Riddlesoft promises it's "coming soon" in the trailer.
[Via IndieNerds]
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