Category Archives: gdc 2010

GDC 2010: Hands on with ‘Pocket Creatures’

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GDC 2010: Hands on with ‘Pocket Creatures’ is a post from: Best Iphone Apps Review Website

Today we met with Asbjorern Soendergaard and Morten Svendsen of new iPhone development group Tactile Entertainment. Tactile was founded a year ago to focus on iPhone games and their first project Pocket Creatures is finally nearing completion.

While we covered the game's announcement last week, today we had time to see the game in person at GDC. After spending time with it, Pocket Creatures seems a surprisingly complex experience. Soendergaard didn't want this to be considered just another pet game. Instead, he describes the game as an open world sandbox experience partly inspired by Black and White.

The game opens on a deserted island where you find a mysterious egg on an alter in an ancient temple. The egg hatches and you are responsible for the care of the creature. You can treat your creature with love or hate and condition it's behavior based on positive or negative feedback. Environmental objects and creatures can be used and combined in surprisingly complex ways.

Morten Svendsen walked us through the various interactions in the game:

Rubbing on screen will give your creature love/affection while swiping across the screen will slap/hit your creature. Feed it a banana and then slap it, and it will learn to hate bananas and avoid them in the future. Various objects and tools can be combined in different ways (seeds + water + manure = growing plant).

The game keeps running track of all the relationships between the creature and its environment, and the creature will act autonomously even without your interaction and will behave based on this previous conditioning. Meanwhile, different achievements unlock cosmetic add-ons, such as horns or wings, so you can customize your creature's look.

The game remains in pre-beta so the video does not represent the final visuals, which will be further enhanced. Overall, though, I was surprised and impressed at the depth of interaction for the creature and its environment. It was definitely beyond my initial expectations of a "pet" game, so I recommend at least watching through the video to see it in action. The game is about to go into beta, and should be coming in the next month or two.


GDC 2010: ‘geoDefense 2′ Coming for the iPad

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This afternoon we met with David Whatley of Critical Thought Games and aside from race cars and sniper rifles, we also discussed the future of his company and the geoDefense series of tower defense games.

Following a series of complicated business deals involving his former company, Simutronics, Whatley will soon be focusing full time on game development. Formerly, Critical Thought Games was a very small operation that existed entirely out of David's spare time. In the not too distant future, Critical Thought Games will be expanding, adding employees and setting up a brand new office to build iPhone, iPad, and various Facebook social games.

Fans of the geoDefense series will be happy to know that one of these new games they're working on is geoDefense 2. Initially the sequel will be iPad-only, with levels and gameplay that take advantage of the increased screen real estate available on the device. It will share the same graphical style, only this time instead of a small array of towers with deep upgrade paths, Whatley is debating a Plants vs. Zombies style game that just has tons of different towers to utilize.

Things with geoDefense 2 are still in the air while the new Critical Thought Games offices and staff get settled, but David assured us he does have plans to adapt the iPad version of the game to the iPhone as well. Needless to say, once more details are available on geoDefense 2, we'll post them.


Toucharcade at GDC 2010, IUGO Party and Looking for Writer

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Toucharcade at GDC 2010, IUGO Party and Looking for Writer is a post from: Best Iphone Apps Review Website

TouchArcade will be attending the Game Developer's Conference in San Francisco from March 9-13th. If you're a developer who wants to meet up and show us your upcoming games, please email us to set a time.

If you just want to say hi and grab a drink, we'll be at the IUGO Developer gathering on Wednesday, March 10th starting at 8pm. It will be held at the Marriott Lobby Bar. Free drinks while they last. It should be a fun time. Last year we met and hung out with IUGO, Imangi, Steph Thirion (Eliss), Firemint, Bolt Creative and many many others. Drinks will be sponsored by Team Phobic, TouchArcade, and IUGO.

Finally, we are looking for writer in the San Francisco area. If you are an avid iPhone gamer, live in the San Francisco area, and would be available to meet for an interview at GDC, please send us your resume. Previous writing experience preferred.

You can also follow us on twitter (@hodapp, @arnoldkim) to keep up with our whereabouts at GDC.


GDC 2010 Adds Windows Phone Lectures To Comprehensive Smartphone Game Line-Up

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xblphoneFollowing the announcement of the Windows Phone 7 Series, including Xbox Live functionality, Microsoft is revealing first technical details at a GDC 2010 tutorial, joining event coverage of smartphone gaming from iPhone through Android to Blackberry, Palm and beyond.

The Windows Phone 7 Series itself is a new set of smartphones running a drastically reconfigured Windows OS and including Xbox Live-compatible avatars, achievements, and games as part of the new system.

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer showcased the Windows Phone 7 Series set of phones at the Mobile World Congress 2010 in Barcelona, and announced that the new phones will debut by holiday 2010.

As noted on Microsoft’s official Windows Phone blog, the company has been getting “a lot of questions about the developer story, platform, etc. We are not prepared to talk about it yet but all will be revealed at two coming events… [including] Game Developers Conference in San Francisco.”

The sessions appears as part of Microsoft’s Game Developer Day tutorials on March 9th and 10th, with much of Wednesday, March 10th dedicated to the new operating system and technical/design specifics.

Some of the session titles include ‘Overview of Game Development for Windows Phone’, ‘Optimizing Performance of Modern Games for Windows Phone’, ‘Development and Debugging Tools for Windows Phone’, and a discussion on “basic design for a web-services-enabled game” for a Windows Phone 7 Series-compatible device.

The sessions, which are accessible via All-Access or Summit-specific GDC 2010 passes, join a major set of content sessions for mobile and handheld devices, including the new iPhone Games Summit on March 9th-10th, as well as the GDC Handheld/Mobile Summit on the same dates, which includes talks on Android and other mobile OSes.

In addition to these notable talks, smartphone game-related sessions are rounded out by a Palm sponsored session on WebOS in the Main Conference and a Blackberry-specific Developer Day on March 9th.

Final pre-onsite registration for GDC 2010 ends on March 4th, and passes are available now at the official Game Developers Conference website.


GDC 2010 Announces Deus Ex 3, Yamaoka, Ngmoco Talks

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GDCbug2010As the March 9th-13th event approaches, GDC 2010 organizers have revealed new lectures on Deus Ex 3’s “cyberpunk renaissance” look, Silent Hill producer Akira Yamaoka’s ethos, and iPhone publisher ngmoco’s move from traditional development to the digital world.

The new announcements come with less than a month to go until the event, which takes place from March 9th to 13th at San Francisco’s Moscone Center, and includes two days of Summits and tutorials alongside three days of Main Conference content.

A pair of particularly intriguing new lectures lead the new line-up announcements. Firstly, Eidos Montreal art director Jonathan Jacques-Belletete presents a lecture on “The Successes and Failures of Creating a Near-Future Cyberpunk Setting with a Renaissance Twist in Deus Ex 3“, providing some of the first concrete information about the much-awaited title.

Jacques-Belletete “…will discuss the creative underpinnings behind the unique blend of art style that combines the past, present and future in the next evolution of the Deus Ex franchise”, with particular reference to the title’s “Cyber Renaissance” look, which “is infused across the fashion, characters, environments and story.”

Secondly, veteran Silent Hill composer and recent series producer Akira Yamaoka, who has just joined No More Heroes creator Grasshopper Manufacture, will present a lecture entitled “As Long as the Audio is Fun, the Game Will Be Too”.

This retrospective, taken from Yamaoka’s “first 20 years in video game production”, will present an interesting angle: “People tend not to think about game design and audio design in parallel. I will present my views on audio design in games from a producer’s perspective, having had experience in both roles. With few technological limits remaining, we can focus on achieving realism and interaction. What challenges remain in audio design?”

In addition, as part of a series of GDC 2010 Track keynotes just confirmed, including already-revealed lectures from Metroid creator Yoshio Sakamoto and on StarCraft II’s programming approach, a number of major new lectures have been revealed, including the following:

- In “The Art Direction of Batman: Arkham Asylum – Rebooting a Super Hero Video Game IP”, Rocksteady’s David Hego will discuss making the acclaimed title, “from the challenges of taking a well known IP to new grounds, how to stay true to the spirit of 70 years of Batman comics, and how to rejuvenate its feel and look by injecting a hyper realistic approach to it.”

- Ngmoco (Touch Pets, Rolando) head and former Electronic Arts executive Neil Young will present “Things to Unlearn Moving From Traditional Development to the New Digital World”, and in his talk, will speak “candidly about the challenges that traditional game developers face in transitioning from long development cycles, packaged goods and the one time sale to the essential new models of games as a service, virtual goods, data driven design & minimum viable products.”

- In “Designing a Story for Sound”, sound design legend Randy Thom of Skywalker Sound will discuss how “early collaboration between sound designers, visual designers, the writer, and the director” is vital for audio in any medium. Thom will show how collaboration and experimentation during pre-production on two famous films he was a part of, Apocalypse Now and Wall-E, allowed sound to be a full partner in storytelling.

As well as the nine major Summits, from iPhone to indie and social games — and notable tutorials on the first two days of the show, there are six main Tracks – programming, art, production, business, audio, and design – for GDC 2010.

Game Developers Conference 2010 will also play host to the GDC Expo Floor, including a host of notable tool companies, the recruitment-specific GDC Career Pavilion, the 12th Annual Independent Games Festival plus Awards and the 10th Annual Game Developers Choice Awards, open to all pass holders.

More information on many of the highlighted areas of GDC 2010 is available on the official Game Developers Conference weblog, and the GDC 2010 website has a full list of lectures, passes, and opportunities at this year’s event, as well as specifics on registration pricing and options.


Reminder: Last Day For GDC 2010 Early Registration

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GDCbug2010Organizers of GDC 2010 are reminding that today is the last day to register for up to 35% off pass prices for the March 9th-13th event, with the free Android phone offer also expiring today.

The Moscone Center, San Francisco-based event has just announced a raft of new lectures, including highlighted talks from Pixar notables, Lionhead’s Peter Molyneux, Double Fine’s Tim Schafer, and Final Fantasy XIII’s director Motomu Toriyama, and a surprise lecture from Metroid co-creator Yoshio Sakamoto.

However, Thursday, February 4th is the final day that GDC is accepting registrations at the early rate, which includes up to 35% discount from final pass prices. The early reg rate will be open until 11.50pm ET this evening.

In addition, today is the final day to register for free Nexus One and Verizon Droid by Motorola phones with GDC 2010 attendance, as part of a promotion between Google and Game Developers Conference. Select All-Access Pass and Summits & Tutorials Pass attendees will receive the phone, and more information is available on a GDC website page.

As well as the nine major Summits, from iPhone to indie and social games — and notable tutorials on the first two days of the show, there are six main Tracks – programming, art, production, business, audio, and design – for GDC 2010. These include lectures from the creators of Assassin’s Creed II, Splinter Cell: Conviction, Uncharted 2, Braid, God Of War III, Dante’s Inferno, APB, and a host of other acclaimed games.

Game Developers Conference 2010 — part of Think Services, as is this website — will also play host to the GDC Expo Floor, including a host of notable tool companies, the recruitment-specific GDC Career Pavilion, the 12th Annual Independent Games Festival plus Awards and the 10th Annual Game Developers Choice Awards, open to all pass holders.

More information on many of the highlighted areas of GDC 2010 is available on the official Game Developers Conference weblog, and the GDC 2010 website has a full list of lectures, passes, and opportunities at this year’s event, as well as specific on registration pricing and options.

Attendees are also reminded that they can email GDC 2010’s registration staff — or call them at 866-535-8997 or +1 (415) 947-6926 from 9am to 4pm PT each weekday — if they have any issues registering. (All GDC 2010 registrations commenced before the 11.50pm ET deadline will be honored, even if any technical issues occur.)


GDC Debuts 2010 Indie Games Summit Line-Up

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spiderGDC 2010 organizers have revealed an initial set of Independent Games Summit talks for the March event, including notable lectures by Ron Carmel (World Of Goo) and Randy Smith (Spider).

The summit, now in its fourth year and taking place on March 9th-10th during Game Developers Conference 2010 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco, features lectures, postmortems and roundtables from some of the most notable independent game creators — including many former and current Independent Games Festival finalists and winners.

Overall, the 2010 Independent Games Summit “seeks to highlight the brightest and the best of indie development, with discussions ranging from game design philosophy, distribution, business, marketing, and much more.”

Advisors for the Summit include Independent Games Festival chairman Simon Carless and independent developers such as Flashbang Studios founder Matthew Wegner (Off-Road-Velociraptor Safari), as well as colleague Steve Swink (Shadow Physics).

With a final set of lectures to be announced soon, a number of major talks have been revealed on the Summit homepage. Highlights include the following:

- Indies and Publishers: Fixing a System That Never Worked
In IGS 2010’s kickoff talk, 2D Boy co-founder Ron Carmel (World Of Goo) will discuss “the problems with the current model (a tenant farming ecosystem built upon a weak security model), contrast how Valve and Microsoft deal with developers, and propose that creating more transparency in the game industry will give rise to a healthy model for developers and publishers/distributors to work together.”

- Increasing Our Reach: Designing To Grab and Retain Players
During his keynote talk, Looking Glass Studios veteran and Steven Spielberg collaborator Randy Smith (Thief) will talkk about the design concepts behind ‘immediacy with depth’, as applied to his recent iPhone hit Spider: The Secret Of Bryce Manor. He notes: “The indie games movement should be the wellspring of daring and innovative ideas, but we need a sizable and devoted audience to help us realize that potential. How do we reach more players? Is there something we’re doing wrong?”, and vows to look at design solutions.

- How to Manage an Exploratory Development Process
Thatgamecompany co-founder Kellee Santiago and producer Robin Hunicke “will discuss thatgamecompany’s experiences in managing a creative process that needs to be exploratory and experimental without leaving the team feeling aimless”, with particular reference to the developer’s leading games, which include multiple Choice Awards-nominated PSN title Flower and Flow.

- Scrap Metal: Pushing the Envelope with a Team of Two
In a talk on the upcoming Xbox Live Arcade topdown vehicular shooter from Slick Entertainment’s Nick Waanders (N+) and Kees Rijnen, the duo discuss making the XBLA title with a team of two. They explain how “a lot of choices had to be made to get the biggest bang for the buck, while maintaining the high polish level we wanted” — discussing tools, the game’s deferred shading engine, design choices, and more.

- NinjaBee’s Top 10 Development Lessons
In this lecture, Brent Fox from Kingdom For Keflings and Cloning Clyde creators NinjaBee presents 10 key lessons from their work, which has spanned platforms such as PC, XBLA, iPhone, WiiWare and beyond. Fox notes: “These pieces of wisdom should make your development experience smoother and help you avoid some of the same pitfalls” that the notable independent developer is now managing to avoid.

Other confirmed lectures include Wolfire’s John Graham (Overgrowth) on Effective Marketing For Indie Game Developers, the co-creators of IGF finalist Osmos on the creation of that game, Jeff Lindsay and Jim Munroe on ‘Creating And Nurturing Your Indie Game Community’, plus talks on making Fantastic Contraption and Scrap Metal — as well as the return of the multi-speaker Indie Game Rant.

More information on the Independent Games Summit, which can be attended via All-Access or Summit-specific GDC 2010 passes, is available on its official webpage.


Uncharted 2 Leads Choice Award Nominees As iPhone Games Reach Finalist Roster

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chaw10Organizers have revealed the nominees for the tenth annual Game Developers Choice Awards, the leading peer-based video game industry awards. Nominations this year are led by Naughty Dog’s Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, with seven nominations.

The acclaimed title is closely followed by five nominations for Thatgamecompany’s evocative downloadable game Flower, and four nominations for Ubisoft Montreal’s well-received Renaissance action game sequel Assassin’s Creed II.

Other multiple nominees include notably diverse titles such as PopCap’s Plants Vs. Zombies and Infinity Ward’s Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.

The changes in today’s game industry are well represented in the Game Developers Choice Awards this year by the inclusion of multiple iPhone titles. Tiger Style Games’ App Store debut Spider: The Secret Of Bryce Manor earns two nominations in this year’s awards, as Firemint’s Flight Control competes with Scribblenauts and Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars in the Best Handheld Game category.

Organizers have also further diversified the awards by adding a Best New Social/Online Games category this year, with both Facebook and free-to-play online games competing for the new prize.

The Game Developers Choice Awards are open to any video game, with no restrictions or payment for game submission, and Main Competition finalists are chosen via a combination of open game industry nominations and the votes of the leading creators in the Choice Awards Advisory Committee.

Starting this year, winners are now being selected by the Game Developers Choice Awards-specific International Choice Awards Network (ICAN), which is a new invitation-only group comprised of 500 leading game creators from all parts of the video game industry. Choice Awards organizers believe that, in tandem with their goal of having the most focused, impartial awards in the game industry, this additional voting transparency will further boost the awards’ reputation.

The complete list of nominees for the 10th Annual Game Developers Choice Awards are as follows:

Best Game Design
Batman: Arkham Asylum (Rocksteady)
Assassin’s Creed 2 (Ubisoft Montreal)
Flower (Thatgamecompany)
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves (Naughty Dog)
Plants Vs. Zombies (PopCap)

Best Visual Art
Borderlands (Gearbox Software)
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves (Naughty Dog)
Assassin’s Creed II (Ubisoft Montreal)
Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Infinity Ward)
Flower (Thatgamecompany)

Best Technology
Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (Infinity Ward)
Red Faction: Guerrilla (Volition)
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves (Naughty Dog)
Killzone 2 (Guerrilla Games)
Assassin’s Creed II (Ubisoft Montreal)

Best Writing
Brutal Legend (Double Fine)
Batman: Arkham Asylum (Rocksteady Studios)
Dragon Age: Origins (BioWare)
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves (Naughty Dog)
Halo 3: ODST (Bungie)

Best Audio
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves (Naughty Dog)
Dragon Age: Origins (BioWare)
Rock Band: The Beatles (Harmonix)
Flower (Thatgamecompany)
Brutal Legend (Double Fine Productions)

Innovation
Scribblenauts (5th Cell)
Flower (Thatgamecompany)
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves (Naughty Dog)
Plants Vs. Zombies (PopCap)
Demon’s Souls (From Software)

Best Debut
The Maw (Twisted Pixel)
League Of Legends (Riot Games)
Spider: The Secret Of Bryce Manor (Tiger Style)
Torchlight (Runic Games)
Zeno Clash (ACE Team)

Best Downloadable Game
Plants Vs. Zombies (PopCap)
Trials HD (RedLynx)
PixelJunk Shooter (Q Games)
Shadow Complex (Chair Entertainment)
Flower (Thatgamecompany)

Best New Social/Online Game
Restaurant City (Playfish)
Farmville (Zynga)
Dungeon Fighter Online (Neople/Nexon)
Free Realms (Sony Online Entertainment San Diego)
Bejeweled Blitz (PopCap)

Best Handheld Game
Scribblenauts (5th Cell)
Flight Control (Firemint)
Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars (Rockstar Leeds/Rockstar North)
Spider: The Secret Of Bryce Manor (Tiger Style)
Legend Of Zelda: Spirit Tracks (Nintendo EAD)

Game Of The Year
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves (Naughty Dog)
Dragon Age: Origins (BioWare)
Batman: Arkham Asylum (Rocksteady Studios)
Demon’s Souls (From Software)
Assassin’s Creed II (Ubisoft Montreal)

In addition to the awards for individual games, the Game Developers Choice Awards committee is in the process of announcing its Special Award recipients.

Most recently, it was announced that this year’s Pioneer Award is being given to Valve’s Gabe Newell for his work in co-creating vital PC digital download service Steam, and helping to make possible some of the most important video games of the past two decades — from the Half-Life series through Portal to Team Fortress and beyond.

Information on the winners of the Ambassador and Lifetime Achievement Special Awards — as well as the identity of this year’s Game Developers Choice Awards host — will be revealed in the near future.

Winners in all major categories will be honored at the Game Developers Choice Awards show, open to over 3,000 of the world’s leading video game developers, and taking place Thursday, March 11th at 6:30 pm at the Moscone Convention Center during the 2010 Game Developers Conference in San Francisco.

For more information about the 10th Annual Game Developers Choice Awards, check out the official website – and for information about the 2010 Game Developers Conference, please visit the official GDC website.


GDC 2010 Debuts Major Business-Focused Talks

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GDCbug2010The organizers of Game Developers Conference 2010 have revealed major Business Track talks for the March 9th-13th event, including sessions from Tiger Style (Spider: The Secret of Bryce Manor) founder Randy Smith and Pocket God iPhone creator Dave Castelnuovo.

The announcements come as part of the first of a series of GDC 2010 track-specific announcements, this one focusing on the Business & Management Track, which “looks at the game development process from the standpoint of running the business, and offers proven strategies for the developer who needs to understand complex business issues.”

The subset of the Game Developers Conference 2010 Advisory Board tasked with programming this track include notables such as Epic Games president Mike Capps, InstantAction CEO and Westwood Studios co-founder Lou Castle, and Warner Bros. Seattle studio GM Laura Fryer.

Some of the highlighted Business Track lectures already announced for the San Francisco Moscone Center-based event include the following:

- Crushing The Overhead: Case Study of A Microstudio Start-Up
In this lecture, Thief designer Randy Smith explains his indie studio Tiger Style released Spider: The Secret of Bryce Manor on the iPhone, topping the App Store charts amidst praise from players and press and netting over a quarter of a million dollars. He will discuss “team building, infrastructure, sales, compensation, process, schedule, project direction, product design, marketing, and more.”

- Why Owning Your Own IP is a Bad Idea: Giving Up Your Rights for Fun and Profit
Foundation 9 VP Chris Charla presents an interesting argument: “Conventional wisdom says you should always own your own IP. In the games space, we argue that the conventional wisdom is no longer valid. For independent developers to maximize their chance of popular and commercial success (and getting action figures made of your characters!), retaining ownership of your IP may be the worst decision you can make.”

- Kings of Convenience – What Walmart Tells Us About the Future of Gaming
EA DICE’s Ben Cousins (Battlefield Heroes) presents an intriguing lecture on “using the historical analogy of the rise of the supermarket in the post-automobile world to inform us about a possible future of the games industry.” Cousins explains: “How can we apply the technological revolution of the motor car and similar technology-driven business revolutions to our own rapidly changing industry as we react to the technological revolution of the internet?”

- Console Wars Revisited: Are We Breaking the Mold or Reliving History?
Don Daglow has led development teams on every generation of game hardware going back to the Atari vs. Intellivision era, and he argues that “we’re reliving many patterns of games industry history” in this business lecture, pointing out “why PS3 and 360 sales are following historical patterns — and what you can expect to happen next,” as well as how to identify a few key elements of any platform and quickly evaluate its potential for developers.

Other notable Business Track talks include Pocket God iPhone creator Dave Castelnuovo on Ongoing User Engagement: How to Listen to Your Community, Tripwire’s Alan Wilson (Killing Floor) on Funding Small Studios: So Many Sources of Funds, So Little Cash, and veteran researcher Dmitri Williams on Leveraging Your Data by “modeling user behaviors with data captured from game logs and surveys”.

Alongside the full set of announced GDC 2010 lectures thus far comes news on reduced conference pass prices for the event, with the introduction of optional lunch packages. Game Developers Conference 2010 will also play host to the GDC Expo Floor, the GDC Career Pavilion, the 12th Annual Independent Games Festival and the 10th Annual Game Developers Choice Awards.

Early Bird rates for GDC 2010 end on February 4, 2010 — for more information on the 2010 Game Developers Conference, visit the official GDC 2010 website.


GDC 2010 Reveals First Summit Sessions and Keynotes

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gdc2010regOrganizers of next March’s Game Developers Conference 2010 have revealed keynotes and first sessions for Summits, with notables including Facebook’s Gareth Davis (Social & Online Games Summit) and Spider’s Randy Smith (Independent Games Summit).

Taking place March 9-10th, the GDC Summits highlight the leading edge of game development in emerging and notable areas including; iPhone Games, Social & Online Games, Game Localization, Mobile/Handheld Games, Independent Games, Artificial Intelligence and Serious Games.

Of the major Summits, Facebook’s platform manager Gareth Davis will deliver a keynote at the newly formed Social & Online Games Summit titled ‘How Friends Change Everything’. It will discuss Facebook’s massive disruption in who plays games, as well as how games are best discovered, distributed, designed and monetized on the service.

In addition, Randy Smith, owner and game designer at Tiger Style will keynote the Independent Games Summit. Tiger Style is the developer of the critically and commercially successful iPhone game, Spider: The Secret of Bryce Manor, named by Apple as their top-rated game of 2009. Smith, who is also a veteran of Thief creator Looking Glass, will deliver a broad keynote address, ‘Increasing Our Reach: Designing to Grab and Retain Players.’

Alongside these notable announcements, all of GDC’s market-leading Summits have announced initial lectures, with a large number of new speakers and topics now confirmed for the event.

Other notable featured talks at the one and two-day Summit events include:

- Experimental Game AI: Live Demos of Innovation – Richard Evans, Maxis; Steve Rabin, Nintendo; and more (AI Summit)
- Club Penguin DS: Elite Penguin Force – Post Mortem – Patricia Pizer (GDC Mobile/Handheld Summit)
- Advanced Localization Methods for Japanese Games – Peter Fabiano, Capcom; Ryoichi Hasegawa, Sony; and more (Localization Summit)
- Code of Everand: Designing The Serious Casual MMO – Kevin Cancienne, Area/Code (Serious Games Summit)
- Falling to Your Death: The Canabalt Postmortem – Eric Johnson, Semi-Secret Software (iPhone Games Summit)

“We’re thrilled by the content already programmed for this year’s summits at GDC 2010 and there is so much more yet to come,” said Meggan Scavio, GDC event director. “Like last year, the summits are an outlet to explore the emerging segments of our industry and these keynotes highlight exactly that mission.”

GDC 2010 as a whole returns to San Francisco on Tuesday, March 9 through Saturday, March 13, 2010 for five days of lectures, panels, summits, tutorials and roundtable discussions on the most comprehensive selection of game development topics taught by leading industry experts.

Alumni registration for the show ends December 22, 2009 and Early Bird rates end February 4, 2010. For more information about the 2010 Game Developers Conference, including the eight summits, visit the official Game Developers Conference 2010 website.