If your life revolves around making video games, then you would be in San Francisco this week. The annual Game Developers Conference in San Francisco (http://www.gdconf.com/) is THE major event for the game development industry. GDC is five days of educational sessions, specialized summits, networking events, and expo & career pavilions.
On the final day at GDC, the show continues with lots of activity in the Career Fair. With the continuing bad economy and poor job outlook, there were many people visiting all the exhibiting companies with resumes and demo reels in hand. While there were many companies looking for new talent, then number of openings appears to be small.
Many of the final lectures and sessions were very full as the conference attendees eagerly rush to take in a final chance to learn from the many experienced speakers before the close of the show. As the show ended, hundreds gathered in the main lobby of the convention center reluctant to see this year’s GDC end.
Some things that caught our attention today were:
Hi-Rez Studios gave the first hands-on demonstration of its spy-fi action MMO Global Agenda. Guests experienced fast-paced combat, in both PvE and PvP missions, using stations within the Hi-Rez exhibition booth and playing real-time with remote players.
“Our combat system was inspired by modern multiplayer shooters”, says Executive Producer Todd Harris. “But in addition to firearms, we’ve added melee, hundreds of other high-tech player-usable devices, and jetpacks! We find it a refreshing change from the standard tab-targeting found within fantasy MMOs and we’ve been thrilled to see the reaction from others here at the show. And while we think our combat system is a major differentiator, we’re equally excited about the RPG advancement system and the opportunity for player-groups to compete for territory control.”
Booth guests also got a taste of Global Agenda’s sophisticated, face-customization system and the introductory game sequence in which the player’s special agent character escapes from the clutches of an oppressive world government called The Commonwealth.
“Players begin as a fugitive”, Todd says. “But after choosing a class and advancing their agent skills via PvE or PvP missions, they encounter other groups within the world and choose which ones to align with. We expect most players will eventually participate in our Campaign mode which allows player groups to acquire territory within the world, construct facilities, defenses, and bases on that territory, produce resources, and engage in the player-driven drama to dominate a region.”
Hi-Rez Studios also announced that they are still accepting applications toward their upcoming closed Beta. Players looking for a refreshing take on the MMO genre were encouraged to apply at http://www.globalagendagame.com.
Calling all superheroes and supervillians… City of Heroes Content Update Issue 14 is officially making its debut via the game’s open beta session. In Issue 14, players will have an opportunity to create and give feedback on one of the most in-depth player created mission systems in an MMO to date! The Mission Architect game system is a robust new system that allows players to literally design their own missions for the game, determining details ranging from environments, mission objectives and enemies, to the written fiction and character dialogue. With Mission Architect, players will also be able to share their creation with the entire City of Heroes community as everyone’s story/mission masterpieces will be available in-game for fellow gamers to play and rate - and the higher the rating, the more benefits and rewards players will experience.
City of Heroes Issue 14 was developed by NCsoft NorCal in Mountain View, CA. In addition to the launch of Issue 14, NCsoft will be releasing City of Heroes Architect Edition for both PC and Mac in mid-April, a retail product featuring Mission Architect alongside other content updates.
For more information, please go to the official City of Heroes site at http://www.cityofheroes.com/news/news_archive/issue_14_open_beta_begins.html
The iPhone OS 3.0 news from Apple unlocks many more opportunities for innovative game development for the iPhone. Social Gaming Network has been planning for this moment for years and made huge strides with existing releases to achieve exactly what consumers have craved – and now Apple is responding. SGN has already pushed the boundaries with games for iPhone creating seamless game experiences across platforms. SGN games that monetize through virtual goods with unique pricing structures evocative of the in-app purchasing capability just announced in the iPhone OS 3.0 Software Developer Kit are already available for iPhone including Mafia: Respect & Retaliation, Agency Wars and a proven model (fluff)friends on Facebook.
Shervin Pishevar, president and CEO of SGN, states: “This is a pivotal moment that SGN has been waiting for. Our vision for offering our engaged audience unique and immersive games is further being realized with this announcement from Apple. It will unleash a tremendous amount of creativity and incredibly engaging experiences for consumers around the world from the developer community. SGN is uniquely positioned moving forward to deliver even greater experiences for consumers and go even further with Apple’s announcement of the new OS 3.0.”
Synergies between SGN’s suite of games that have already delivered on Apple’s vision with iPhone OS 3.0 include:
- A vision of creating immersive games with robust user pay models. From the beginning, SGN recognized that the only viable model would have to generate revenue from both advertising and user pay for in-game items or advantages. SGN’s recent releases for iPhone including Mafia: Respect & Retaliation, Agency Wars and i(fluff) all feature pricing structures that enable users to buy new levels. Now with the convenience of purchasing new levels of content built into the iPhone OS, the possibilities for future games, enhancing games and making game play even more advanced are incredibly exciting.
- SGN is positioned to excel at an even faster pace with over 10 million users of games such as iBowl, iBasketball, iBaseball, SGN Golf, Mafia: Respect & Retaliation, Agency Wars, iFun, and i(fluff) on the iPhone and iPod Touch. Apple has confirmed with this announcement that sales are more than 30 million for iPhones and iPod Touch. Given these statistics, SGN games are already on one in three devices.
- With iFun, released in November, using the accelerometer technology in the iPhone, SGN could link the handset to a computer via wireless or 3G connection, making the iPhone into a Wii-like controller for the game. This convergence will continue to develop and become increasingly seamless. With new Bluetooth connectivity, SGN games can potentially be played on other Bluetooth devices, linking players seamlessly wherever they go literally across any platform.
- SGN has leveraged the convergence paradigm giving users the ability to play games either on mobile devices or on a PC (through social networks). SGN believes in creating high quality games with engaging play that will captivate and connect friends and family. SGN is bringing the vision of the social graph to gaming ever closer.
For more information on Social Gaming Networks products, go to http://www.sgn.com
That’s it for now from the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco. We will be following up our coverage throughout the year with reviews and updates of other news and products we found at the show.
—Harvey Lee
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