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Stay up to date on everything happening with the Game Developers Conference, the Independent Games Festival, the Game Developers Choice Awards, and more through our online blog. To get GDC updates sent straight to your mailbox, subscribe to our GDC Newsletter.

Fallout 3's Pagliarulo To Keynote 2009 Game Career Seminar

February 19, 2009

Emil Pagliarulo, writer and lead designer for Bethesda's Fallout 3, will deliver a special interview-style keynote with Spike TV's Geoff Keighley keynote for the Game Career Seminar at the 2009 Game Developers Conference, taking place in San Francisco's Moscone Center from March 23 to 27, 2009.
Titled "Unlikely Beginnings: Fallout 3's Lead Designer on His Path into the Game Industry," the keynote will guide attendees through Pagliarulo's career path, from nearly becoming an elementary school teacher, to working as a game journalist and eventually to designing one of 2008's most critically-acclaimed games.
Discussing how professional networking, corporate ladder-climbing, and luck played in the designer's success, the special interview format will facilitate an engaging conversation on the trials and tribulations of a career in game development.

GDC 2009 Adds Noby Noby, Level 5, Left 4 Dead Talks

February 18, 2009

Organizers of next month's Game Developers Conference have revealed major new talks from Keita Takahashi on Noby Noby Boy, Valve's Michael Booth on Left 4 Dead, and Level-5's Akihiro Hino, on Professor Layton and his firm's other titles.
A high-profile late addition to the program for the San Francisco-based developer event, Katamari Damacy creator Keita Takahashi will present a talk called 'All About Noby Noby Boy', discussing his supremely quirky new PlayStation Network title. Attendees are promised that "This class will be a refreshing change of pace."

Final Reminder: GDC 2009 Early Registration Extended Until Feb 17th

February 17, 2009

Organizers of the 2009 Game Developers Conference have extended early registration for the March 23rd-27th San Francisco-based event to Tuesday, February 17th due to public demand, with 30 percent discounts now only available until that date.
The extension gives interested attendees more time to sign up for the 2009 edition of the world's leading game industry conference, which includes a multitude of discipline-specific lecture tracks, focused sub-market summits, major keynotes, award shows, and more to attend this year.

2009 Game Developers Choice Awards Honor Kojima For Lifetime Achievement

February 17, 2009

The 2009 Game Developers Choice Awards, the highest honors in game development acknowledging excellence in game creation, will honor Hideo Kojima with a Lifetime Achievement Award at this year’s ceremony taking place at the Game Developers Conference next month.
Kojima is Corporate Officer, Executive Producer and Director of Kojima Productions and creator of the seminal Metal Gear series, and the Lifetime Achievement Award recognizes the career and achievements of developers who have made an indelible impact on the craft of game development.
Renowned as one of the world’s most influential contemporary game developers, Hideo Kojima first decided to get involved in the game development business while studying economics.

Previewing GDC 2009: Inside The Business & Management Track

February 15, 2009

[In the sixth of a series picking out the most notable Game Developers Conference 2009 lectures, sister site Gamasutra examines the Business & Management Track, featuring talks about starting up an independent studio, learning from Flagship's demise, Age Of Booty creator Certain Affinity's rise, negotiating rights for future games, and much more.]
Game Developers Conference 2009 (organized by Gamasutra parent company Think Services) is set to take place in San Francisco's Moscone Center from March 23 to 27, 2009.
With nearly 390 sessions now confirmed for GDC 2009, we'll be taking a track by track look at the conference's line-up over the next few weeks.
Sixth on the list is GDC's Business & Management Track, which will "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."
Notable highlights thus far announced for this track are as follows:

GDC 2009 Early Registration Ends February 12th

February 11, 2009

Organizers of the 2009 Game Developers Conference are reminding potential attendees that early registration for the March 23rd-27th San Francisco conference ends on Thursday, February 12th, with 30% discounts only available until that date.

Metal Gear Solid Creator Kojima To Keynote GDC 2009

February 10, 2009

Organizers have revealed that Hideo Kojima, Corporate Officer, Executive Producer and Director of Kojima Productions, will deliver a keynote address at next months 2009 Game Developers Conference (GDC) in San Francisco.
Known for giving rise to the stealth action game genre with his creation of the acclaimed Metal Gear series more than two decades ago, Kojima’s keynote will focus on conquering various development obstacles with creative game design, using the driving game design philosophies behind the Metal Gear series as reference.
The address, “Solid Game Design: Making the ‘Impossible’ Possible,” marks Kojima’s debut appearance at the GDC. The Game Developers Conference takes place March 23-27 at the Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco.
Kojima joins a host of notable speakers at this year's GDC, including Nintendo president Satoru Iwata, Lionhead's Peter Molyneux, LittleBigPlanet creators Mark Healey and Alex Evans, Epic's Rod Fergusson, and a host of others.

LittleBigPlanet, Braid, Left 4 Dead Lead Game Developers Choice Award Finalists

February 9, 2009

Media Molecule’s LittleBigPlanet leads the nominees for the ninth annual Game Developers Choice Awards with seven nominations, organizers have revealed.
Number None’s Braid follows closely with five nominations. Among the nominations for LittleBigPlanet is the coveted Game of the Year award.
Other nominees for that category include Fallout 3 and Left 4 Dead, each of which received a total of four award nominations; Rockstar North’s Grand Theft Auto IV, which earned a total of three nominations; and Lionhead Studios’ Fable 2. Winners will be honored at an awards show taking place during the 2009 Game Developers Conference.
The two leading nominees are celebrating a homecoming of sorts with their nominations for the Choice Awards. Media Molecule’s LittleBigPlanet made its debut during a keynote lecture at the 2007 Game Developers Conference, while Number None’s Braid was winner of the Innovation in Game Design award at the 2006 Independent Games Festival (IGF), which is also part of the Game Developers Conference.
Produced and hosted by Think Services’ Game Developers Conference and presented by Gamasutra.com and Game Developer Magazine, the Game Developers Choice Awards honors the developers of the best video games released during the previous calendar year, as well as awarding key figures from the video game community.
Other multiple nominees for this year’s event include such diverse and notable titles as EA Maxis’ Spore, 2D Boy’s World of Goo, Kojima Productions’ Metal Gear Solid 4, Epic Games’ Gears of War 2, and Ubisoft Montreal’s Far Cry 2. The complete list of nominees is:

2009 Independent Games Summit Completes Line-Up With Humble, Fitterer, Santiago

February 9, 2009

The organizers of the 2009 Independent Games Summit have revealed the completed line-up for the March 23-24 GDC 2009 event, with Electronic Arts exec and art-game creator Rod Humble, Audiosurf's Dylan Fitterer and Flower's Kellee Santiago among the newly confirmed speakers.
The third annual Independent Games Summit, which takes place on the Monday and Tuesday of this year's GDC 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.
The 2009 IGS seeks to highlight the brightest and the best of indie development, with discussions ranging from game design philosophy, distribution, business, marketing, and much more. A synopsis of the full summit line-up is as follows:

Previewing GDC 2009: Inside The Production Track

February 6, 2009

[In the fifth of a series picking out the most notable Game Developers Conference 2009 lectures, sister site Gamasutra examines the Production Track, featuring talks from the Spore, Crysis Warhead and Fable II creators, as well as production analyses from BioWare Austin, Microsoft Game Studios, and Bungie.]
Game Developers Conference 2009 (organized by Gamasutra parent company Think Services) is set to take place in San Francisco's Moscone Center from March 23 to 27, 2009 - with the important early registration deadline now imminent, and set for February 12.
With nearly 390 sessions now confirmed for GDC 2009, we'll be taking a track by track look at the conference's line-up over the next few weeks.
Fifth on the list is GDC's Production Track, which will look at "the game development process from the standpoint of running project nuances" and will offer "proven strategies for effective game production."
Notable highlights thus far announced for this track are as follows:

Bosslady Blog: The Latest GDC 2009 Additions!

By Meggan Scavio |  February 3, 2009

[In her latest Bosslady Blog update, Game Developers Conference event director Meggan Scavio discusses the newly announced Nintendo keynote, as well as the GDC Vault and new Dead Space, LittleBigPlanet and Flagship Studios lectures.]
Hopefully by now, the news of GDC 2009's first announced keynote has made the rounds as far as... you. But if you happen to live on the planet formerly known as Pluto, let me bring you up to date.
Satoru Iwata, President of Nintendo Co., Ltd, will deliver the opening keynote at this year’s GDC, titled “Discovering New Development Opportunities.” Mr. Iwata has spoken at GDC twice already and always manages to surprise and inspire. Can’t wait to see what he’s got to say this year!
For anyone who happens not to be a morning person, please take note: Iwata’s opening keynote on Wednesday, March 25th will begin at 9:00 am. GDC keynotes have historically started at 10:30 am, but we thought it would be nice to open the main conference with everybody gathered in one room. Expect bonding - hand holding not required.
Another neat new thing we’re doing this year is the GDC Vault. This new site will host video/slide/audio sync-ed recordings of all GDC Summits, Lectures and Panels, and will be available for online streaming one week after GDC this year. Not only is this quite a task (we’re recording 250 sessions), but it's free to GDC 2009 All Access pass holders. You need never miss another GDC session again - like I said, neat.
Browsing the website, I found a lot of intriguing new sessions that have popped up since my last update. Sister website Gamasutra has kindly been posting their top picks by track, but here are some new announcements even they haven't picked up on:

2009 Choice Awards Names Ambassador, Pioneers, Schafer As Host

February 3, 2009

The 2009 Game Developers Choice Awards, the highest honors in game development acknowledging excellence in game creation, have named the recipients of two of its special awards, while also revealing that popular host of the 2007 Awards and Double Fine founder Tim Schafer is returning to present this year's Choice Awards.
Harmonix co-founders Alex Rigopulos and Eran Egozy, co-developers of a groundbreaking decade-plus long line of music games culminating in the Rock Band franchise, will receive the Pioneer Award for their work.
In addition, Tommy Tallarico, co-founder of the Video Games Live concert series and founder of the Game Audio Network Guild (G.A.N.G.), will receive the Ambassador Award for helping to advance the game audio community.

GDC Canada Reveals Advisory Board, Track Format

January 31, 2009

Think Services Game Group and Reboot Communications have revealed new details on this May's GDC Canada, including an advisory board including EA, Next Level Games, Radical, and BioWare execs, as well as a track line-up based around the production schedule of video games.
According to NPD Canada, the Canadian game industry grew by 23 percent in 2008, reaching C$2.09 billion in revenues. GDC Canada plans to serve this fast-growing region by providing a forum for Canadian developers to share best practices for fostering ingenuity and quality within their globally distributed games.
GDC Canada’s content lineup emphasizes the production cycle of game development, with lecture and panel tracks focused on the following stages of game creation: Concept/Preproduction, Production, Finalling and Post Launch/Analysis:

Previewing GDC 2009: Inside The Programming Track

January 29, 2009

[In the fourth of a series picking out the most notable Game Developers Conference 2009 lectures, presented by sister site Gamasutra, they examine the Programming Track, with newly added talks from the Killzone 2, Halo Wars, and Uncharted 2: Among Thieves creators.]
Game Developers Conference 2009 (organized by Think Services) is set to take place in San Francisco's Moscone Center from March 23 to 27, 2009.
With nearly 280 sessions now confirmed for GDC 2009, we'll be taking a track by track look at the conference's line-up over the next few weeks.
Fourth on the list is GDC's Programming Track, which will focus on the "ever increasing challenge to produce games that capture the attention of the public and the media," as well as the opportunities presented by "mature consoles, new handhelds, a highly competitive sales environment, and increased demand for very high production values in games."
Notable highlights thus far announced for this track are as follows:

Nintendo President Iwata To Keynote GDC 2009

January 27, 2009

Satoru Iwata, President of Nintendo Co., Ltd. will deliver a keynote address at the 2009 Game Developers Conference, kicking off the main conference’s schedule of lectures, panel discussions and roundtables.
The address, “Discovering New Development Opportunities,” marks Iwata’s first return to the GDC keynote stage since 2006. The Game Developers Conference takes place March 23-27 at the Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco.
Being a developer himself, Iwata’s keynote lectures at the Game Developers Conference are known for inspiring other developers to think about creating games in new and different ways:

Connecting the Global Game Development Community