Gardens of Time, Google, Mad God sessions added to GDC 2012's Social & Online Games Summit
This week, organizers of the 2012 Game Developers Conference continue their regular series of updates by announcing new sessions for the show's Social & Online Games Summit, with talks covering Playdom's popular Gardens of Time, the Flash MMO Realm of the Mad God, and Google's latest in Open Web tech.
These talks join a number of other notable sessions for the Social & Online Games Summit, all of which will offer unique and in-depth insight into the ever-changing realms of Facebook gaming, browser development, traditional MMOs, casual games, and beyond.
All eight of GDC 2012's specialized Summits will take place during the first two days of the show -- from Monday, March 5 through Tuesday, March 6 a the Moscone Center in San Francisco.
Those interested in checking out the content in these Summits can do so by registering for an All-Access or Summits & Tutorials Pass on the official GDC website (a specialized Independent Games Summit Pass is also available).
The following is a selection of the latest talks to be added to GDC 2012's Social & Online Games Summit:
- Playdom's extremely successful Gardens of Time helped pioneer the hidden object genre on Facebook, and in "Gardens of Time: Design Problem Solving," creative director Eric Todd will examine how this influential game took shape. Throughout the session, Todd will look back on the game's conception and development, detailing the problem-solving lessons he gleaned from designing, launching, and operating Facebook's first major hidden object game.
- Elsewhere, Spry Fox CEO David Edery will outline how the Flash-based MMO Realm of the Mad God (developed in partnership with Wild Shadow Studios) found surprising success despite breaking some well-established tenets of online game design. The talk, "Realm of the Counter-Intuitive God," will look at the game's numerous eccentricities, from its bullet-hell combat to its strict permadeath mechanic, to examine what worked, what didn't, and how these choices affected the game's bottom line.
- Finally, Google software engineer Vincent Scheib will host "The Bleeding Edge of Open Web Tech," picking apart the latest developments in the world of browser-based games. During his presentation, Scheib will focus primarily on client side web technologies, including Web Sockets, WebGL, Mouse Lock, Web Audio API, and more.