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AGDC08: The Psychology of the MMO Gamer
The first panel we attended at Austin GDC was entitled "The Psychology of the MMO Gamer," which seemed to hold a mythical amount of promise. Sure enough, once the panel began it was clear that these people had gathered a couple of days before and said, "So hey... what can we talk about?" It was a bit disorganized, but some good stuff came out of it, particularly finding out how a six-year old can grief you with pudding. Read on to find out how you too can learn this devious and delicious skill.
Joystiq @ the Austin Game Developers Conference
What, you thought GDC only happened in San Francisco? Well, so did we. But we've invaded the land of BBQ, music, and Shiner Bock to bring you the latest from the development-heavy Austin Game Developers Conference. This year the focus is on writing and game audio, so we'll bring you the best of the fest as we sit in on panels and talk to people in the game industry. Austin is fast establishing itself as a mini-mecca of gaming companies; already places like Activision Blizzard, NCSoft, Vigil, and Sony Online have offices here, with more opening all the time. Texas Governor Rick Perry announced this summer at E3 that Austin would be heavily pursuing game companies and offering them tax incentives to set up shop here, so if you're wanting to work in the industry, you might consider a move.
Icarus Studios demos iPhone MMO software this week
Icarus Studios -- developer of Fallen Earth and the associated Icarus Platform virtual world development tools --announced via press release that this week it is demonstrating its 3D MMO platform running on Apple's iPhone at the Austin Game Developers Conference.The demo is modest -- a "360-degree panoramic tour of a sample virtual world location." Users control the camera with the phone's accelerometer. Apple recently threw down the gauntlet, saying that the iPhone and the iPod Touch platforms are "the best portable device for playing games." No reason that future can't include MMOs, right?The iPhone client is scheduled to launch in Q1 of 2009. Does this mean that within months everyone on the New York subway, the Chicago El, and the London Underground will be immersed in a never-ending, time-sinking quest for teh phat lewtz?
AGDC08: On avatar rights and virtual property
If you're anything like the average MMO gamer, you click through that 'shrinkwrap license' without even batting an eyelash. The End User License Agreement, or EULA, is just a speedbump in the logon process for game players. For game companies, though, they're extraordinarily important documents. They require legal consultation, careful thought, and even more careful wording. They do exactly what the name says, spelling out the rights a player has in an online world. Noting that he really enjoys it when panel participants argue and disagree, Erik Bethke brought together a group of people to debate and discuss the issue of user rights. Along with Bethke, author Erin Hoffman, legal representative Greg Boyd, startup VP Scott Hartsman, and noted industry designer and analyst Raph Koster filled out the panel. Read on for notes from their fascinating discussion, which covered everything from government intervention in online worlds to the 'ownership' of virtual property.
WoW Moviewatch: Forestkeeper McBride and contest deadline reminder
In Marshal McBride's simple world, he's a quest giver from Northshire Valley that loves nothing more than helping noobs. However, his world is turned upside down when he is given orders to vacate his job and take up as the forestkeeper of Elwynn Forest. What follows is the bizarre tale, machinimated by Hamfist Productions, of adjusting to his new position, with strangely voice acted characters and even weirder dialogue. It's not too shabby, though!In other news, the Dell machinima contest comes to a close on September 23rd. The top two prizes are a Horde or Alliance Dell XPS 1730 laptop and an Alienware desktop. For complete rules, check out the contest website. Also, I'll be at the Austin Game Developer Conference this week, so if you see me out and about, say hi![Via Warcraftmovies.com]If you have any suggestions for WoW Moviewatch, you can mail them to us at machinima AT wowinsider DOT com.Previously on Moviewatch ...
Massively reports from AGDC!
Warhammer may be already well into launch mode, but some of us aren't all about play this week. That's right, Massively.com is reporting live from the Austin Game Developer's Conference! AGDC is traditionally one of the year's biggest MMO love-ins, as developers and publishers get together to talk about the field of online games. Today through Wednesday we'll be offering up blog posts about panels, keynotes, and events from Austin, Texas.And, of course, that's just the start. Look to this space next week for interviews and deeper insights about the events of this week. If you have a chance between RvR scenarios and Public Quests, be sure to check back for tons of news from AGDC 2008!
ZeniMax Online is hiring at Austin Game Developers Conference
If you're a talented game professional and you're planning to attend the Austin Game Developers Conference this coming week, you may want to head on over to booth 100 and speak with ZeniMax Online Studios (which has a brand-new official site). As they've just announced, ZeniMax will be looking for potential employees with experience in Art, Programming, Design, Server Technology, Customer Support, QA and Marketing. Despite the fact that ZeniMax is located in Hunt Valley, Maryland, this may be a great opportunity for those developers in the Austin area who have suffered through the area's recent set-backs.ZeniMax Online is the sister company of Bethesda Softworks, most famously known for their development and publishing of the Elder Scrolls Series and the upcoming Fallout 3. However, don't mistake their association with Bethesda to any connection with the Fallout MMO, which is currently in development by Interplay.
Austin Game Developers Conference previews the evolving face of MMOs
Worlds in Motion has continued to announce some of the highlights of the upcoming Austin Game Developer's Conference. We've previously talked about featured speakers like Nexon's Min Kim, and interesting events showcasing the collaboration between casual gaming and MMOs. These newest events continue to explore some topics we've returned to several times before here at Massively. The business side of massive gaming, for example, will be explored in a panel entitled Evolving Business for MMOs. Speakers will include Turbine Business Development VP Robert Ferrari, CCP CEO Himlar Veigar Pertursson, Funcom Business Development VP Nicolay Nickelsen, Nexon America director Min Kim, and ImaginVenture SA COO Jessica Mulligan.Other talks will include tips for the changing face of MMO business models, focusing on free-to-play and RMT models. Another will discuss some of the challenges of running a Beta test, with hands-on knowledge from Keneva's Jonathan Hanna. Check out the full listing of MMO-related talks and panels over at the official AGDC website today.
AGDC announces first keynote address
The Worlds in Motion site notes that the first keynote address has been announced for this year's Austin Game Developer's Conference. Last last month the first speakers, such as Damion Schubert and Min Kim, were announced for the MMO-focused event. This week the event's first keynote has been announced, and it's very different from your average early-morning droner. Fans of The Office rejoice! The folks behind the Dunder Mifflin social networking game will be offering up ways of "driving user behavior and increasing engagement".Other events announced include a technical discussion on Tabula Rasa's shading technology; that's an in-depth session aimed at MMO developers looking for cost/benefit tradeoffs. Probably the most exciting announced talk this week is Nick Fortugno's talk entitled What Your Mother and Your Ten-Year Old Can Teach You About MMOs. He gave a similar lecture at this year's IMGDC event, previously discussed here on the site. Interested parties will get early bird status through August 27th.
Austin Game Developer's Conference announces speakers
This year's Austin Game Developer's Conference, slated for early September, sounds like it will be a good one. Though the ION 2008 event was a fantastic MMO-focused design and development thinktank, AGDC traditionally fills that roll. CMP (the event's organizer) has announced some of the speakers that will be participating in the event. The list includes industry heavyweights like Nexon America's Min Kim, BioWare's Damion Schubert, and Cryptic's Gordon Wei.We're particularly interested in Mr. Schubert's talk. Last year his Zen of Online Game Design discussion was one of the highlights of the conference, and his discussion for this year sounds equally engaging. Entitled "Endgame: How to Build High-End Gameplay for Your Most Devoted Players", it would seem to be tackling one of the issues that a lot of MMO players find very pressing. Make sure to check out the descriptions of the events, and if you're thinking of going make sure to register soon. Early registration is only open through the end of July. And, of course, you can look forward to extensive coverage from Massively.com; we'll be at the event in force!
Damion Schubert interview pt. 2
Another element you seemed to feel strongly about in your talk was guild tools. We're talking about designers who play their own games, have a feel for their own spaces. Why are these designers, who are playing their own games, not turning around and creating the kind of guild tools that we feel should be available? More and more they seem critical, why aren't they being addressed? Damion: Because they're hard. The number one guild-killer is drama. At the end of the day it's not raid slots, it's not even loot distribution. Most guilds have a system, they use it. Most players suck it up and live with it or they move on to another guild. Most of the time it's two guys crushing on the same girl, or a guy deciding that he's sick of the guild master and undercutting him, or a guy getting drunk and launching profanities in the guild chat channel ... these are problems that can be addressed by tools, but what makes the guildmaster's life hard right now is the drama. If we can find a way to reduce drama, to help police the drama, to know what's going on inside the guild it will become much easier for guild leaders to keep their guilds together.
BioWare Austin's Damion Schubert explains his endgame philosophy
We had the pleasure of sitting down with Damion Schubert at AGDC 2008 earlier this month. A longtime commentator and respected developer, Schubert is currently the lead combat designer on BioWare Austin's un-named MMO. While discussion of that still somewhat secretive project was verboten, Schubert kindly gave us a chance to follow up on his talk at this year's conference about the MMO endgame.We chatted with the designer about a number of issues, including the role of the endgame for new or casual players, the dangers of guild drama, and the overall problems with the endgames of today. Schubert was very careful in his discussion of that last question ... "I think that if somebody could find a way to create a good 25-man PvE experience that could be done ad-hoc, that could be less about "We need these people here at this time" and more about "Hey, show up if you can and we'll try to get this done." I think that's something that players would find a lot less scary."Read on for our full interview, with insights on the MMO endgame from an industry icon.
No touch-screen strumming for Guitar Hero DS; peripheral promised
We kinda knew about it already, but it now seems official that developer Vicarious Visions is working on an external peripheral for their adaptation of Guitar Hero on the Nintendo DS, rather than relying on touch screen controls.Games Are Fun was in attendance at this year's Austin Game Developers Conference, and caught up with Vicarious design manager Adrian Earle, who spilled the beans on Vicarious's port of the acclaimed music franchise. In addition to the horrible decision to build a peripheral for a portable device, Vicarious plans on leaving much of the game's visuals as-is, making them two-for-two in a "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" mentality that may prove problematic when moving an established console title to an entirely new platform.We'll give Vicarious Visions the benefit of the doubt, and assume the decision to ignore the touch screen was to avoid comparisons to Jam Sessions. Still, here's hoping Vicarious will let us rock out and still fit the darn thing in our pocket.
Austin GDC: Live at the Minho Kim keynote
If you haven't heard of Minho Kim, I'll forgive you -- I hadn't heard of him either until the name showed up in the list of keynote presentations at the Austin Game Developers Conference. Kim is Nexon America's director of game operations, and while Nexon hasn't made a big impact in North American markets, their free-to-play, micro-transaction driven online games (the best known of which is probably MapleStory) are a hit in Asia and Europe. Kim's keynote launches the final day of the conference with a discussion of micro-transactions. Joystiq is on-site waiting for festivities to begin, so keep reading for a play-by-play.
Austin GDC: Live at the Hiromichi Tanaka keynote
Hiromichi Tanaka is the executive officer of Square Enix and the producer of company's entry into the MMO market, Final Fantasy XI. This morning at the Austin Game Developer's Conference he's going to be talking to us about the challenges of cross-platform design with a design post-mortum of Final Fantasy XI.11:06 AM CST: We were supposed to get started at 11AM CST, but the event seems to be running fashionably late.11:08 AM CST: Introducing Hiromichi Tanaka speaking on Launching Final Fantasy XI on Multiple Platforms.
Austin GDC: Live at the Sulka Haro keynote
Never heard of Sulka Haro? Then you must not have tried Sulake Corporation's casual online game, Habbo. Sulka Haro is Sulake's lead designer and he's going to be kicking off day two at the Austin Game Developer's Conference by talking to us about designing games to support open-ended play and end-user creativity.9:29 AM CST: The keynote is scheduled for 9:30, and people are slowly filtering into the conference room.9:34 AM CST: Introducing Haro to applause.
AGDC: How to rule the World (of Warcraft)
I'm attending the Austin Game Developers Conference this week, and today's big event is a keynote by Mike Morhaime, president and co-founder of Blizzard Entertainment. Titled How to Rule the World (of Warcraft): Ten Lessons, I doubt it covers guild management, PvP tactics, or farming for gold -- but I'm certainly interested in Morhaime's thoughts on the operation and administration of the Warcraft universe. Keep reading for a play-by-play of the keynote!9:25 AM CST: The ballroom is filling up, and everyone is waiting for the show to get started.9:36 AM CST: The ballroom is working its way towards full, all of us waiting on the man of the hour to show.
