Katherine Goes to GDC

Hey everyone! My name is Katherine, I’m a community manager at Human Head Studios. I had the privilege of attending Game Developers Conference this year for the first time and want to share what I learned!

The GDC team of Human Head Developers

I was able to attend the conference with a Conference + Summits pass thanks to a generous scholarship opportunity. There are a great deal of scholarship opportunities on GDC’s website that promote diversity. I’d absolutely recommend that you apply if you’re in need of assistance.

After arriving at the conference on Sunday, I was able to spend some time exploring San Francisco. It’s such a beautiful city, and there’s so much to see! We visited Chinatown, the Fisherman’s Wharf, and saw Alcatraz. There was a lot of delicious food as well - I personally  recommend Bread and Cocoa and Super Duper Burgers.

On Monday, the Summit talks began. I was able to go to several talks which I found especially helpful: one by Jesse Schell (you can find his book in our Bookshelf for Developers blog,) one by the team that created Gonner, and one by Gorogoa’s Jason Roberts. Many of these talks will uploaded to the GDC Youtube channel or the GDC vault, but here are my favorite takeaways from each:

“Non-linear Narrative in Games” - Jesse Schell: Schell talked about how Christopher Alexander’s architectural design principles from “The Timeless Way of Building” and “The Nature of Order” can apply to game development. In his books, Alexander outlines what makes a space effective. A few of these include a space feeling alive, comfortable, egoless, having boundaries, containing living courtyards, and having clear paths and goals. The presentation included a great deal of these principles and I found them to be very effective - not only when applied to narrative as intended, but also in level design, game design, and art. For the complete list of principles, you can pick up a copy of Alexander’s work here.

“The Sound of ‘Gonner’: Exploring the Intertwined Relationship between Sound and Game Design” - Martin Kyvale and Mattias Dittrich: The creation of Gonner’s award-winning sound design was largely the result of talent mixed with bold creativity, as the team wasn’t afraid to experiment with their game. My favorite takeaway from the talk is what the duo referred to as “F*** It Fridays” - a day set aside in their development cycle to try crazy new things and see what stuck. I was inspired by their willingness to step outside of their comfort zone and reinvent their game on a regular basis, even mid-development. The result is a masterful game that beautifully blends together audio and gameplay. Learn more about Gonner here!

“Gorogoa: The Design of a Cosmic Acrostic” - Jason Roberts: Roberts covered an expansive number of design topics in his talk, but my favorite was about the direction of influence in creative work. Many game design decisions are made at a high level and ripple downward to low-level mechanical decisions, but sometimes reverse-engineering from the bottom up is best. This was the first time I’d heard this advice, and his examples from Gorogoa established that this workflow could be extremely effective! You can learn more about the creative whimsy of Gorogoa here.

Photo credit: IGDA Chicago

When I wasn’t going to talks, I had the opportunity to learn from game developers at various meetups in and around the Moscone Center. They shared their advice on best practices, recommended their favorite games, and told their favorite stories from the development of their games. All of their great advice made me wonder… if I could travel back in time, what GDC advice would I have given myself?

My advice for GDC-goers (now from experience!)

1. Bring an umbrella! It rained two of the five days that I was at the convention, and I didn’t pack an umbrella. After speaking to other developers, it seems like this has been a recurring event - so pack something to keep you dry!
2. Don’t forget a battery pack for your mobile phone. I told myself that keeping my phone charged would be easy, but outlets aren’t always accessible, especially if you’re walking around the city outside of the convention center.
3. Comfortable shoes trump being fashionable unless you plan on using taxis or ride services frequently. A lot of the coolest things San Francisco had to offer were within walking distance of the center, but sometimes “walking distance” meant walking upwards of 45 minutes to get there. Invest in comfortable sneakers.
4. Bring something to write in, something to write with, and a waterproof bag to contain it. I brought a pen and paper notebook to record notes, but even my backpack couldn’t keep it safe from the rain or rogue water bottles. Bring a plastic ziplock to keep fragile materials like notebooks and business cards safe and dry.
5. Wear layers! A crowded room in the convention hall could be quite warm, while San Francisco’s spring temperatures hovered between 50-60°. It’s better to be adaptive than uncomfortable.

I hope that every game developer has the opportunity to attend GDC at least once, because it was a great experience. I’ll definitely try to go again next year!

Do you have any great GDC stories or advice? Let us know in the comments.