Yesterday evening, the Game Developer's Conference closed their doors and finished up. I actually haven't made much progress on Esther's quest at all due to all the GDC craziness, so this artcile will be more of a discussion of that than anything else.
I didn't know exactly what to expect at the conference. It was my first time going, so I went with the goal of absorbing as much information as possible. I think I did my best on that goal. I had an Expo pass, which is what other develoepers in my area recommended. The Expo pass is the most restrictive access to the conference. You can only go for the last three days (Wednesday through Friday), you hardly get access to any sessions or talks, and there are other areas you can't access either. It didn't matter to me, though. There was still so much going on with just the Expo pass that I was able to get a lot of mileage out of it. Here's a breakdown of what I did:
The expo is a massive floor in the basement of the convention center where developers and companies show off their stuff. The main purpose is for tech companies to market their technology to game developers and for developers to market their games to publishers or other sources of income.
Lots of tech companies were at the convention marketing their newest products and services. Google was at the convention marketing their new console and the new Stadia cloud gaming service, Epic Games was there to show off the new game store and (of course) to show all the latest updates for Unreal Engine 4, and Unity technologies was there for a similar reason. Microsoft, Sony, and Amazon were all there as well.
There were also lots of game developers showing off their latest games for a variety of reasons. Sometimes, the reason was to look for a publisher to give them money to finish the game. Other times, the reason was to look for other people to join their development team to help finish the game. Other times still, the purpose was to advertise a specific technology the game uses.
Honestly, I found the expo to be a little overwhelming. I had a hard time socializing with other people with all the massive marketing stuff going on. It was really cool to walk around and look at everything, but I think the most useful part was talking with other game devs and asking them about the challenges they had faced while working on whatever they were showing off. Even then, this isn't always a polite thing to do, since the time spent talking about that stuff would sometimes be better spent talking to a potential publisher or business partner. It's a loud, overwhelming, exhausting place.
The expo wasn't all bad, though. It served as a hub place to connect with people. I got to meet the lead developer and project manager for Godot, the engine I use to make games! I reached out to them over gmail and asked if they wanted to meet somewhere on the expo floor to talk. I had a conversation with them for a while, and I consider that to be the peak of my expo floor experience.
GDC isn't just about marketing, though. There are also a bunch of sessions going on during the expo. As far as I could tell, there were three kinds of sessions: talks, panels, and round-rooms. Talks are just that, panels are like talks, but with voices from a few people instead of just one, and round-rooms are open discussions where anybody can participate.
The sessions were all varied in topic, and they could be pretty hit or miss. I saw some that were funny, interesting, and thought-provoking, while others nearly put me to sleep. I think the most interesting one I went to was a round-room discussion about the future of narrative design in games. I love experimenting with narrative in my own games, so it was interesting to hear the community's perspective on that matter.
Overall, I'd say it's worth attending a few of the talks and sessions, but you can never really know the quality of a session until you actually go and see it. Of course, the other option at that point is the expo, so they can serve as a nice break from walking around through all the craziness if you need to take a break.
Of course, I think the main reason for an indie dev to attend GDC is for the social events that supplement the conference itself. There are lots of parties, meetups, and other events that happen during and after the convention that were all very well worth my time. These events helped me make connections with all sorts of people in the industry. I made some new friends, connected with artists, programmers, musicians, business people, students, and even other solo developers like myself. So many of the conversations I had were memorable, authentic, and friendly. I hope some of them lay the foundation for ongoing relationships in the future.
It was also interesting to run into some people from home at these events. Some of the best conversations I had were with people I already knew from game developer meetups back at home. It was cool to see them in a different environment, and we always talked about the most real, down-to-earth stuff whenever that happened.
Overall, I had a great time at this conference, and I will definitely be going again. It was time well spent, and I think it will only continue to do more for my game development career with more time. At this point, I'm staying in San Francisco for a couple more days to see the city and just relax away from home for a bit. For now, I'm signing off, and I promise I'll have one more article about Esther's Quest before the month ends. Thanks for reading!
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