GDC ’18 Talks Selection

Last month, while the 2019 edition of the Game Developers Conference was taking place, I watched the lecture from the previous year. Here is a personal selection of free videos from the GDC Vault:

• The Art of ‘Wonder Boy: The Dragon’s Trap’
  Ben Fiquet
  The art director, and only artist, behind the visually stunning platformer remake delivers a comprehensive making of.

• #1ReasonToBe
  Rami Ismail, Samer Abbas, Matthieu Rabehaja, Carlos Rocha, Lara Noujaim, Javi Almirante, Irina Moraru
  Uncommon panel of six speakers from usually unsolicited part of the world.

• Inside the Indie Mind: Zach Barth (Zachtronics)
  The crazy guy behind the crazy puzzle games discusses many topics during this interview.

• The 2018 Indie Soapbox
  I love this batch of microtalks, my favorites:

  • What makes people continue to want to play? from Davey Wreden: interesting aimless thoughts about video game concepts.
  • Life = Pain + Video Games from Danny Baranowsky: super interesting talk about pain.
  • On life goals from Adriel Wallick
  • The curse of min-maxing from Justin Ma (Subset games): about game neuroses.
  • The Tóth Sausage Conjecture from Frank Lantz: it's not about video games but who cares.

• Don’t Break the Chain: Maintaining Productivity on Your 19th Game
  Jason Rohrer
  Feedback, with plenty of data, on how to work alone, from the man behind One Hour One Life.

• ‘Horizon Zero Dawn’: A Game Design Postmortem
  Eric Boltjes
  Great postmortem of the development phases and the lessons learned by the game design team while building their first open-world game. With a rare look at early prototypes.

• Dealing with Scope Change in ‘Heat Signature’ and ‘Gunpoint’
  Tom Francis
  Feedback on his experience of scope creep.

• Weaving 13 Prototypes into 1 Game: Lessons from 'Edith Finch'
  Ian Dallas
  Interesting to see how much this beloved game changed.

• Making the World Give a Damn About Your Game in 2018
  No More Robots’ Mike Rose
  Up to date (for 2018) presentation on how to smartly market a game.

• Queens of the Phone Age: The Narrative Design of ‘Reigns: Her Majesty’
  Leigh Alexander
  Powerful feminist lecture on her role writing a female centric game.

• Failing to Fail: The Spiderweb Software Way
  Jeff Vogel
  Loved this human and funny experience from the oldest indie developer.

Bonus

Through the suggestions of YouTube, I ended up watching this great talks from other editions:

• Trailer Made: What Makes a Successful and Memorable Game Trailer
  Derek Lieu, 2019
  I love trailers, and especially game trailers, so I liked to hear advice, even not groundbreaking, from a professional making them.

• Owlboy: The Motivational Power of Inspiration
  Simon Stafsnes Andersen, 2017
  The artist of Owlboy shares his deep experience making the game during nine years.

• How to Survive in Gamedev for Eleven Years Without a Hit [How to Survive in Gamedev for Eleven Years Without a Hit]
  Jake Birkett, 2016
  Funny and honest 10+ years indie game dev career experience.

• How To Make Your Game Just Completely Hilarious: The Stanley Parable
  William Pugh, 2015
  He's making humour using the format of talk as he used, with Davey Wreden, the video game format for The Stanley Parable, so I had a fair amount of laughs.

and more

All 442 videos from 2017 are now free on GDC Vault: https://gdcvault.com/browse/gdc-17/?&media=v

There is an alternative web app easier to browse, with the videos since 2016: GDC Vault Explorer

Fin