Last year’s inaugural Develop in Brighton event was so enjoyable (and, of course, productive/valuable) that I was eager to head back for the second edition. And, despite the less-than-stellar weather (like we had last year), the overall event was well worth it again. Kudos to Susan Marshall and the Tandem team!

Again, Pixel-Lab held an education day co-located with the main event. This provided valuable insight into the educational and student/talent challenges that the UK is dealing with. It was during one of the session that EA UK head of HR Matthew Jeffrey was quoting stating that “graduates are not slave labour“…

In addition to the main conference - which was loaded with many great sessions - there was the annual Develop Excellence Awards ceremony. While I’m not usually a fan of non-game-industry-comedian-style hosts, the comic’s opening “I see you’re wearing your finest t-shirt” joke easily won over the crowd. In fact, I was busting out in laughter pretty much the entire show!

Also, in good British tradition, the socials and pub nights were all enjoyable - especially the ongoing GamesIndustry.biz party.

Thankfully, Develop has done up summaries of all the good sessions and relevant activities.

Anyway, on to some quick photos:


Ellie Gibson (GI.Biz) leads the industry panel at the Games:Edu day: Matthew Jeffrey (EA), Chris Wells (Epic Games), Chris Satchell (Microsoft Game Studios), Jason Avent (Black Rock Studio), Matt Southern (Evolution Studios).

Rob Catto (Full Sail) closes out the edu day with an overview of how things are done state-side…

A photo-shy Meggan Scavio (CMP Game Group) at dinner with Paul Gouge (Rockpool Games), Martin de Ronde (One Big Game) and Francois Masciopinto (Interactive Studio Management).

A somewhat knackered Nick Burton (Rare) waiting for the opening keynote to get under way.

Richard Garriott (NCSoft) delivers an insightful opening keynote.

The session description sounded promising, but EA UK’s head of HR Matthew Jeffrey’s dismissal of crunch as inevitable for deadline driven perfectionists was a big disappoint - though the rest of his session was quite agreeable.

Jonas Eneroth (Games BizDev) and The Alpenwolf (design columnist for Develop).

Dan Marchant (Obscure) and Charles Cecil (Revolution Studios) at the Develop Awards.

At the Rare table, Ryan Stevenson and Richard Geary have high hopes for Viva Pinata’s many nominations.

Similarly, the boys from Realtime Worlds - Phil Wilson, Billy and Dave Jones - are hoping for some love for Crackdown.

Evolution Studios’ Matt Southern and Scott Kirkland jazzed over Motorstorm’s win for best new console IP.

Kenny Young (Media Molecule), John Broomhall and Tommy Tallarico celebrate after the success of the day’s audio track sessions.

Sean Kauppinen (Kohnke) and Julien Merceron (Eidos) review some shameful videos of a very drunk industry exec…

On the walk back from the closing party, passed by the Royal Pavilion (which was known as party central back in the day).