The Ludicine research team from the University of Montreal hosted an academic conference on horror games, titled appropriately “Thinking After Dark: Welcome to the World of Horror Video Games”.
I was able to pop in briefly to catch a few of the paper presentations. But, sadly, missed all the keynotes. Though, I did steal away keynote speaker (and Kaos|THQ designer) Richard Rouse for some crazy tofu lunch action!
Adrian Forest (Queensland University of Technology) explores the use of space relative to fear in the ‘Shock series of games.
Matthew Weiss (Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab) dissects the rules of the horror genre and adaption to games.
And so, I’m into my second full week out of IGDA. The most noticeable difference is that my email traffic is massively down. It’s like I actually have time to go to the bathroom without the fear that 100 new emails will stuff my inbox!
In reality, there’s not been much change from a purely mechnical point of view. During my ~9 year tenure with IGDA, I always worked from my home office, without much in the way of traditional office support structures, etc. So, being freelance and working from home isn’t much different in that regard.
Though, was fun setting up my own web site (using WordPress), rebuilding/coordinating my new email accounts (centralizing on Gmail), finding a new calendering system (Google Calendar), rebuilding my time tracking tool, etc, etc. Still need to find a good contact/prospecting management and tracking tool.
Interestingly, I’ve made a conscious decision to be as web/cloud driven as possible. Meaning, I pretty much work out of a browser window all day (ie, meaning, I’m fully mobile).
Anyway, happy to take any recommedations or pointers to good tools, apps, books, web sites, etc, for freelance consultants :)
Every year for GDC, I have the pleasure of working with Eric Zimmerman on planning the rant session (which was totally awesome, BTW). This year, instead of a co-moderating role Eric suggested I do a mini rant regarding my departure from IGDA. A chance to blow off some steam in a fiery farewell.
Not feeling particularly vengeful, I twisted the rant more into an apology to the development community. Here’s roughly what I said (though, do recall that the context of the rant is especially performative and is intended to be in your face (you should hear what others had to say)):
Serving the IGDA for the past 9 years has been extremely rewarding and challenging. I helped to get a lot done, but somehow feel that I failed the community.
Sorry for being too focused on the nuts and bolts, with my head down in execution. I just didn’t spend enough time on the big picture vision stuff. It’s scary, and easy to avoid when you’re just “busy” doing stuff.
Sorry for not having the leadership skills to beat the barriers of participation inequality. Less than 1% of the IGDA membership are truly active in driving the org forward. Sorry for not doing a better job building up a strong pipeline of community leaders and volunteers. Sorry for not overcoming your general apathy and laziness.
Sorry for not doing a better job of roping in all the snipers from the sidelines. Turns out you are all pretty damn good at bitching and complaining and being critical. But then you don’t actually do anything about it and you don’t get involved. Sorry for not bringing critics under the tent and getting them to work at improving things.
Sorry for not getting you to be more serious about the profession of game development. You are no longer a bunch of hacks. This is a real art and science. We need to be way more deliberate and control the path the profession takes as it evolves into the future.
Most of all, sorry for not doing more to help you realize your power! Both, collectively as a profession to tackle industry issues, and as creators of culture. You are all having a massive impact on society. You are transforming the world day-by-day without even realizing it.
Oh well, f* you, it’s not my job anymore!
Sorry.
