#gameconference

This year’s 2015 GDC was an interesting and learning experience.  This was my second time attending GDC.  The first time, I got an EXPO pass.  With the expo pass I only got to experience the expo floor and go to the numerous crazy parties every night of the week.  Being my first time there at the time, I was a bit overwhelmed at how big the conference was and what to do when I was there.  I felt I did not experience the full potential when I was there compared to my experience this year.  I think it also helped I relatively knew the layout and where to go to attend the things I was interested in unlike the first time.

This year at GDC I got an Audio pass because I was interested in learning more about sound in games.  I’ve always felt sound and music make a player have a better experience as well as enjoy the game a whole lot more.  Players get excited about certain sound effects as well as awesome music!  But who wouldn’t!  Humans in general are fascinated about audio.  Other than Audio talks, I went to a wide range of talks, some interesting and some not so much.  But then again it all depends on what fascinates you, plus if the speaker knows how to engage an audience.  While at the various talks, I took down notes on things I found interesting as well as things I did not know.  Maybe some of what I wanted to remember will be helpful to those reading.  

One of the audio talks I attended was the Audio Bungie talk where I was introduced to the term called ‘ducking.’  For those that don’t know, ducking is having other sounds shut up.  I learned that as a developer, you want to make sure you have occlusion and abstraction in your game.  To not have it, is super distracting to the player.  What I mean by occlusion and abstraction in your game is having certain audio sounds be at the appropriate decibel level depending on where the player’s character is in the game/what they are doing in the game to make it more believable/natural.  Sound developers do this by combining multiple parts to make a better realistic sound.  They layer the noise depending on where the player’s character is in relation to the thing giving off the noise.  One of the examples they used was a gun.  Far away the gun sounds like one distinct noise.  But as it moves closer while firing, more sounds the gun gives off, becomes noticeable.  Like the noise the release mechanism gives off.  Though when done correctly, the gun firing sounds natural if you have ever been exposed to a firing weapon.   Like models that have LOD(level of detail) depending on distance, sound has it as well.  Towards the end of their talk, they introduced different audio programs they use to achieve the desired effect such as WWise and FMOD as well as stressed how important it is for someone doing audio to know how to do programming for sound as there are usually about 2000+ lines of sound code for a decent size game.  And when doing programming for sound, to always keep your scripts separate so if it does break something, it can easily be debugged and you won’t get blamed for changing the code elsewhere.  

A talk that was not quite audio was the Google Lightning talk.  Lightning talks have multiple speakers who all had a limited time to share something.  I would highly suggest Lightning talks done by companies because they give you a lot of information in a short amount of time.  Plus, speakers are constantly switching which I believe keeps you more engaged/interested.  I know with today’s technology we are easily distracted or lose interest in something quickly.  Another thing, this talk encouraged me to go to other talks of theirs that went into more detail on different things that caught my interest.

One of the things I learned at this talk was about Google’s Project Tango.  A current project that lets our smart devices learn about the space we are inhabiting.  It uses the device’s camera to scan a room as well as it’s compass to figure out where you are in the space.  It can also build the world in a 3D version in your smart device, as well as recognize when you revisit the same area.  I already have many ideas on how I can use Project Tango for my own ideas and inspirations.  It is not quite available to the public yet, but Google is in the process of getting ready to release it.   

Another speaker at the Google talk had some good advice I believe everyone should remember even if they are already aware of it.  Just make sure you are applying whatever advice you deem important if you say ‘yeah yeah I know that, etc.’  I know many people who do not listen to good advice but claim otherwise.  This speaker(can’t remember his name) introduced me to a term called ‘Kitchen Sinking.’ Kitchen Sinking essentially means drowning your game in extra things to make your game seem more exciting, more fun.  For example, adding a variety of powerups thinking players will like your game more because of it.  This speaker said to step back from this and concentrate on the mechanics that change the way the player plays.  To keep it simple and see what attracts the player and wants them to play your game.  After this, slowly add in extra things like a power-up but don’t drown your game in it.  Make sure the add on things are not the main thing that attracts your players.  

Another thing he mentioned, was to not hold onto good ideas longer than you should because they do not mesh with what you are working on.  Sometimes you have to kill your darlings to move on to far better things.  If you keep holding onto things trying to get them to work because you think they are an awesome idea is only going to hold you back.  Plus, in addition to that, he said make sure to get your games out there, even if they are a work in progress.  The more feedback you have the better, but don’t spam people to play your games.  If you keep bothering someone to play your game, more than likely by the time they get around to trying it, they are going to feel some kind of annoyance about it which will hinder their feedback.  Always be professional about it and do not get upset or worried if they do not get around to it right away.  People are busy, be friendly and courteous and they will respect you that much more.  Also, he mentioned not to be too quick to reject bad comments.  He said to try to understand the reason behind their comment.  There is a reason why they felt the need to say whatever.  Who knows, it might be on some mechanic in the game that you as the developer just need to tweak to make it that much more enjoyable.

Other than the normal talks, I would suggest going to the hands on workshops GDC offers.  I went to one of the Google coding workshops where I learned how to make my Unity game be used for VR on the phones through the use of Google Cardboard.  They gave us a mini unity game project to download which they then walked us through the steps of setting the unity project to work for the Google Cardboard as well as getting it onto the device for testing.  I thought it was extremely helpful.  Plus, I apparently introduced what they called the Unity Pro Tip of the day where I had my unity screen turn red when I pushed play to test it.  Google employees where fascinated by my Unity UI turning red on testing.