Scotland's Games Ecosystem Cluster
It has been a while since Girl Geek Scotland hosted a dinner but they certainly came out with all guns blazing for their return, with a host of fantastic guests answering questions in a panel debate. Although not entirely games related the events are highly regarded in the tech community and so we couldn't afford …
Continue reading "Conversation with Silicon Valley – Girl Geek Dinners"
We were delighted to be invited to Guerilla Tea’s second workshop with Enable Scotland’s East Renfrewshire Local Area Coordination (LAC) Team; with some parents and LAC’s there with the kids. For those of you who don’t know LAC’s support people with disabilities to think about and plan for a life that makes sense to them. …
After a bit of a hiatus its great to see the IGDA Scotland meetings getting back on track with last months meet up in Glasgow, for a play party of the Scottish Game Jam games, being the best attended event so far and next months Edinburgh meeting already planned – keep the 10th April free. …
Continue reading "March Madness – IGDA Scotland Event, Dundee"
Jamming isn’t the easiest of things. However you do it, undertaking a 48 hour journey to produce a game from conception to birth, isn’t easy and there are likely to be stumbling blocks along the way. The first of these is the brick wall that exhaustion causes. It’s just physically draining to work for long …
Continue reading "Jamming in Diversity – The Trials and Tribulations of the Jam"
As chief organiser Brian McDonald pressed play on the audio file you could see that everyone in the room wasn’t paying full attention. Only as the regular, pumping, sound of a heart-beat was heard throughout the room did the jammers taking place realise that this was it, this was the theme. Nothing added, nothing taken …
Continue reading "Listen to your Heart – Global Game Jam brings an Audio Twist in 2013"
Into the final speaker sessions with an almost filmic title. Users to Creators Starting with a discussion about using the market to create economic growth we have Bill Liao, CoderDojo (@liaonet) Ian Livingstone, Life President Eidos (@Ian_Livingstone), Ella Romanos, MD Remode Studios(@ella_romanos), and Ray Maguire, Interactive Opportunities. Introduced by Fred Hasson, who started the whole …
Continue reading "Users, Creators, Love, Sex and Dwarves – Edinburgh Interactive (Session 6)"
Who need lunch, as we take you into the afternoon. Getting Above the Noise With more than 500,000 games and applications on Android, iPhone and other devices, players and developers both need a way to find each other. You’ll meet three companies; GREE, Flurry, and Tapjoy, who are creating global networks and tools for …
Yesterday Edinburgh Interactive closed, with a Dragons Den type affair; the idea concerning a pitch of a game or interactive experience to a panel of Ian Livingstone (Life President Eidos), Rob Woodward (CEO Scottish TV), Bill Liao (Co-founder coderdojo.com), Mark Phillips (Harbottle & Lewis) and chaired by Sean Dromgoole (GameVision/Some Research). The event was done …
Continue reading "Dragons, Zombies and A Day in the Life – Edinburgh Interactive (Session 4)"
Back from lunch and into the fray with Are Computer Games Art? Chris Bateman @SpiralChris International Hobo and Ren Reynolds (@RenZephyr) Virtual Policy Network got a good response from the audience. Hell, yes! We thought computer games were art. Hosted by Ren, he posed the question to Chris who started with Ernst Gombrich’s Meditations …
Continue reading "Art, Squirrels and the New Reality – Edinburgh Interactive (Session 3)"
Getting Brands to Pay for in Game Purchases With spiralling development costs, piracy concerns, and a competitive market meaning less return on each project; game developers are increasingly looking at new business models. At the forefront of this is Free2Play or freemium games such as EA’s Battlefield Play4Free series on PC and Rovio’s Angry Birds …
Continue reading "Pay, Horsepower and Reward – Edinburgh Interactive (Session 2)"