GDC round-up

I am back from GDC. And I bear with me THE CRUD. THE CRUD has also infected multiple members of
my family. THE CRUD is to be feared. I heartily recommend running in the opposite direction should
it seek to make your acquaintance.

Because of THE CRUD I have had to turn down a lovely opportunity to speak at ETECH this year on
serious games, A Theory of Fun, and whatever else might have fit into the 45 minutes. This
sort of sucks, as ever year I see ETECH happen in San Diego and I never get to go.

I have many many stories from GDC. Alas, THE CRUD prevents me from actually relating any of them. The
talks related to the book seemed to go well, though I think there are significantly more mixed reactions
to A Grammar of Gameplay than there were to the keynote for Serious Games, which was basically the familiar old AToF presentation again.

Nonetheless, there was a lot of coverage. Witness:

Theory of Fun keynote:

• Alice’s mad transcription that led to most of the coverage below.
• Josh Rubin’s detailed summary
• A summary of the Serious Games Summit
• I like the comment: “If you’re a gamer human, then there’s a transcript… I emplore you to read it.”
• I got Scobleized!!
• The Game Blog says “an excellent read”
• Someone on LiveJournal says “long, but fascinating read”
• “Keynote of the week” says Ryan
• Salon blogged it…
• The Hobbit Hole takes notice
• Ludonauts MISSED IT. Again.
• TerraNova (in the person of Cory) quibbles
• A lengthy summary from GameDev.Net
• Game News Blog says “sing it, brotha”
• Joystiq claims the speech is “like a shot of caffeine.” There is, however, a really bizarre discussion following.
• This blog somehow relates the talk to Sabrina. The movie. And not even the Audrey Hepburn one.
• Kotaku says “Go read it and then impress your friends with how brainy you are about video games.”
• BoingBoinged…
• Grown Up Gamer says “If I die tommorow and can’t post any more things in this blog, at least I will have linked to this keynote address.” I love you too. 🙂
• And another blog…
• Alice’s mad transcription
• The Listless Lawyer says “Pac-man gets horribly abused in the middle of the speech, but Koster makes some interesting points anyway”
• Blistered Avalon claims “It’s absolutely brilliant”
• Gamasutra’s Postcard summary
• Peter Butler over at download.com
• Idle Thumbs (scroll down a bit)

• A podcast about the session
• Dave Rickey’s take

Instanced vs Persistent panel:

• Zen of Design, aka Damion Schubert, discussing the panel
• Richard Bartle starts us off over at TerraNova

Grammar of Gameplay:

• Psychochild says “best non-keynote talk I saw”
• TerraNova’s discussion
• Dave Rickey’s debate with them
• Frans Mayra’s summary
• Laundry Sessions’ take

Enough for now, this pesky fever won’t let me stare at a screen for very long…

Oh, before I forget: I did a signing at the bookstore, and we sold out there. 🙂 And I am supposed to speak at SUPERNOVA (but I need to dig up the link). And I have posted the slides for A Grammar of Gameplay.