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Hey, so it turns out game developers are...like, normal people. They like to drink and party and...well, that's where most of the similarities end, but throughout the week of the 2009 Game Developers Conference, I got to witness them in shaggy-hair-down mode, away from the hypnotic glow of their work computer monitors.
And just why was I allowed to mingle freely with these creatures, who are normally well-protected by their overprotective public-relations handlers? It seems GDC -- although still filled with mind-numbing tech-speak seminars -- is becoming more and more consumer focused, probably picking up the fun slack that previous Electronic Entertainment Expos (E3) have left behind. Each year, we see more and more game announcements, game demos, and game parties at this show...ironically, all stuff geared more toward consumers and gamers than your typical developer.
Cool by me -- I like fun. And to show you how mind-numbing-tech-speak-free this GDC was for me, here is my behind-the-scenes diary of the week, which was unfortunately cut short due to last-minute surgery. Sure, this story's a bit late, but, hey, better late than...well, never mind that. How about if I just bribe you (free games!) into reading this post? (Read on for details....)
Saturday, March 21
2:15 pm -- Snowboarding with friends. Hit this jump and launched into the air OK, but the landing...not so OK. I think I broke my thumb.
Sunday, March 22
6:00 pm -- Co-hosted a pre-GDC cocktail party with SparkPR. Met a lot of friendly and interesting industry people who were in town early for the show. Most of them asked me what Bitmob.com was, although I think they were just being polite since I was handing out free drink tickets. Ran into a couple of fans from the 1UP/EGM community as well.
Monday, March 23
1:45 am -- At Denny's with a big post-party crowd. Mega 64 guys were feeding me their leftover ham and onion rings because my food hadn't arrived yet and I was starving. Game|Life's Chris Kohler had to take off early and rather abruptly...left 20-some dollars on the table to cover his share of the tab, which we thought was way too much at first...until the bill came. He was $11 short. Blame downtown San Francisco's tourist-unfriendly prices.
Tuesday, March 25
3:05 pm -- Just entered Tecmo's press conference at the PlayStation Store inside of the Metreon. A little awkward at first running into their marketing manager, since I heard he blacklisted me for something I previously wrote, but he was very friendly and professional toward me. Looks like that's behind us now -- unless he's secretly planning revenge, perhaps of the public-humiliation-prank variety.
3:18 pm -- Watched world-premiere trailer of Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 for the PS3. Could barely see the TV screen because I was standing all the way in the back, until someone next to me pointed out that the same video was playing on all the in-store displays right behind us. Stopped tip-toeing. Graphics were beautiful, as expected.
3:24 pm -- Q&A session with the game's director and producer (and head of Team Ninja), Yosuke Hayashi. Best question from the crowd came from Joystiq's Christopher Grant, who asked Hayashi what he thought of the comments made by his predecessor, Tomonobu Itagaki, about how a PS3 port of Ninja Gaiden 2 "would be a loss of face for everyone involved." He basically responded that Sigma 2 was made in reaction to fan feedback.
5:07 pm -- Looked for LucasArts happy hour at Jillian's inside the Metreon but only saw huge crowds for some big conglomerate party that I wasn't supposed to be at which included Ubisoft (uh-oh...more blacklisting awkwardness?) and EA Sports. Found out the purpose of this giant gathering was to recognize Canadian videogame companies.
Didn't see anyone I knew but found and befriended the oyster bar. Feeling a little guilty consuming the raw mollusks since I wasn't invited to this bash. Ran into BioWare big-wig prez Greg Zeschuk, who was celebrating his Canadian-ness by wearing the country's national shirt, a hockey jersey. He noticed my wrapped-up thumb, so we talked snowboarding for a while.
Found out he used to be an amateur snowboarder with offers to go pro back in 1987. His pocket protector told him to go to medical school instead, which worked out since "Dr. Zeschuk" sounds better than "Greg Zeschuk's Pro Snowboarder, the videogame." Zeschuk did later clarify, "Key point is that ‘pro' in those days meant they give you three boards, a jacket, boots, gloves, and paid for two competitions. It was a little rustic...." Also pointed out to me the LucasArts party was in the pool hall portion of the bar.
7:38 pm -- Made my way over to the Deep Silver event. Who? Publisher for Duke Nukem: Critical Mass (PSP, DS), Cursed Mountain, and Risen. Wait, who again? Never mind.
Checked out both Nukems...they won't make waiting for Duke Nukem Forever any easier. The DS version is a side-scroller whose smooth, almost sluggish animations remind me of those in classics Out of This World or Flashback.
Party's still a big success in many eyes, however...mainly because of HipHopGamer's great stage performance and the catered Popeye's fried chicken (pretty sure the two had nothing to do with each other). Later, was backstage with HipHop while he interviewed my girlfriend, Raychul, for his site. Hanging out with HipHop and his crew reminded me of how not black I am, but they recognized me from my EGM days and made me feel a'ight.
Wednesday, March 25
9:55 am -- Finished watching Nintendo Co. Ltd.'s president Satoru Iwata's keynote speech. Most memorable parts:
- Talked about how Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto's personal activities tend to turn into videogames. Gardening led to Pikmin, owning a puppy translated to Nintendogs, and yoga turned into Wii Fit, etc. So Iwata jokingly asked Miyamoto to stop discussing his current hobbies with the press to avoid accidentally revealing any upcoming secret Nintendo projects.
- "How can we make a good rhythm game if we have no rhythm ourselves?" Iwata asks. Then showed a video of these geeky developers taking dance lessons, all in the name of research. Iwata also tells the crowd at this time that everyone in the room gets a free copy of Rhythm Heaven (DS) today.
- "Random employee kidnappings": Miyamoto may spontaneously, randomly grab a Nintendo worker walking down the hall and pull him or her into a room to spot-test a game in development. No setup, no talk, no discussions...he just wants to watch this subject play a game. He studies their reactions...when they're having fun, when they're frustrated, etc.
- Showed Rock N Roll Climber, a WiiWare game that simulates rock climbing with the controllers and balance board. When you reach the top, you find an electric guitar that you rock out on. I've never used Internet shorthand to describe a game before, but there's always a first time for everything: WTF.
- Decided Final Fantasy is the new Mega Man. I can't keep track of what games are coming out for which systems anymore. Square Enix needs to put out one massive compilation on PS3 Blu-ray: All Final Fantasy games to date, all updated (or not), all in one package...and then be done with it...for now.
Dear reader: If you're still with me at this point, you deserve a prize...or rather, a chance to win one. Comment below, and in a week, I'll pick one of you at random and send you my GDC copy of Rhythm Heaven, still unwrapped and mint in box.
1:05 pm -- Sat down to watch Terminator Salvation demo. First impression, the world looks like Fallout 3's, only more colorful. Second impression: not that impressed. Liked cover system (visual indicators popped up and players can choose which direction and piece of cover he wants to head toward). Liked how Salvation forces you to flank enemies more than other cover-based games (to get to a terminator's weak spot in back, for example). Didn't like physics and visual style (very generic, making the entire game feel personality-less). Didn't like seeing Greg Ford dying on Easy difficulty during his hands-on demo (he was playing way too aggressively, not using cover hardly at all).
Someone asked why no online play, and the developer was refreshingly honest. Said they wanted to do it, but it just wouldn't be polished with the deadline that they had. I'm more used to hearing BS like, "We feel this game is a great as a single-player experience on its own, and multiplayer would only water that down," which wouldn't have flown with this squad-based shooter. At least it has two-player local co-op.
1:55 pm -- Finished watching Batman: Arkham Asylum demo. Much, much better. Characters looked meaty and solid. Combat was cinematic, if a bit simplistic. Liked the stealth missions the best. It's like a superhero-boosted Splinter Cell, with Batman grappling from ledge to ledge, pouncing on clueless criminals from out of the darkness, then zipping away to safety again before others arrive on the scene.
At one point, Michael Donahoe asked the producer if Batman has superpowers. Producer looked at him strangely, wondering if he was joking or not. (He was.)
3:20 pm -- Arrived late to my appointment to see Section 8 for the 360 and PC. During the demo, the producer seemed pretty down on his competition, saying his game's more realistic approach to sci-fi won't have silly stuff like "goo guns, Star Trek transporters, Protoss, Zerg...." He wants us to think more Aliens with colonial marines or Battlestar Galactica.
I just see another Battlefield (teams, capture points, etc.) rip-off, but with a ton of really great features (customize soldiers from weapons to equipment to stats like speed and armor; live orbital-drop spawning, straight onto the combat field; and "DCMs": direct combat missions, where one side may have to escort a convoy or assassinate a specific target, and the other side has Counter DCMs to destroy that convoy or protect that target). But, it was hard to see how fun this game is or isn't in a non-multiplayer environment, playing by myself with unfinished bots and a broken thumb.
4:08 pm -- Showed up to my Hudson appointment, looked around the hotel suite, then wondered what I got myself into. The room was full of casual games with wide-eyed, cartoony characters -- felt like I went down the wrong aisle in Toys R Us. I did spot the only hardcore game in the room, a downloadable Miltary Madness Nectaris, but didn't get a chance to play it much. It's a 3D update to a classic, but I'm not sure it'll beat out Advance Wars for me.
Also played Water Warfare for a bit. The Wiimote calibration was all off, but I did OK in split-screen play (I'm sure the producer took it easy on me). Raychul saw this game in a separate appointment for GameGirl.com, and claims this would be the first-person shooter that she would finally dominate me in. I don't intend to find out (it's meant for kids, with water guns and playgrounds and such).
5:45 pm -- Ran into old EGM/CGW/GFW buddy Shawn Elliott at the Access Communications party. Literally four of his 2K Boston cohorts came up to me at different points and brought up the time where they showed an early version of BioShock to us at the EGM offices. Apparently (I don't remember this at all), I looked at the demo briefly then walked away emotionless and noticeably unimpressed.
I told them it must've been either: I was busy or distracted, or I was keeping my poker face on, having learned a long time ago in this business that letting company reps know that I'm impressed by a demo can backfire come review time.
We've gotten heat before at EGM for saying a Pride FC demo looked good, but the final reviews were less-than-good. Hey, a controlled 30-minute sampling of the best a game has to offer is not necessarily representative of the complete, start-to-finish product. So since then, I tried to avoid flattering anyone or anything during the preview stage.
The BioShock guys were totally cool about it, though. They thought it was funny...because in the end, I scored the game 10 out of 10 in EGM.
It's no Pride FC, but BioShock's not too bad.
11:40 pm -- Back at home, working frantically on some email interviews I told David Jaffe (God of War dude) and Cliff Bleszinski (Gears of War dude) I'd have to them by this point (this was when we thought we were launching at the end of March), and preparing questions for my Nintendo interview in the morning.
Got a text from a to-remain-unnamed game-industry friend who tells me he's at the strip club with my girlfriend and her GameGirlfriends, and that I'm missing all the fun. Raychul texts me, too, to remind me what all the cool kids are doing while I'm at home working. I curse everyone, hem and haw, then finally decide to go. Was not as exciting as how I built it up in my head.
Thursday, March 26
3:30 am -- Back home from the strip club, resumed working on my interviews. Tired and falling asleep at the computer...mentally cursed everyone again for peer pressuring me to go out. Wondered if asking Jaffe if he's ever been in a real-life three-way will piss him off (he answers).
12:00 pm -- Done interviewing Denise Kaigler, Vice President Corporate Affairs of Nintendo of America. (Why was she barefoot during the interview?) Video's here.
12:35 pm -- Just tried out Burn, Zombie Burn! at its launch party. It looks like it should be a Robotron-style dual-stick shooter, but it's not. This confused me.
Dear reader, part two: Damn, you really find all this interesting? OK, prize #2 is a free download code for Burn Zombie Burn. Just comment below, but this time, use the word "burn" somewhere for me to find.
2:40 pm -- At EA Play event. Been here for a half hour now, watching a GI Joe demo that nearly put me to sleep. Reminded me of when developers were first making generic, indistinguishable 3D action games on the PS1. The only things that excited me fall into the "fan service" category: unlockable Storm Shadow, classic cartoon song plays when your character is boosted, and the possible inclusion of public "and knowing is half the battle" service announcements and their Internet parodies.
When explaining why they didn't include online co-op (it's local only), producer said they felt, "The best experience is playing together on a couch." Ah ha! (See Terminator entry above.) But he also admitted they had to dial back a lot of stuff to get everything done in time for the movie's launch. He also described the DS version as Ikari Warriors with light RPG elements. Wish I saw that game instead.
Ran out of time. Was really bummed I didn't get a chance to try out Boom Blox: Bash Party. Heard it's excellent.
The rest of GDC week
Got my thumb X-rayed, found out it was broken really badly, had to go in for urgent surgery, and missed several GDC meetings, panels, and guest appearances on Digital Trend's Players Only and Mega 64's Marcus' Corner (sorry again, guys!).
Really didn't want to go out that night after my operation -- I was still loopy from the general anesthesia -- but I did organize a Ziff-Davis reunion party at Jillian's, so I really had to show up. Glad I did, though. It was absolutely fantastic seeing all my old friends and coworkers....
