Game Developers Conference China - Day 1

The first day was rather interesting as it was a day full of mixed feelings about what would be presented in the Conference. So my first task was to collect my Conference ID from the onsite registration kiosk and there was a small queue at the collection center.

 

 

Once I collected the ID I was given a nice Cloth bag (as shown in the picture above) which included a limited edition conference T Shirt, a guidebook featuring the agenda, sponsors, speakers and a briefing about the topic they are intending to speak.

 

Once the registration process was done I  went straight to the conference which was held in two different floors, the conference was divided into several tracks namely Business & Marketing, Design, Production, Programming, Independent games summit, Smartphone & Tablet Games, Round Table, Tutorial and Sponsored Tracks. The sessions on Independent Games Summit, Tutorials and Sponsored tracks were held on the first day.

All these tracks had sessions that were overlapping with each other, so it was very tough to select the most appropriate session as there were several interesting sessions that were held simultaneously. 

After giving a careful thought I decided to go for a full day tutorial on 'Level Design Fundamentals and Techniques', I decided to attend this session so that I could learn about level designing in games which is very important when progressing to a new level, in addition to that I wanted to get level design insights from the professionals in the field. This was indeed a fruitful session, it was from this session I learnt that every gaming company should have a level designer if there are serious about their game (As it is a known profession within the gaming industry).

They spoke further about the following topics

1. The Role played by a Level Designer
2. Layout (Using the layout of the game to teach the game)
3. Layering
4. Visualizing (Rule of thirds  - An important concept in photography and Gaming)
5. Modes of creating a layout (Paper Planning, Graybox Blackout and Kit Roughing)
6. Environmental Storytelling.

This session explained several more insights on Level Designing and went on till the evening but I decided to leave early  so that I can attend other sessions in the conference.

 

It was while going through the agenda that I came across a sponsored session arranged by Adobe titled 'Equipping a perfect game design team- Visual Design tactics with Adobe's technology edge'. I thought I should attend this session since I was keen to know how Adobe would cut its teeth into the gaming market.

When I just started my career as a game developer around a year back I was happy to see the Adobe Gaming SDK (http://www.adobe.com/devnet/games/gaming.html) that consisted of several tools and frameworks for gaming that is supported by Adobe, so I thought that it would be interesting to know more about their involvement in gaming. However there was an issue in attending this session.

 

This session was delivered in Chinese, and in order to get it translated live I had to get a translating device from the conference by keeping my Passport as a security, that lead me to problem number two. I hadn't brought my passport to the conference.

 

Fortunately one of the organizers of the event was very kind enough to convince with the organizers of the session to keep my bag (I brought a hand luggage that consisted of some of my belongings) instead of my passport as a security, and I was finally able to get the device below.

 

 

Many technologies and tools consisted in the Adobe Gaming SDK were discussed in this session, In the Picture below the speaker was discussing  about Dragon Bones - A 2D skeletal animation library for Flash, but what inspired me in this session was something else; It was Adobe Scout (http://www.adobe.com/devnet/scout/articles/adobe-scout-getting-started.html).

 

Adobe Scout is a profiling tool that could be used to analyse the behavior of the Flash content. Initially I was thrilled to see Adobe extending its arm towards gaming and to know that it has further extended itself for developing Program Analysing (i.e: profiling) tools I was thrilled, even though Adobe Scout was designed for Flash based Game Development which would probably benefit only  2D Games, developers now have a tool to analyse their games prior to its release. This proved the extent to which a technology company can expand itself and one day I hope that in Sri Lanka we could learn a lot by looking at these developments.

 

Finally after the end of this session, I went back to the hotel calling it a day and with the intension of learning a lot more the next day.

Game Developers Conference China

I am now in China to attend the Game Developers conference in Shanghai, this is an annual conference that is been held in China with its main chapter held in America and the European chapter held in Germany.

I was able to compile all what I have learnt there, however I had an issue in publishing them because the following web sites are restricted in China.

Google (Which includes blogger)

Facebook 

Twitter

Youtube

And a host of other sites as well.

Therefore all these had to be posted after coming home, which will be serialized in this blog.

Poetry Time: Ode of a Rich Man

 

I Pay Taxes to the governing body

I give charity to the needy

The politician insults me during an election

The poverty claps at its own discretion

 

To be poor in a rich country is indeed a shame

But to be rich in a poor country am I to be blamed

Richness and Poverty are part of the Economic game

An unfortunate designation in front of a human's name

 

I live to this day awaiting for a change

From a poverty stricken, yet a prejudiced human race

I still manage to uphold my grace

To cautiously look into the consequences I am yet to face

Good Poetry



Good poetry has always inspired me, it is difficult to identify where the exact source of inspiration is hidden, but let me repeat Good Poetry is always an inspiration.

In Poetry it is often not the content that is captivating, but the way the words are positioned, the way the words trick the mind to convey the content and the way a complex thought is written in a few words that kindles inspiration.

As writers thoughts keep flowing, so by condensing these thoughts to a few words and positioning those words in a way that directs the human mind to an unknown destination is indeed an artistic blessing. As a result of my acquaintance with poetry, I have tried my hands on writing my own proses, which have either ended up in some discarded book or my faithful waste paper basket  .

Hence I decided to include all the proses that I write in my blog with the Title: Poetry Time.

Therefore have a nice day until I post my first line of prose.

Books - Good Bad and the Ugly

With the end of the Colombo Book fair I thought of writing about books, it's good bad and the ugly pages.
Reading has been encouraged in this part of the world as a powerful tool and the only tool for learning (this was way before internet and multimedia teaching materials were popular). However like everything, Books and Reading has its good, bad and ugly sides to it.

The Good

• You do learn a lot - Yes this is true, you get to learn a lot
• You can kill your time - While going on a bus, waiting for someone or to kill the idle time, this is the ideal thing to do. 
• Peaceful - You don't have to depend on anyone, you can do it by yourself. 

The Bad

• Forgetting - However good or fast you are in reading, it will be of no use if you are unable to recall what you have read. Imagine you read a book on First Aid and when you try to apply it and you forget the series of steps. 
• Rate of being an Introvert increases - If you are addicted to reading the last thing you want to do is to talk with visitors who visit your home or to go out of your house (or library for that matter)

The Ugly

• Reading is not something that you can do for a long time
• Reading may not be possible as you age, naturally your eyesight might be weak and as a result your interest to read will go away with time - At that time you will always want someone who reads to stop it and talk

Yet with all that Reading is an act that we all do at some point of time providing your literal.

Therefore enjoy your reading !!

Garbage Thoughts

I remember one gentleman who had visited a country in Scadinavia mentioned that in that Country people are allowed to camp on private properties.
This amazed me and my family members for some time. How can a government of a country allow outsiders to camp on someone else's private property?
but...., he continued, when they leave the site, not even a 'tissue paper' could be found on those properties.
I visited the Dehiwala Sunday Fair, once it was over and the merchants have headed home, this was what I was able to spot.

For some reason, I recalled the story.
Garbage Thoughts. After all Sri Lanka is not Scandinavia.

Tragedy begets Popularity

I thought of writing this post after seeing the popularity of the video shown below

This video had a clip of two girls (seems to be from a middle eastern Country) singing inside a car and one of them dancing while driving. Unfortunately the Car met with an accident (as shown in the video).

What interested me was the song that those girls were singing as it had a nice tune, when I looked through the comments I realized that I was not alone as there were so many people requesting for the name of the song.

Until one Samaritan posted the song and the song had a video as well. This is the video

One of the first comments I saw in that video was 'It was the video of the two girls that brought me here'.
Today this singer and the song has received international popularity. When writing this post I realized that Tragedy has a possibility of begetting popularity

Social Networking - Proceed or not ?

After a long lapse I decided to write about a topic that shocked the Country, shocked to the extent that a debate erupted about Social Netwoking sites (Facebook in perticular).

Amanda Todd who had been one of the victims of Cyber Bullying and harassment , posted a video about the trauma that she had undergone as a result of online harassement, for some unfortunate reason Sri Lankans did not pay much heed on to this, if they did, such a dialogue would have taken place some years back, the video she posted could be viewed below

I have been a verbal critic of Social Networking, yet I must admit that Facebook has been tightening its security and improved with time where security is concerned.

Another factor tends to blame the parents/family for negligence, I am not afraid to say that this view is endorsed by another section of society who want to safeguard Social Networking sites, and these social networking sies can't avaiod these criticisms.

Social Netwoking is similar to a Park, where individuals, families, friends and gangsters all get together when they are free. 
Imagine two children of the same family (A and B) decide to enter this park called Social Networking. Child A meets family C where the Father is a Professor, Mother is a Scientist, Son is a Lawyer and Sister is a teacher, while Child B  meets Family D, where the Father is a Swindler, Mother is drug dealer, son is a contract murderer and sister is a drug addict. What would be the fate of both these children (Much similar to the Buddhist Jataka story on the two parrots) 

Then where exactly is the mistake?

Open to Discussion