Dr. Anthony Whitehead

Many game designers have taken different approaches to game design. Great graphics, amazing game controls, beautiful story, immersive music, etc. But is there a flow to these choices in the design process? In this presentation we will explore some of the best games who have won awards or great reviews and come up with a flowchart that should help put you on track to develop the next big hit.

Christian Beauclair, Microsoft

Christian is a hardcore gamer who's been playing games since he was 16. He has worked as a game software evaluator for 8 years prior to his joining Microsoft. In his current role, he spends a lot of time talking to schools about XNA Game Studio 3.1 and the Indy Game market.

Pitching a game idea often starts with a basic concept and a pitch document. In this presentation I will share some of our experiences putting together, and receiving successful (and unsuccessful) game pitches over the years. I will share some tips on making a game concept or demo appealing, and walk through an example pitch document, explaining the different pieces of information we use to convey your great game idea to a publisher or even your own development team.

Antonio Santamaria, Artech Studios

We describe Exocortex Technologies background, the problem were are solving, an overview of the technology with examples, our value proposition, the target market, the reasons for our success to date, and the lessons we have learned. The lessons we have learned will be helpful to anyone looking to enter the game business.

Ben Houston , Exocortex Technologies

Many of the new and exciting ways of interacting with computers are emerging from the game design field. Because of the rigorous requirements of gaming, games are often the ideal arena in which to cultivate and test new and emerging technologies. In this talk we will look at some of the past, present and future innovations in HCI that have been driven by gaming.

Dominira Saul, Akendi

Over the past 3 years BlackCherry Digital Media, in partnership with the Mushkegowuk Cree of Northern Ontario and Carleton University have been working to create an online resource, pathoftheelders.com, which is set to launch March 24th, 2010. The main goal of this project is to teach cultural history to Cree youth but the deeper goal is to have an impact on the appalling suicide rate among aboriginal youth. This presentation will focus on the genesis, motivations and goals of the project, the challenges facing serious game designers and some of the lessons learned from this undertaking.

John Seck, Black Cherry Digital Media
Dr. John Medicine Horse Kelly, Carleton University

The mobile industry is a fast evolving machine. From the Apple iPhone to the BlackBerry Storm, many of the newest devices dispose of the old keyboard and directional pad input in favour of a simple touchscreen. But what does that mean for games? We'll discuss the major issues with the lack of a control mechanism, compare some possible implementations and see why it's more than handling a few new events.

Ryan Henry, Magmic

Brent George, Ubisoft

With 14 years of experience, Brent George is no stranger to the animation industry. Brent had spent time in commercial, television, and film production before enthusiastically transitioning into a professional role in one of his favourite past times, the game industry. After giving a peak at what life is like working as an Animation Director for one of the world's premiere game development studios, Brent will entertain us with some anecdotes from his most recent adventures working on James Cameron's Avatar: The Game.

Dr. Anthony Whitehead

Games, Call of Duty Tournament, All Nighter Lan Party

Judges TBA