GDC 2012 details Google, Facebook, Unity dev days

Author: by Staff

For today's update regarding the 2012 Game Developers Conference, show organizers are revealing initial information on a series of sponsored Developer Days, showcasing numerous talks from major companies such as Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Unity, and more. Taking place on the first two days (Monday, March 5th and Tuesday, March 6th) of the San Francisco show, these full-day sponsored developer events offer GDC attendees a chance to learn about key development tools and platforms directly from the companies that make them. These events are open to attendees with Summits & Tutorials and All Access passes -- to register for your own, please visit the official GDC website. Without further ado, here are a selection of the sponsored Developer Days to be featured at GDC 2012: - Offering a robust lineup on its latest game-focused tech, Google will host two separate Developer Days, going in-depth with web- and Android-based development, respectively. Each of these events will help attendees become even more familiar with Google's game platforms and technologies, and will feature some key development tactics for leveraging Google+, YouTube, mobile platforms, and more. - Elsewhere, engine developer Unity Technologies will host a number of case studies, tutorials, and other sessions to help attendees better make use of the company's popular development tools. Along the way, the event's speakers will help developers focus their Unity-based projects and better position their games in front of their target audiences. - At Microsoft's dedicated event, the company will present numerous sessions on the latest developments with Xbox Live, Windows 8, Windows Phone, and more. These presentations will detail new and upcoming services for these platforms, including new APIs, cloud-based storage, asynchronous gaming, and much more. - With Facebook gaming quickly becoming one of the industry's most influential markets, the company behind the social networking giant will host a series of talks detailing how to better integrate social apps with Facebook's newest services. Throughout these sessions, attendees will learn the fundamentals of social game development, and will get an in-depth look at how to better leverage Facebook's new Timeline and Open Graph features. - PrimeSense, the company behind the 3D depth sensing technology in Microsoft's Kinect, will host numerous talks detailing the current state of motion-based gaming. Featuring speakers from Halfbrick, Voxler, Sidekick, and PrimseSense itself, this event will help developers learn about new motion-sensing technology, the design principles for motion-based games, and the business tactics involved in bringing these titles to market. - Finally, wireless device and mobile development company Qualcomm will put together talks covering new innovations in mobile tech and app development (with full session details coming soon). Throughout this event, attendees will pick up on new strategies for creating games in Unity, tactics for leveraging the latest mobile hardware, and much more. These sponsored Developer Days make up just a small fraction of the myriad sessions to be held at this year's GDC. For more information on any of the talks announced so far, please check out the show's official Schedule Builder. Also be sure to keep an eye on the official GDC news blog, which will showcase exciting new announcements for the show, in addition to this continuing series of posts pointing a spotlight at the show's most exciting, informative, and usual content. To keep up-to-date on all the latest news about GDC 2012, please subscribe to updates from the GDC news page via Twitter, Facebook, or RSS. GDC 2012 will take place March 5 through March 9 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco, and is owned and operated by Gamasutra parent company UBM TechWeb.