GDC Europe adds Assassin's Creed III, Daglow, Epic level design talks

GDC Europe 2013 organizers have announced new talks for its August event, with Steven Masters on Assassin's Creed III's design, luminary Don Daglow on the 'treasures and traps' of next-gen, and Epic's James Brown on empowering the player in storytelling. These talks are part of the design and business tracks in GDC Europe 2013, which will take place Monday through Wednesday, August 19th-21st at the Cologne Congress-Centrum Ost in Cologne, Germany - just ahead of (and co-located with) the massive 275,000 person Gamescom event. For the Design Track Keynote, Ubisoft Montreal's Steven Masters will discuss how he organized the work of 600 people across 3 years in 'Designing Assassins Creed 3.' Ubisoft's GDC 2013 production panel, 'Three Years of Collaboration on Assassin's Creed III' focused on handling the large-scale collaboration for the massive hit franchise. However, Masters' talk at GDC Europe 2013 will detail how Ubisoft reinvigorated the core gameplay, including the use of frequent playtesting to refine the multi-million selling title. Industry veteran Don Daglow, whose 40+ years in the game industry include the first baseball game (Baseball), the first PC RPG (Dungeon), and the first god game (Utopia), will speak about the challenges and opportunities ahead in 'This Time It's Different: Treasures and Traps in the Next Gen.' What if download-only games were the norm on next-gen game consoles? What would your favorite game feel like that was different from what we're used to getting from the US/Canada, Japan and the UK? What would F2P feel like on console? What if the online interaction were the most important feature for the player? These are some of the questions that Daglow proposes to explore. Lastly, Epic Games' lead level designer James Brown, whose work includes the hit Gears of War franchise, will examine popular techniques for storytelling in games and attempt to explain "how almost everybody has it wrong" in 'Once Upon a Time: Giving Players the Freedom to Create Their Own Story.' Games are unique in that they can provide a framework in which stories can be told, and he aims to explore if a game's pre-crafted story and a player's organic story can co-exist, and if not, which should take precedence. More talks will be revealed throughout the months leading up to GDC Europe in August. Early bird registration for GDC Europe 2013 is now available, with discounts up to 20% off admission. Group admission discounts are also available. For all the latest news on GDC Europe, subscribe for updates via Facebook, Twitter, or RSS. Gamasutra and GDC are sibling organizations under parent UBM Tech.