GDC China Reveals Online Game Sessions From BioWare Austin, Carbine, Bigpoint

Author: by Staff

With less than a week left before GDC China, show organizers have revealed three new sessions in the Online Games track, featuring speakers from BioWare Austin on merging casual and hardcore, WildStar developer Carbine on MMO production, and Bigpoint on its 3D web game Drakensang Online (pictured). Taking place November 12-14 at the Shanghai Exhibition Center in Shanghai, the event will once again serve as the premier game industry event in China, bringing together influential developers from around the world to share ideas, network, and inspire each other to further the game industry in the region. This year, the show's Main Conference will feature three primary tracks, covering Online Game Development & Business, Global Game Development, and Social Games, and two Summits on Indie Games and Mobile Games, respectively. Here are the latest talks to be revealed for the show: - BioWare Austin's Damion Schubert will host "Double-Coding: Making Online Games for Both the Casual and the Hardcore," which will examine how developers can straddle the line between two very different player demographics. Schubert will discuss the values held by both types of users, and will go over some strategies to convert casual players into online devotees. - The second new talk in the Online Games track is "Massively Multiplayer Game Production: From Tiny Teams to Giant Projects," featuring Turbine founder Jeremy Gaffney, now of WildStar developer Carbine Studios. Drawing from his extensive experience producing large-scale MMOs, Gaffney will detail the essential qualities of a good producer, and will offer numerous production tips related to online game development. - Rounding out this week's new sessions is Bigpoint chief games officer Philip Reisberger in "Trends and Challenges Facing the Next-gen 3D Web Games Like Drakensang Online." Reisberger will pick apart the studio's browser-based action RPG to offer insight on how to craft a robust 3D game on the web. For more details on these or other sessions at GDC China, please check out the show's official website. Just last week, show organizers unveiled three additional sessions, including a cloud-gaming focused talk from Microsoft, an Ubisoft postmortem on the Smurfs & Co Facebook game, and a breakdown of RPG math from Wizard101 developer KingsIsle Entertainment. To register for GDC China, interested parties can go to the event's official website to start the registration process and gain access to the numerous talks, tutorials, and events the show will have to offer. For more information on GDC China, please visit the official GDC China website, or subscribe to updates from the new GDC Online-specific news page via Twitter, Facebook, or RSS. GDC China is owned and operated by UBM TechWeb, as is this website.