Brenda Romero, Ubisoft's Patrick Redding join GDC 2014 speaker lineup

With discounted early registration for Game Developers Conference 2014 in full swing, we're announcing new sessions for the Main Conference that you'll want to check out. GDC 2014 will have UC Santa Cruz's Brenda Romero talking about re-inspiring designers for greatness, Ubisoft's Patrick Redding on enabling setbacks in stealth games, and Operations Catalyst Consulting's Lucien Parsons on gender-based pricing and in-app payment psychology. Now in its 28th year, GDC is the world's largest and longest-running professionals-only game industry event, and will once again take place at the Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco, California during March 17-21, 2014. Brenda Romero of UC Santa Cruz hopes to reignite the passion for greatness that brought developers to their profession in "Jiro Dreams of Game Design." Inspired by the movie "Jiro Dreams of Sushi", Romero will share how to achieve such goals, especially when shipping games often means compromising on an ideal vision. Patrick Redding, Ubisoft's game director for Splinter Cell: Blacklist will argue that players should suffer occasional setbacks, in his talk, "Make Things Worse: Enabling Setbacks for Consequential Play." Here, he will mainly look at setbacks in stealth games, showing how at best they can enable tense cat-and-mouse with AI, and at worst they can degenerate into brittle guesswork with little room for experimentation or error. Lastly, those looking for a roadmap for successful retail marketing and IAP implementation will want to attend consultant Lucien Parsons' session, "Why'd She Buy THAT? Customer Psychology in Game Purchases." Drawing from pricing and marketing strategies in and out of the game industry, Parsons will examine the psychology behind the buying habits of men and women to provide concrete tactics and techniques for use in games. GDC earlier revealed the first Production and Design track talks, which will feature developers on Splinter Cell: Blacklist, Skylanders Swap Force, and Dragon Age. Also of note, the 2014 Independent Games Festival, whose awards are given during GDC 2014, hit a record-breaking 1,000-plus entries for the Student and Main Competitions. All entries are available online to browse, with finalists to be announced in January. GDC 2014 itself will take place March 17-21, 2014 at the Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco, California. You can register for the event by visiting the info page on the official GDC 2014 website. Early Bird pricing, with discounts up to 30 percent, will remain in effect until January 31st, and some passes including the Indie Games Summit pass have limited amounts, so interested parties should register now. For more information on GDC 2014, visit the show's official website, or subscribe to regular updates via Facebook, Twitter, or RSS. Gamasutra and GDC are sibling organizations under parent UBM Tech