GDC Austin's iPhone Games Summit Reveals First Speakers

Author: by Staff

Organizers of this September's iPhone Games Summit at GDC Austin have announced first speakers, with the developers of titles like Enigmo and Flower Garden join Looking Glass alum Randy Smith to discuss the business and tech behind working on Apple's device. Initial information about the September 15th-16th Summit, a separate part of the wider, 'connected game'-focused Austin-based event, is available on the GDC Austin website. The two-day iPhone Summit is divided in half, with one day dealing with the business and marketing realities behind making games for Apple's phone, and the other going in-depth on technical hurdles and tips for iPhone developers. Other Summits taking place at GDC Austin this year -- also available to access for those with an Austin GDC Summits Pass or All-Access Pass -- include a brand-new Independent Games Summit and the notable, long-running Writing and Audio Summits. Details on the iPhone Games Summit at GDC Austin (created by Think Services, as is Gamasutra) include specifics on the first lectures and panels for the first-ever Austin edition of the popular main GDC event, and the highlights include: - In 'Pangea’s Road To Success: Launching & Marketing an iPhone App', the local Austin company's founder Brian Greenstone (Enigmo, Bugdom 2) explains why "the hardest part about being an iPhone app developer is figuring out how to get your app seen by the consumer", suggesting concrete solutions from a successful practitioner. - Snappy Touch (Flower Garden for iPhone) founder and Game Developer magazine programming columnist Noel Llopis will present 'Squeezing Every Drop Of Performance Out Of The iPhone', which will "describe the iPhone performance optimization lessons learned through many hours of tuning", with lots of practical tips and tricks. - In 'From AAA to iPhone: Tiger Style and the making of Spider', Looking Glass and EA LA veteran Randy Smith is joining colleague David Kalina to discuss their move from high-budget console to iPhone games, promising a look at the business and design behind making an iPhone game, and "how it all impacted the quality of the product and the sales numbers." - Presenting a more technical lecture, Elecorn's Michael Smith will speak on 'iPort: How To Bring Any C++ Game To The iPhone', which presents techniques used to faithfully port a 3rd person shooter to iPhone, and discusses "general platform porting methods and principles", as well as game play and user interface design differences to consider. - Finally, in 'Bringing Game Brands to the iPhone: A Business Approach', PlayFirst's Chris Williams (Diner Dash, asks an interesting question: "What do you do when Diner Dash proves to be a Top 100 Paid Application for over 9 months? You make 49 more ports… Or maybe you don’t." Approaches and lessons learned will be covered, with quandaries such as balancing the promise of an increase in sales with the cost of adding iPhone-specific features to existing games. With more lectures to be announced in the near future, further information on 2009's iPhone Games Summit at Austin GDC, including registration details and other specifics, is available at the official Summit @ Austin GDCs website.