GDC was all about the people

Cristi (Sand Sailor Studio) at GDC 2016

Is more than a week now since Game Developers Conference ended, but Sand Sailor Studio still feels the crazy enthusiasm and vibes.

Even though GDC wasn’t the first developer conference I attended, I couldn’t help being amazed by its magnitude and diversity. I mean, casually stumbling upon game developers on the street is not something you’re used to, especially if you come from a country where the game development community and related activities have recently emerged. (Thumbs up for RGDA who’s more and more active).

But back to GDC: this is all about networking! If you don’t mingle, shake hands, exchange business cards, get your game played, listen to others’ ideas and constantly pitch your projects, then you only get half of what GDC has to offer. The learning sessions are brilliant, of course. As an indie developer you need to top your own experience with other people’s trial & error stories. In the end it all narrows down to this: the people are the key, trust me on this one.

So my GDC week  went by pretty much like this:
   •    Wake up, call the team home, see what's up with the current build in development
  •    Go to GDC, meet the good people as planned (talk about Black The Fall)
  •    Top that with some unplanned cool encounters (talk about upcoming secret project for VR, pam-pam!)
  •    Check out the epic parties and have even more lucky encounters
  •    Have people play Black The Fall and candidly take mental notes
  •    Steal some time from all the above to check out San Fran – it’s awesome!

That’s pretty much it. Then pack everything, fly home, go directly to the studio, gather everyone around and share the vibes: the talks, the feeling, the game impressions and the trends.
Then get back to work. Ah, I’ve missed this…

Yours,
Cristian