#gcap14

[alexandermuscat]

Off to GCAP 2014

Melbourne might in it's own little continental corner of the world's games industry, art and culture scenes, but it sure knows how to make it's own waves.  It's tight-knight headstrong industry, indie, creative arts and criticism scenes all tend to get a visible amount of crossover; noteably in events like Freeplay, Parallels, (wonderfully run and managed) IGDA chapter events and Games Connect Asia Pacific; the local industry conference here.

I'm still baffled that I hadn't ever attended a GCAP conference before, especially when money wasn't so tight in the past, unlike now, post GDCE. However I was fortunate enough this year to receive a GCAP Assist award-thing, providing me and some lucky others with a ticket to GCAP 2014. A special thanks to the GDAA and Epic Games for sponsoring us!

You can bet that anything story or design related I'm eyeing intensely, and the speaker line up seems ace. Better yet, being able to meet a bunch of local game devs in person and put some faces to those Twitter handles.

[paperboxstudios]

Melbourne Digital Games Week

PAX was the main part of the second half of the week, PAX is quite different from GCAP, the event is much more focused on promotion and the larger publishers like Ubisoft and Riot Games put on a huge spectacle. It's good to see the Australian gaming community growing both in terms of the player base and the number of growing local developers.

An after party was held on Sunday night. This was a great way to finish the week, it was a chill event with catering and drinks. It gave the developers a chance to just relax after an intense week of conferences and conventions. As the night was coming to an end and we were about to leave, there was a sense of sadness, but at the same time everyone was excited to get back home and get started on that new game idea or make those final changes to their almost finished game. 

These are exciting times for the games industry so much talent floating around and so much potential. Well, I guess it's time to get back to work.