Aliens in the Desert

Here I am to report back on how I did for my GDC resolutions!  Only a few weeks late! 
I didn’t do too badly on the GDC front. I had a great and thought-provoking conference, and in fact am still sorting through the thoughts it provoked. Here’s a break-down on how well I accomplished each of my earlier stated goals:
1) Post a little each day.

Yeah well, we all knew that was doomed from the beginning. I think the people who actually blog during GDC either are obsessive compulsive laptop toters or else professional journalists. Since I am neither (my laptop weighs 7.5 pounds and I’m not luggin that thing all over the damn place!) I didn’t really have much of an opportunity to write anything while the conference was going on. I mean, I could’ve tried to do it on my DS with my Opera browser, but I still can’t figure out how to go back from a text field to the page the field appears on so I can click buttons like “save” or “submit”. Sooner or later I’ve got to sort this out. As it was, my post-GDC evenings consisted of limping back home, feeding my baby and crawling pathetically into bed. Hopefully I’ll remember this next year and not set such a ridiculous goal.

2) Post pictures before GDC next year (I still have some awesome ones from last year I haven’t shown you).

Hey, its not next year yet, is it? Anyway, I’ll have to see how many are worth posting. The only thing that stands out in my mind is that I took some pictures of the Wii Balance Board. Which I need immediately, incidentally.

3) Avoid tripping over incredibly stylish interior design elements at 3 Rings’ offices, falling on my face and spilling my drink everywhere.

This I managed to do. Or, I mean, not do. I did make it to the hush hush 3 Rings’ party, did have a drink, did eat lots of their yummy brie, did chit chat with some rad folks (including the devs of PMOG). I also did wish that the interior of my offices was nearly as stylish as this place. But I did NOT trip over the “sucker flanges”, which is what I am now calling those little spiffy looking spurs at the bottom of the columns in the main room which make you feel like you’re in a submarine designed by Lemony Snicket and which can cause just as much anguish as one of his books.

4) Stand in any given line for no longer than 10 minutes.

Take that lines! Not only did I make it to the Experimental Game Design Workshop in time to get a seat without standing in line, but I also simply didn’t go to any talks that required ridiculous linage. Which is a good thing, since I was about to fall over any second come day three.
5) If I get stuck in some stupid “overflow” room without audio for the Game Developer’s Choice Awards, leave.

This happened at the first SF GDC, and it so sucked. But this time, because of my parental duties, I actually didn’t even make the awards. Its the first year since I started going to GDC that this was the case. Thursday was my designated stay out late night. I had assumed that the awards would be Thursday night, as I think they always are. But they weren’t and my schedule got screwed up as a result. I am sad I missed the awards, but I had a good time at the Women In Games International mixer, and then I went home to my family. So it all worked out.
6) Avoid spending money on food by going to every party I can and filling up on miniature quiches and crackers with goat cheese.

The WIGI mixer had some lovely food; tasty little burgers, little potatoes with some stuff inside along with some other nummies which I can’t remember. Delicious. Best of all, it just kept coming and coming! Everytime I thought we had polished off the last of the goodies, some guy with a bowtie would bring out more trays of it.

Unfortunately, the bounty ended there. I simply did not wind up in enough locations with free food at the right times. Someone was always dragging me off to breakfast, lunch or dinner where I had to pay myself. Lame. My pal Jose got me into the Speaker’s party, and I did have some snacks there, but we had just come from dinner and there was a monstrous crowd around the food table. We then went to Three Rings’ party where I did enjoy some tasty cheese and bread as well as some other noshes, but I still just wasn’t that hungry. Note to self: Parties instead of dinner plans!
7) NO Red Bull!

The worst I did on the caffeine level was an iced mocha and a frappaccino on the same day. But I had barely slept the night before, so I needed it just to get through. I did avoid the Red Bull system shock though.
Only take home free schwag that I actually want.

I killed on the schwag this year. Seriously. I brought home one piece of maybe junk — it is a little squigey-like thing for cleaning dust off your monitor. And I did get plied with a Disney Online shirt I wasn’t too into — until I got it home and realized that it’s a girl-style shirt and fits me great and is really soft and a cool color. But I also got the best schwag I have ever gotten at GDC. Two free games, one is an Indie game that I’ll have to play and review here since the guy gave it to me for free. The other one is called Lost Odyssey and is an RPG for the 360 which I was dubious about at first but which has really caught my attention. I also got a 2GB key-chain drive with a 30 day trial of Eve Online on it (maybe that counts as three games?). And speaking of key-chains, I got one of those adorable Wiimote flashlight key-chains that I so coveted last year. I also took away a few nice pens. I’ll always take pens, especially if they seem half-way decent. So I would call this year total success on the schwag front.
9) Play more than 2 games at the IGF booth.

Failure.  Maybe some day I’ll learn to actually go to the IGF area and play games on the first day of the conference when I am fresh and excited, and not the last day when I am worn out and just want to crawl in a hole and sleep for a year.  The only one I put hands on was The Path, and then I got stuck early in the game and felt rather silly getting angry at my gothy girl for not ceasing her patty-caking with this girl she found on the side of the road.  I couldn’t get her to leave her new friend.  I’m still not sure if this was a bug or part of the game, but I was very self-conscious of my desperately pressing every single button while onlookers looked on.  It seems like the kind of game I’d want to play in the privacy of my own home, anyway (tho looking at the site just now it seems I can’t yet).  It’s lush engrossing quality seemed terribly diminished by the noisy clamor of the expo show floor.

10) Meet lots of great people, have lots of fun conversations, go to some great talks, and walk away completely inspired and exhausted. (Gotta have at least one I know I can accomplish in order boost my confidence for attaining the rest).

Yeah, this was a gimme.  We all knew it. I had an extremely fun time indulging in my game-industry geekery.  Although I miss the days when the conference was in San Jose, it being in SF this time did make it pretty easy for me to go out there then come home to the baby at night.  I’ll probably never be able to be my party-hopping hard-drinking game-smack-talking self again.  But maybe that’s for the best.