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Nihilistic Software
www.nihilistic.com
User Name.........Innerloop
Full Name.........Robert Huebner
Description.......Lead Programmer
2/27/2000
I noticed some other web page posted a list of GDC conference sessions they
were looking forward to or recommending to people, and that seemed like a
pretty cool idea. The hardest part of the conf. each year is picking the
right session to go to at a given time, it always seems like after a session
you talk to people and they saw something awesome that you just missed. So
I figured I'd take a shot at what I want to try to check out this year. I'm
personally mostly into Programming and Design, so that's what I'm going to
cover..
Programming:
First off, this year I'm giving my talk about the NOD engine's modeling system
in the much-sought-after (ahem) 9am slot on the first day. But despite that,
I'd definitely recommend Ming Lin's talk "Fast Proximity Queries for Large
Game Environments". It says intermediate but it sounds rather advanced, and
collision detection of complex and curved objects is a big big issue going
forward, and something a lot of games could do better.
Real-Time Cloth by Dean Marci sounds cool.. I really want to learn more about
physical modeling of stuff like cloth for games. I don't know the speaker,
but he's with Intel Architecture labs which has a good track record for well-
organized topics and speakers, so I'm hoping for a thorough discussion of a
cool topic for both PC and nextgen console games.
Interaction with Groups of Autonomous Characters by Craig Reynolds should be
cool, his talk last year was great and on a similar topic. Craig is one of
the top "mad scientists" over at Sony's graphics R&D lab, and he has a good
track record of speaking at Siggraph as well as GDC. Hell, he even won an
Academy Award for his graphics research work. I only know one other guy in
the game industry who can say that.
"Fast Code, Game Programming, and Other Thoughts From 20 (Minus 2) Years in
the Trenches" by Michael Abrash. Ok, your guess is as good as mine as to what
this will ACTUALLY be about, but hey, its Michael Abrash, one of the most
consistently interesting and entertaining speakers at the show.
The Tribes Engine Network Architecture by Mark Frohnmayer and Tim Gift should
be interesting.. Anyone who's played Tribes knows that its got great network
code that really hides lag well and scales well to many clients, so I'm
interested to find out a trick or two from these guys.
The Benefits of a Microprogramable Graphics Architecture by Dominic Malinson.
Ok, disguised by this fairly try title is a pretty important talk, the
architecture in question here is the PSX2 and the speaker is the head of
Sony's American graphics R&D.
Tricks of the Programming Trade by Jon Bentley. I've never met this guy or
heard him speak, but I've got a good feeling about this. This guy's books are
some of the best, and its one of the few sessions that just focuses on good
old fashioned programming. No specific technique or algorithm, but just the
core 'art' of programming itself.
New Pioneers at the Graphics Frontier by Kurt Akeley. Ok, so I'll admit I'm
judging more by the speaker than the topic here, since the topic is typical
keynote-type fare, probably not a lot of hard-core usable code will be pre-
sented, but hey, this guy is the CTO and co-founder of SGI. His resume is
longer than Nihilistic's Coke bill, including co-designing OpenGL and 11 parents.
Design:
Character Case Studies
Tim Schaffer is giving a talk entitled, "Character Case Studies" which doesn't
tell you a while lot, but if you know Tim, you know its a safe bet. Tim is the
designer from Grim Fandango, Full Throttle, and Day of the Tentacle, and Tim
also happens to be a hilarious guy.
Everquest Post Mortem by apparently the entire EQ team :) Love it or hate it
(and I tend to switch off between those two extremes) Everquest is a great
example of the right design at the right time, and I love hearing these sort
of case-studies presented at the conference.
Metagames by Richard Garfield. Again, gotta go with the speaker here, Richard
designed Magic the Gathering, the non-computer version of Crack cocaine (EQ
being the computer version, naturally).
Using the Evolution of Black & White As an Example of Next Generation Develop-
ment Ethos by Peter Molyneux. Peter is right up there with Tim and Sid in my
person game design pantheon, and Black & White looks groundbreaking, so what
else do you need?
The Role of Reality in Epic Game Creation by Yu Suzuki. Its always cool to
get an idea of how the Japanese design their games. Its such a different
process and aesthetic, we can all learn a lot from these guys.
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