The Game Developers Conference announces record-breaking attendance for their 2011 show, saying over 19,000 industry professionals gathered in San Francisco for the 25th annual GDC. They also announce the dates for next year's convention, which will be held from March 5-9, 2012. Here's a bit on this year's show:

Some of the highlights of this 25th iteration of GDC included an all-star line-up of 'classic postmortems' – discussing the making of some of the most seminal video games of all time. Eric Chahi's talk on Out Of This World/Another World received a standing ovation for its inspirational story. Other postmortems included Mark Cerny on Marble Madness, John Romero and Tom Hall's on DOOM, and Will Wright on Raid On Bungeling Bay – with enjoyable bonus 'Russian Space Minute' diversions.

Other major talking points at the show were a keynote from Satoru Iwata, President of Nintendo, entitled "Video Games Turn 25: A Historical Perspective and Vision for the Future,” as well as a social game-centric Rant and the Game Design Challenge – won by Jason Rohrer with an innovative Minecraft mod. Standout talks from StarCraft II's Dustin Browder, LucasArts' Clint Hocking, and GDC veterans Chris Crawford and Brian Moriarty were also among the most buzzed-about lectures at the show this year.