April’s monthly meet-up has come and gone, and it proved to be one of our most successful events to date. A large portion of the thanks goes to our fantastic speakers.

First up, we heard from Simon Joslin of The Voxel Agents, creators of Train Conductor. In what was an extremely informative and interesting thirty minute presentation. Voxel walked us through the debut year of one of Melbourne’s up and coming independent studios. Many thanks to Simon, Matt and Tom (aka The Voxel Agents) for sharing their experiences with the IGDA.

Following The Voxel Agents was news from a magical event held on distant shores; the 2010 Game Developers’ Conference (GDC), occurring annually in San Francisco.

Jenn Sandercock gave us insight into the mayhem, mischief and magic of volunteering for GDC as she recounted her unique perspective of the bohemoth conference.

Mark Flanagan brought back some knowledge from the various presentations he made it to at the conference. His talk touched on some peculiar and brilliant ideologies shared by Naughty Dog, the team behind Uncharted 2. Mark has copies of the GDC presentations he covered for anyone who may be interested.

Then last up to give us their GDC perspective was Alexander Bruce, creator of award winning PC title, Hazard. Bruce spoke of his successes and experiences travelling to GDC as an indie and (along with some interesting stories) had some great tips for travelling indie developers. Most memorable were some exceptionally good examples on the importance of capitalising on your successes.

Then, of course, the ever-impassioned Stephan Schutze was up to tell us all about his new endeavour – an online free-to-download sound library. Definitely something all developers should be checking out. You can find out more at www.stephanschutze.com

Until our next meeting (4th of May), keep up the great work guys.

Thanks to all our speakers and those who came along on the night and made it the fantastic event it was.

It’s a double header for the April meet up, covering near and far.

First up is The Voxel Agents, creators of Train Conductor, reviewing their first year as local indie developers.

Then we will be hearing from those who went to GDC to get the goss

If you have any questions feel free to email info@igdamelbourne.org

And then there’s the customary facebook event

Tuesday 13 April, 7pm

The Embassy
1 Queensbridge St, Southbank

Thanks for everyone who came along to Open Mic Night to help make it such a great success, especially to the presenters!

There have been some requests for speaker details.  We are in the process of gaining approval to publish them, and will continue to update any missing once once we get the all clear….

Trent Kusters - Torus Games - trent@igdamelbourne.org

Alexander Bruce - Hazard - alex@igdamelbourne.org

Craig Peebles - Cosmos Concerto, Moving Target Games – info@movingtargetgames.com, www.movingtargetgames.com Twitter: @movingtargetgam

Chris Watts - Mole, Roo Games – designerwatts@gmail.com Twitter: @DesignerWatts

Neil Rennison - Gamebook Adventures, Tin Man Games – neilrennison@tinmangames.com.au www.tinmangames.com.au Twitter: @TinManGames

Andrew Golding - Jolly Rover, Brawsome - andrew@brawsome.com.au
Jolly Rover website: http://www.brawsome.com.au/JollyRover
http://www.brawsome.com.au
Twitter: @brawsome
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Jolly-Rover/302892718921

Matt Clark - Train Conductor, The Voxel Agents – mattclark@thevoxelagents.com, www.thevoxelagents.com, Twitter: @TheVoxelAgents Facebook: www.facebook.com/TheVoxelAgents

John Sietsma - Layar AR Games – john.sietsma@gmail.com

Paul Seidel – Voice over artist, Big Mouth Media – info@bigmouthmedia.com mob: 0410 699 916

Adrian Lyons - TBC

Andrew Drage - brewin@hotmail.com mob: 0425 726 136 www.infinitespiral.com.au

Alex Fraser - Cargo – alex@phatcore.com – you can download a demo of Cargo from http://phatcore.com/alex/?p=177

David Thompson - Tiberian Sun Rising - dthompson@cnc-source.com mob: 0438 043 261 http://www.moddb.com/mods/tiberian-sun-rising

Ian Stewart - http://www.premier.vic.gov.au/app-my-state.html

Brad Giblin - FilmVic – brad.giblin@film.vic.gov.au, http://www.film.vic.gov.au

And finally, the committee is always happy to receive feedback and suggestions, so feel free to email feedback@igdamelbourne.org with any thoughts or suggestions.

The Open Mic Night at the Embassy Club, 1 Queensbridge St, Southbank has finalised the speaker list, and it looks to be a cracker.

The evening starts at 7pm and the microphone will be switched on at 8pm. Each presenter has five minutes and the line up is:

Trent Kusters – Trent and Torus
Alexander Bruce – Hazard
Craig Peebles – Cosmos Concerto
Chris Watts – Roo Games and their next project
Neil Rennison – Tin Man Games and Gamebook Adventures
Andrew Goulding – Jolly Rover
Matt Clark – The Voxel Agents
John Sietsma – Making a game for the Layar AR Browser
Paul Seidel – Voice over artists for games
Adrian Lyons – Ray Trance: A real time ray tracer project
Andrew Drage – Operation Time Bomb
Ian Stewart – App My State

Due to the number of speakers we will save questions until after the presentations.

If anyone can assist with arranging recording the night for podcasting that would be great – please email info@igdamelbourne.org if you can help out