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CO1301 - Games Concepts Week 24 Employment & Industry

CO1301 - Games Concepts Week 24 Employment & Industry. Gareth Bellaby. References. Rabin, Introduction to Game Development , Chapter 1.1. Lecture Structure. Games The games industry Culture. Populous. Populous , Bullfrog, 1989 Populous II , Bullfrog, 1991

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CO1301 - Games Concepts Week 24 Employment & Industry

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  1. CO1301 - Games ConceptsWeek 24Employment & Industry • Gareth Bellaby

  2. References • Rabin, Introduction to Game Development, Chapter 1.1

  3. Lecture Structure • Games • The games industry • Culture

  4. Populous • Populous, Bullfrog, 1989 • Populous II, Bullfrog, 1991 • Populous: The Beginning, Bullfrog, 1998 • Peter Molyneux • God game • Isometric projection. • Progressive levels.

  5. Black & White • Black & White, Lionhead, 2001 • Black & White 2, Lionhead, • Peter Molyneux. • The game incorporates machine learning. One of the few games to include machine learning. • Uses learning trees. We'll look at this technique in later years.

  6. Doom 3 • id Software, 2005 • More a thematic remake of the original Doom than a sequel. • Good use of tension and lighting. • Parallax mapping. • Shadows.

  7. Games you ought to play • Play a representative of every one of the main commercial genres: FPS, RTS, RPG, Platformer, TBS, etc. • I'll do a lecture on the history of games and this will touch upon some important games. • There are other games which are widely recognised within the industry and which an employer would expect you to be aware of. • No need to play a game in full. Download the demo, 15-30 minutes play to at least have a basic knowledge of the gameplay.

  8. Games you ought to play • Civilization. • Starcraft. (A SF-themed sequel to Warcraft). Regarded as one of the best RTS's. In particular viewed as being the best balanced RTS. • GTA: San Andreas. • The Sims. • Final Fantasy VII • Silent Hill (any of I, 2 and 3).

  9. Games you ought to know • Fallout • Zelda (Ocarina of Time or Twilight Princess) • Deus Ex (the original not the sequel) • Halo • Mario • Sonic • Tomb Raider

  10. The games industry

  11. People you ought to know • Ian Livingstone (Eidos) • Peter Molyneux (Fable, Black & White) • John Carmack (lead programmer on Doom, Quake, id Software, authored several important graphics papers) • Sid Meier, (Firaxis, Civilization) • Shigeru Miyamoto (Mario, Donkey Kong, Legend of Zelda) • Chris Crawford (founder of the Game Developer's Conference)

  12. People you ought to know • Brian Reynolds (Alpha Centauri, Rise of Nations) • Richard Garriott (Ultima series, Tabula Rasa) • Hironobu Sakaguchi (Final Fantasy) • Warren Spector (System Shock, Deus Ex) • Roberta Williams (King's Quest) • Will Wright (SimCity, The Sims, Spore) • John Romero (Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, Quake, Daikatana) • David Braben (created "Elite" with Ian Bell, now head of Frontier)

  13. Manufacturers • Nintendo • Sony • Microsoft

  14. Nintendo • Nintendo, Japanese, 1889 • NES, SNES, Nintendo 64, Gamecube, Game Boy (portable) • Current: Wii, Game Boy Advance • Game Boy Advance still strong especially in the East • Publishers • Need to adhere to their requirements

  15. Sony • Sony, Japanese, 1946 (name in 1958) • PlayStation, PlayStation 2 • Current: PlayStation 3, PSP (PlayStation Portable) • PS2 games still being published • PS1 is still supported • Sony Computer Entertainment Europe (SCEE) (technical help, profiling, testing) • Need to submit games • Need to adhere to their requirements, e.g. max loading times • Publishers • Developers

  16. Microsoft • Microsoft, American, 1975 • XBox • Current: XBox 360 • Software developers, Windows, Office, etc for the PC • DirectX (used for PC and XBox). Work closely with video card manufacturers. • Developers (Microsoft studios) • Some hardware (XBox, some peripherals such as mice, NOT computers or components such as video cards) • Need to adhere to their requirements for the XBox • No control over the PC releases. • XBox Live Arcade becoming increasingly more important.

  17. Publishers • Eidos Interactive • EA • Paradox • Capcom • Koei • Vivendi • Take-Two Interactive • Ubisoft

  18. UK employment • If you obtain employment within the games industry it is almost certain that it will be in the UK. • Employment in the non-English speaking world requires knowledge of the language and, possibly, a visa. • US requires a visa and this is difficult to obtain especially for a graduate job. • Therefore you need to know about UK games and the UK industry.

  19. UK Developers • Over 200 UK Developers. This doesn't include developers of games for mobile phones, Interactive TV or Flash games. • Some important names and product you need to be know. • Companies change names frequently, e.g. Climax Racing now Black Rock Studio, acquired by Disney Interactive Studios (MotoGP) • Almost all of the large internatational studios have UK offices as well. • Microsoft and Sony a significant UK presence. Nintendo to a lesser degree but still important.

  20. UK Developers • Blade Interactive (World Snooker Championship, Hydrophobia) • Traveller's Tales (Lego Star Wars) • Bizarre Creations (The Club, Project Gotham Racing) • Kuju (6 studios in UK, Battalion Wars, Buzz, SingStar (latter now Zoe Mode)) • Evolution Studios (Motor Storm) • Rare (Perfect Dark Zero, Viva Pinata) • Team 17 (Worms) • Blitz Games (Spongebob, Bratz the Movie)

  21. UK Developers • Creative Assembly (Total War series) • Lionhead Studios (Fable, Black & White) • Codemasters (Turning Point, Clive Barker's Jericho) • Rockstar (Rockstar Leeds, Rockstar North in Glasgow) • Climax Studios (Silent Hill Origins) • Eutechnyx (Big Mutha Truckers) • Relentless Software (Buzz! The Game) • Real Time Worlds (Crackdown)

  22. UK Developers • Activision (Call of Duty 4, studios all over the world) • GameLoft (mobile games) • Midway (Stranglehold, offices in Newcastle, London as well as US) • Rebellion (Gun: Showdown) • Stormfront (The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers) • Studio Liverpool (part of SCEE, Wipeout Pure) • Revolution Software (Broken Sword) • Frontier (Thrillville)

  23. World Developers • The UK developers are the companies you need to set you sights on. However, you should know about the main non-UK companies as well. • Konami (have a branch in the UK, PES2008, in Japan Resident Evil) • Firaxis (Civilization) • Blizzard (World of Warcraft) • id Software (Doom) • Valve (Half Life) • Insomniac (Ratchet and Clank)

  24. World Developers • Koei (Dynasty Warriors) • Lucasarts (Star Wars) • Namco Bandai (Warhammer: Mark of Chaos) • Naughty Dog (Drake's Fortune, Crash Bandicoot) • Maxis (Spore) • Ubisoft (primarily publishers, also developers, have a UK branch) • Square Enix (Final Fantasy) • Epic Games (Unreal) • Tecmo (Project Zero)

  25. Graphics Cards Manufacturers • NVidia • ATI • Companies work closely with games developers. • Work closely with the developers of DirectX and OpenGL. • Both companies employ graphics programmers. • White papers.

  26. Industry news • Gamasutra • Game Industry biz: • http://www.gamesindustry.biz • MVC • Develop magazine • The Edge

  27. Industry conferences • Special Interest Group on GRAPHics and Interactive Techniques (SIGGRAPH). Presentations printed in the ACM Transactions on Graphics. • Game Developers Conference (GDC) • Develop conference. UK conference in Brighton.

  28. Industry organisations • International Game Developers Association (IGDA) • The Independent Games Developers Association (TIGA) • Entertainment and Leisure Software Publishers Association (ELSPA)

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