Harvey Smith to keynote Austin GDC
Deus Ex designer Harvey Smith has been confirmed as the keynote speaker of Austin GDC this year.
His talk's entitled, “Luckiest People Alive,” apparently, and is unlikely to focus on plane crash survivors, and such.
The event's taking place at the Austin Convention Center from September 15-17. Press release after the link.
GAME CAREER SEMINAR RETURNS TO AUSTIN GDC 2009 WITH GAME DESIGNER HARVEY SMITH AS KEYNOTE SPEAKER
Deus Ex Lead Game Designer Heads Lineup of Professional Game-Makers at Career Conference
SAN FRANCISCO — Aug. 13, 2008 — Think Services’ Game Career Seminar will return to the Austin Game Developers Conference (Austin GDC) 2009 on September 17th, taking place at the Austin Convention Center. This year the esteemed game director Harvey Smith of Arkane Studios will provide the keynote address, entitled, “Luckiest People Alive.” Smith’s previous works have included the critically-acclaimed Deus Ex for Ion Storm, where he served as the lead designer of the 2000 BAFTA award-winning game. In his talk, Smith will discuss what he sees as an imminent explosion of change, creativity, and possibility within the world of interactive entertainment. The Game Career Seminar presents an opportunity for students, graduates and aspiring game developers to meet and network with human resources personnel from various game developers and learn how to enter the thriving game development world.
Smith was recognized as the winner of the Game Design Challenge at GDC 2006 with his “Peace Bomb” game concept aimed at winning the Nobel Peace Prize. Working on game development professionally since 1993, Smith has served as studio creative director at Midway Games’ Austin office, as lead designer of Fireteam at Multitude, and Origin Systems.
The line-up of speakers at the Game Career Seminar also includes:
• Eduardo Baraf, Director of Product Management at Tabula Digita, Inc.
• Brenda Brathwaite, Game Designer and Instructor at Savannah College of Art and Design
• Jennifer Bullard, Senior Producer, AspyrMedia
• Jill Duffy, Editor of GameCareerGuide.com
• Paula Fellbaum, Vice President of Human Resources, Nexon Publishing NA
• Darius Kazemi, President of Orbus Gameworks
• James Portnow, Game Designer and CCO of Divide by Zero Games
• Ed Roman, CEO, Ghostfire Games
• Brandon Sheffield, Editor-in-Chief of Game Developer Magazine
• Brandon Van Slyke, Game Designer at Vicarious Visions
To register for the Austin Game Career Seminar or for more information, please visit http://www.gamecareerseminar.com.