April 8-9TH 2020
The Westin Harbour Castle
XP Game Developer
Summit
The XP Game Developer Summit is a conference in Toronto, Canada about sharing knowledge and supporting growth in the video game industry.
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SPEAKER LIST
The XP Game Developer Summit will host over 25 talks and panels led by mentors in the video game industry focused on game design, business & marketing, funding, game development, technical challenges and how to overcome them. Check back weekly as we announce more talk and panel information!
APRIL 8-9 2020
Room A
Presenter: Jason Della Rocca – Co-Founder at Execution Labs
We all know that promoting your game is critical to getting noticed in the deluge of titles… yet, few embrace the concept of product design as the most critical aspect of marketing. Meaning, how can you design discoverability directly into your game in order to boost commercial potential? This session will explore ways games are shareable, spreadable, contagious, competitive, watchable, variable, and otherwise socially accelerated — both as a way to make games more engaging and commercially viable. Concrete game examples will be provided to showcase these discoverability methods and approaches.
We all know that promoting your game is critical to getting noticed in the deluge of titles… yet, few embrace the concept of product design as the most critical aspect of marketing. Meaning, how can you design discoverability directly into your game in order to boost commercial potential? This session will explore ways games are shareable, spreadable, contagious, competitive, watchable, variable, and otherwise socially accelerated — both as a way to make games more engaging and commercially viable. Concrete game examples will be provided to showcase these discoverability methods and approaches.
Presenter: Kate Edwards – Executive Director of Global Game Jam
With over 30 years of experience in digital media as a geographer and culturalization strategist, and 27+ years in games, Kate Edwards has been involved in the creation of many games, including major titles such as Halo, Fable, Age of Empires, Mass Effect, Call of Duty, and many, many others. She has seen it all when it comes to geopolitical and cultural issues that are often overlooked in content creation and can negatively affect the ability of content to be accepted overseas, and she has seen designers miss opportunities to create more robust worlds that engage the players from diverse cultural backgrounds. Kate will discuss the field of content culturalization and how it can assist game creators with building better game worlds that account for a wider range of cultural and geopolitical considerations.
With over 30 years of experience in digital media as a geographer and culturalization strategist, and 27+ years in games, Kate Edwards has been involved in the creation of many games, including major titles such as Halo, Fable, Age of Empires, Mass Effect, Call of Duty, and many, many others. She has seen it all when it comes to geopolitical and cultural issues that are often overlooked in content creation and can negatively affect the ability of content to be accepted overseas, and she has seen designers miss opportunities to create more robust worlds that engage the players from diverse cultural backgrounds. Kate will discuss the field of content culturalization and how it can assist game creators with building better game worlds that account for a wider range of cultural and geopolitical considerations.
Presenter: Carl Callewaert – Global Director at Unity Technologies
How do you build architectural and gaming environments that create a presence? Carl Callewaert (Unity Technologies) beings this presentation by briefly explaining how and why we perceive 3D and virtual reality. With this knowledge as a foundation, we will then learn to use this in building architectural environments that boost the feeling of presence and immersion. Each topic will focus on examples based on the real-world and the virtual. After the presentation, you will be able to use this knowledge to create a feeling of presence within (room-scaled) architectural VR to boost the Genius Loci.
How do you build architectural and gaming environments that create a presence? Carl Callewaert (Unity Technologies) beings this presentation by briefly explaining how and why we perceive 3D and virtual reality. With this knowledge as a foundation, we will then learn to use this in building architectural environments that boost the feeling of presence and immersion. Each topic will focus on examples based on the real-world and the virtual. After the presentation, you will be able to use this knowledge to create a feeling of presence within (room-scaled) architectural VR to boost the Genius Loci.
Presenter: Jean Leggett – CEO of One More Story Games
This talk looks at OMSG’s strategies for maximising resources and overcoming challenges. Topics such as recruiting interns, raising over $500K, accessing government grants, and developing valuable partnerships will be covered. Learn about how to deal with difficult situations with your co-founders, staff, contractors, financers.
Presenter: James Fraser – Art Director
Best practices for an indie art team to allow them to be ready for success and growth. Including Documentation like ADDs and Style Guides; Art Pipeline creation; file structuring and control; organizing an internal team to work with outsourcing; asset ownership and preparing for bug management. All the things that seem so simple that they often get overlooked but make for big headaches when growing your team and product. Get your team ready for success and all the new challenges that involves!
Best practices for an indie art team to allow them to be ready for success and growth. Including Documentation like ADDs and Style Guides; Art Pipeline creation; file structuring and control; organizing an internal team to work with outsourcing; asset ownership and preparing for bug management. All the things that seem so simple that they often get overlooked but make for big headaches when growing your team and product. Get your team ready for success and all the new challenges that involves!
Presenter: Woogie Wolgemuth – Technical Solutions Engineer at Google
Game launches can be trying times for backend development and operational teams. Learn how to use techniques from Google’s Site Reliability Engineering book to align your team. Improve your next launch by focusing on the user!
Game launches can be trying times for backend development and operational teams. Learn how to use techniques from Google’s Site Reliability Engineering book to align your team. Improve your next launch by focusing on the user!
Presenter: Pawel Czaplarski – QA Lead at 11bit Studios
During my years in Quality Assurance I’ve had an opportunity to talk with hundreds of players both during play tests and after releases on community sites like Steam or Reddit. I would love to share my experience of how to properly get all the information you want from your testers, how to identify which information shares some light on issues you might want to address and how to address those issues properly. I’ll base my talk on play tests which I’ve run during development of games such as: Moonlighter, Children of Morta, This War of Mine, Frostpunk and many more.
During my years in Quality Assurance I’ve had an opportunity to talk with hundreds of players both during play tests and after releases on community sites like Steam or Reddit. I would love to share my experience of how to properly get all the information you want from your testers, how to identify which information shares some light on issues you might want to address and how to address those issues properly. I’ll base my talk on play tests which I’ve run during development of games such as: Moonlighter, Children of Morta, This War of Mine, Frostpunk and many more.
Room B
Presenter: Anya Combs – Director of Games Outreach at Kickstarter
Running a Kickstarter campaign can be scary. How much should you ask for? What happens if you fail? Come listen to successful Kickstarter creators talk about what they did and wished they did while running their campaigns.
Running a Kickstarter campaign can be scary. How much should you ask for? What happens if you fail? Come listen to successful Kickstarter creators talk about what they did and wished they did while running their campaigns.
Presenter: Pejman Mirza-Babei – Associate Dean at the University of Ontario
The overall aim of developing a game that is fun to play is a complex one due to the diversity of players who may interact with the game. An accurate understanding of player behaviour and their gameplay experiences can help identify and resolve any potential problem areas before release. There are two main data sources from which useful data for gameplay balancing can be extracted: the game data (analytics) and the player data (behaviour). In this talk, I provide guidelines and approaches on how smaller studios can also benefit from game analytics and player metrics to optimize their gameplay. Takeaway #1: Get practical guidelines for collecting and analyzing game/player data. Takeaway #2: Learn how to design and conduct gameplay evaluation sessions. Takeaway #3: See examples of gameplay evaluation reports to communicate findings with your development team.
The overall aim of developing a game that is fun to play is a complex one due to the diversity of players who may interact with the game. An accurate understanding of player behaviour and their gameplay experiences can help identify and resolve any potential problem areas before release. There are two main data sources from which useful data for gameplay balancing can be extracted: the game data (analytics) and the player data (behaviour). In this talk, I provide guidelines and approaches on how smaller studios can also benefit from game analytics and player metrics to optimize their gameplay. Takeaway #1: Get practical guidelines for collecting and analyzing game/player data. Takeaway #2: Learn how to design and conduct gameplay evaluation sessions. Takeaway #3: See examples of gameplay evaluation reports to communicate findings with your development team.
Presenter: Annette Stavenow Eriksson & Tommy Persson – Lawyer.se
Welcome to a talk about game developers’ mistakes with IP rights, music collaboration and other easy deals that have the potential to make your future revenues disappear. Or worse, lose your company.
The lawyer company´s CEO Annette, and Tommy, the most experienced video game lawyers in Sweden, will tell you stories from real life and explain the advantages of taking the legal parts seriously when making games.
Questions you may have that will be answered during this session:
When and why do you need to use external lawyer help? Is it important to have a lawyer specialized in videogames or will any lawyer be OK?
Why is it necessary to have proper contracts? What can happen if you don’t?
We will also talk about the importance of negotiating in a smart and clever way and point out ways to do so.
Take the chance to level-up your thoughts about video game law to avoid mistakes other people have already made!
Presenter: Stephen Kim – CEO of Crystallized Games
Creating development teams is hard! From finding the right people, aligning goals and availability, to managing expectations, every aspect is filled with pitfalls and difficulties. This talk will explain how and when indie developers should create teams, and what they can do to ensure that team’s success in the long term.
Presenter: Jools Watsham – Founder & Designer of Atooi
Are you a grizzled indie developer or perhaps thinking of going independent in the future? With 28 years in the videogame industry and 13 years as an indie developer, Jools Watsham has gathered his most vital lessons learned and formulated a handy step-by-step indie survival guide. Starting with what it means to be indie all the way through to how to successfully launch your game, each important step is covered in between. For beginners and pros alike!
Are you a grizzled indie developer or perhaps thinking of going independent in the future? With 28 years in the videogame industry and 13 years as an indie developer, Jools Watsham has gathered his most vital lessons learned and formulated a handy step-by-step indie survival guide. Starting with what it means to be indie all the way through to how to successfully launch your game, each important step is covered in between. For beginners and pros alike!
Presenter: Perry Burkum – Composer at Atooi
Music composer Perry Burkum talks about composing video game music, networking, and music production from the beginning stages to final production.
Presenter: Dr. Kristopher Alexander – Professor at Ryerson University
This talk will outline the breakdown of roles that exist in the esports broadcasting spaces, via virtual studio production, and how that directly ties into game programming and the associated job market.
This talk will outline the breakdown of roles that exist in the esports broadcasting spaces, via virtual studio production, and how that directly ties into game programming and the associated job market.
More to be announced!
Kate Edwards
Executive Director
Global Game Jam
Jason Della Rocca
Co-Founder
Execution Labs
Dr. Kristopher Alexander
Professor of Video Games
Ryerson University
Anya Combs
Director of Games Outreach
Kickstarter
Carl Callewaert
Global Director Evangelism
Unity Technologies
Jean Leggett
CEO
One More Story Games
Woogie Wolgemuth
Technical Solutions Engineer
Jools Watsham
Founder, Designer
Atooi
Stephen Kim
CEO/Co-Founder
Crystallized Games
Perry Burkum
Composer
Atooi
Lidi Giroux
Communications Manager
East Side Games
Emmanuel Evdemon
Lawyer
Entertainment Counsel
Mohammed Agha
CEO
Magmic
Kris Piotrowski
Creative Director
Capybara Games
Justin Vazquez
Executive Producer
Elastic Games
Pejman Mirza-Babei
Associate Dean
University of Ontario
Annette Stavenow Eriksson
CEO
Lawyer.se
Tommy Persson
Lawyer
Lawyer.se
James Fraser
Art Director
Independent
Stephane Cotichini
Founder
81monkeys
Dave Proctor
Director
Mighty Yell Studios
Pawel Czaplarski
QA Lead
11bit Studios
Join us!
Industry Professionals
We bring world-class speakers to Toronto so that they may share their knowledge and experience with the local industry to help them grow and advance their careers. We also provide networking opportunities through a business lounge and programming that encourages attendees to meet new people.
Indie Developers
We help connect indies with mentors so they can receive the critical feedback and/or monetary support they need to make their game successful.
Students
We help build the foundation of the next generation of developers’ networks through specific networking events and opportunities.
PROGRAMMING
Presentations
Attend gaming talks and panels focused on game design, business & marketing, funding, game development, technical challenges and how to overcome them.
Networking
Network and connect with new business partners or old colleagues in the Business Lounge.
XP Share Mentorship Program
This program is designed to build one-on-one mentorship sessions in our Business Lounge across several fields
Industry Mixer
Put on your classiest look and come mingle with other members of the industry at an exclusive party at the Westin Harbor Castle on April 8. The party will feature games, champagne and a few other surprises.
Canadian Game Awards
This year the Canadian Game Awards will take place Thursday, April 9th 2020, via a pre-recorded broadcast on GINX Tv
SUPPORTING PARTNERS
