GDC Europe

Warren Spector warns for marginalization

September 3, 2010 — by Vlad Micu

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GDC Europe

Warren Spector warns for marginalization

September 3, 2010 — by Vlad Micu


During his keynote at GDC Europe, Warren Spector had a lot of advice and wisdom to share on how to mature the game industry. Having worked with several people in Hollywood, Spector addressed the matter of being careful, when borrowing concepts from other media might be fine and developers should step in to do their own thing.

One of the major issues Spector considered to be challenging, is the art of pacing. “In a game, you have about 5 seconds to compel them with some fast paced action,” he argued. In the case of long cinematics, Spector admitted that “there are people who have the credibility to take their time and do something like that.” A picture of Hideo Kojima promptly appeared on the screen behind him.




According to Spector, games are not about magic moments but about the repeated actions. “Our job is to change the context around repeated actions that we offer player,” he argued. “You can do something a thousand times and still have a unique experience.” Spector also addressed the similar need to break out of many conceptual and narrative stereotypes, fearing that “we’re going to be marginalized as comics have been in the USA.”










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Vlad Micu

Vlad Micu is managing editor of Gamesauce.org. He previously has been a freelance game industry professional for over five years and traveled around the world while running his company VGVisionary. Starting VGVisionary during college, Vlad was able to work independently as a pr & marketing consultant, event manager, industry journalist, speaker and game developer. He just returned from Bangkok, Thailand, where he pursued his dream of making video games as the game producer at arkavis, an up and coming casual game studio.

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