Back in Port Trip Report

Hi Everyone-

First off GreatGamesExperiment.com launched today and is now open to public viewing. If you haven't signed up yet stop reading this post and go make an account. GGE is the biggest project we've launched since starting the company.

Ok, now that you've got a GGE account keep reading:

So, I'm back from a very successful conference at Microsoft's Academic days. See my last .plan. As requested I've put lots of pictures from the cruise in this post.



We spent the first night at Disney World (My first time), where I had a chance to meet Microsoft's Academic Evangelist team. It was a great introduction, Philip DesAutles, the MS Evangelist team leader, approached me to 'Thank me for the round of drinks.' I hadn't bought a round of drinks, but it was a great introduction to the MS guys who do what I do for GG. They were really excited about Torque X and TBGX and I promised them a great talk and demo at my presentation. After networking with the MS guys, my lady and I headed to Downtown Disney for some walking and gawking. I've got a great picture on my phone of me under 12' Lego T-Rex.



The first full day of the conference open very well for GG, as Chris Satchell, GM of MS Game Developer group, included several references and slides of GG and TGBX in his opening presentation. I was also pleased at the number of educators who were already using Torque in the classroom who attended the conference. After listening to some fantastic presentations on XNA and Second Life, I headed out for a quick trip down a water slide before being herded onto a bus.



The cruise ship was huge, 2500 passengers, 900 staff, 5 restaurants, 6 bars, 3 pools, 2 hot tubs, a basketball court, and field hockey court, 2 nightclubs and 2 theaters. Disney has this evil little trick where you put your credit card on file at the beginning of the cruise, and then they force you to make all onboard purchases with your room key, so you have little idea what you're really spending on drinks, photos and gifts. The food was extraordinary, and I was able to see why people usually gain 10lbs on cruises, especially with the all you can eat desert bar. It was a Disney Cruise, so the ship was filled with families and kids, but the ship was partitioned well to keep the adult only areas private.



After two outstanding meals the conference started up again aboard the ship. I went to a presentation by Colleen McCreary, head of EA's Global relations. The talk was mostly an overview and recruitment pitch for EA, talking about desired skills for new hires. In addition to C/C++, Vector Math, and operating system experience, I was surprised to see 'Experience with Torque or Renderware' on Colleen slides as well. This was amazing, it was only day one, and already two major players in games, Microsoft and EA, had plugged GG and or Torque to the 150 teachers in attendance! I was stoked.



Day 2 we arrived the Nassau the capital of the Bahamas. After a terrific breakfast I caught presentations on Direct X 10, and another XNA talk by MS. Dave Mitchell, MS Director of the Game Developer Group, did and over view of XNA, and academic resources for teachers interested in teaching games. He also gave a shout out for Torque X and plugged my presentation scheduled for that evening, noting that 'Torque X adds Drag and Drop game building to XNA.' During the QA I had a chance to introduce myself, talk about our educator evaluation program, and promo my evening session 'Where I'll be showing a video of game built in 2 minutes using TGBX.' (Slight exaggeration, as there is no win condition, or enemies in the demo, but hey). After the morning sessions and some lunch my sweetie and I headed to the beach to catch some rays in Nassau.



Friday night, Pirate Night.
Half the ship was wearing headbands and armed with rubber daggers. I found a great pair of Mouse ears with and earring and an eye patch. Eugene is home of "International Talk Like a Pirate Day" so I was well armed with 'Yarrs' 'Ahoys' and 'Booty' references.



I was really nervous going into my presentation. I first heard about this conference 2 years ago, and knew it was precisely where GG needed to be: in front of the 150 leading CS instructors teaching with games in the world. When I got the invitation in late December I scrambled to get someone with more tech knowledge to go with me. I had this deep seeded fear that in the middle of my presentation some Computer Science Phd, would stand up and say "You don't have any idea what your talking about do you?' The plan was to bring Josh Williams as my human tech shield in case I got into any trouble describing why "Deserilized XML in Torque X" was cool. Unfortunately, 11th hour GDC prep kept Josh from being able to make the conference. I was on my own. Knowing I was weak on the tech portion of my talk, I structured my presentation to start strong and end strong. Having watched last year's conference I knew that most industry presenters were good and talking about how CS was applied at their company, and pitching jobs, but there were few companies, besides MS, who were actually building strong bridges between industry and academia (Second Life being a notable exception). With this in mind I formed my presentation around three themes: The case for Games in CS education, Overview of Torque X Tech, and GG's educational resources. For two weeks before the trip I interviewed, Mark F, John Q, and Adam L to buff up on my tech talk. Alex S also made a super sweet 2-minute-game build demo video in TGBX, which I used as my centerpiece. The TX docs also served as a great resource for engine overview info. Indeed during the tech section of my presentation I was reading the overview verbatim.



The presentation went great! I had a lot of friends already in the audience, and the demo's and academic resources I showed brought a lot of "Wows." After the presentation, I was completely mobbed by teachers and industry reps wanting to exchange cards and get more info. In addition to the 150 teachers that were on the cruise MS, is making a DVD of the presentations that will be distributed to schools around the world, increasing the reach of GG's academic message.



After getting the hard stuff out of the way I was ready to enjoy the Bahamas. We spent the next day dock at Disney's privately owned "Castaway Cay" island for snorkeling, bike rides, Bar-B-Que and of course sun. I spent the rest of the trip relaxed while "Networking" over margaritas. It was great.



Back in Orlando I spent an extra day to meet with students at University of Central Florida's FIEA lab, Full Sail and the Orlando TIG group see pictures here. Eric Preisz showed me his lovely house, treated me to his Fajitia skliz and even hooked me up with a 4 am ride the airport. Props! Overall it was a very successful trip, and I've barely had time to 'recover' before heading to GDC this week.

NOTE to educators: If you're going to GDC, I'll be at booth 920 in the West Hall. Please send me an e-so we can set up a meeting.



Thank you once again to my kick ass team at GG who made sure I was well armed for the presentation; John Nordlinger and Kent Foster at MS Research for the invitation; John Jamison and Farhad Jahvid for moral support and of course Marta Cuboni for, everything : ).