Submit your ideas for NZ Game Dev Conference 2014
30 April 2014

The NZ Game Developers Conference 2014 (#NZGDC14) will be on Friday 19 September 2014 at AUT University in Auckland – the same awesome venue as last year.

Last year’s conference sold out with over 320 delegates – 100 more than the previous year – and had extremely positive feedback. With all the current buzz around game development in NZ, we are expecting another sell out crowd and we want to, once again, raise the bar on the quality and relevance of presentations – especially if you’re giving up a day working on projects to be there.

Planning is underway for a local content showcase and we’re already lining up talks and workshops but we need your input to make sure it is the conference that you want to attend. Ticket prices will be around $100, including refreshments and wicked after-party. Great value!

We need your help

Presentations

We’ll have three rooms each running one of the three thematic streams – Production & Business, Art & Design and Tech & Infrastructure – and we are looking for talks from you and your studio. Presentations will be 20 minutes then Q&A.

We want them to be practical, relevant and inspiring! Share a technique or workflow your studio has been working on, give a warts’n’all post-mortem, run a panel discussion or a deep dive for other professional game developers. Email your preferred stream curator (see below) with a title, and 3 things the audience will get out of it, and a short blurb by Friday 11 July. We’ll evaluate submissions and let you know. To improve on last years conference, we’d love each studio to suggest 1-2 presentations each.

We’re looking for inspiring presentations with practical takeaways that will make attending developers better at what they do every day. This is a conference about New Zealand developers sharing knowledge and growing as a community.

Topic Requests

What skills, knowledge, inspiration or confidence do your team really need to succeed? What is in their professional development plans? What was a great international GDC talk that you know would make a difference here? Are there any particular techniques or pipelines you’re trying to get better at? Don’t suggest generic stuff, give us real problems that you wish someone could help you with, and we’ll try to match presentations to these.

International Guests

International speakers or keynotes: Do you have any international industry contacts who ‘want to come to NZ one day’? Suggest19 September to them! They could even hang around for Digital NatioNZ on 27-28 September! We’re inviting some already, and could pay for flights and accommodation for someone worthwhile.

Workshops, Local Showcase & Exhibit

Do you have any workshops you would like to attend or run – or assist – yourself? All ideas are welcome. We’d like to show off as many local pieces as we can in the building. If you have a game you’d like to showcase please let us know. Or do you have any other game thing that you’d like to exhibit during the conference in a neighbouring space? Maybe a game art or hardware museum? Any other crazy ideas are welcome too.

Contact us

If you would like to contribute please contact the curator for the stream you think is most appropriate for your presentation.

Confirmed ticket prices and other details will follow in the coming months, but for now – Save The Date (19 Sept 2014).

Festival of Games, 17-28 Sept

One last thing. This year we are trying to group up as many game events as possible in the two weeks surrounding NZGDC14 to generate buzz, and ultimately funding and support, for the NZ game dev industry. If you have any events such as a pop up arcade, gallery, party, or any other event that you’re thinking of running around that time, it would be great for the game dev community if you could run it in between 17th and 28th of September. We may even be able to help you find a space. Please contact Ben Kenobi <nebibonek@gmail.com> if you would like to be involved in the festival. All ideas welcomed.