Recent content by N. Evan Van Zelfden

Crossplayer Is the Future Why choose between single and multiplayer when you can have both? Read Full Article

QuakeCon 2010: Carmack Ushers in the Age of Optimization If you're industry legend John Carmack, porting a gorgeous high-definition game like Rage to the iPhone in mere weeks is just a question of knowing how to optimize. Read Full Article

Defining The Reset Generation It?s a Friday afternoon, and Scott Foe is in a hotel room, 27 floors above the streets of San Francisco. In two hours, he?ll be unveiling his latest project to the press. It?s billed as ?the highest production value mobile title ever.? Permalink

Inside David Jaffe's Heartland "Early reports said Heartland would be a game that could make you cry - the Holy Grail of game developers from EA's early days to Steven Spielberg today. 'On one hand, it was supposed to be emotional,' says Jaffe. 'We wanted players who are sensitive types like...

SXSW: Can Games Change The World? South by Southwest can sometimes be a platform for activists. This isn?t unusual with documentary filmmakers or advocates of online freedoms. Even musicians can be outspoken. But game developers who care about baby seals? Permalink

SXSW: Underneath "Second Skin" The South by Southwest festival officially began in 1987, the year after Richard Garriott and Dallas Snell opened the Austin offices of Origin Systems. Garriott would go on to develop Ultima Online, which became the first multiplayer online roleplaying game to be...

SXSW: "Publishers are dead, they just don't know it." The venture boys in Silicon Valley listen to Bridges, because he?s got the cred: from a management position at Netscape, and from launching both Netflix and ZoneLabs. The four Netscape vets who started Multiverse are all staunch gamers...

Conferences I Have Known "I grabbed a drink and wandered over to chat with EA's Doug Church. In one corner, the then-phenomenal Guitar Hero was on. I crossed the room to introduce myself to Moledina, and because I cared about such things, began to ask a series of questions, tantamount to 'So...

It is not uncommon in diplomatic circles. They really can ban you. And it has nothing to do with your freedom to review. When you "ban" someone, you are making a statement about the relationship. It's clear, unclouded, and firm. And if the banned party wants the blockade removed, they can...

Look at it from the developer's point of view. VGMwatch gives the example of Midway's "Mortal Kombat development team." Now, if you were Ed Boon and company, sitting there day after day, pouring your heart into a game, and a magazine, such as EGM always ravaged your artistic expression...is it...

Bravo! And do keep up the good work.

Project Horseshoe: EA's New Deal ?Organization design with these big teams and this open-source method of design is really part of game design,? Verdu said, who believes that the days of the giant teams are over, even for EA. ?Our teams are ramping down in terms of size, and we?re giving them...

Project Horseshoe: Summer Camp for Game Designers Project Horseshoe is something like summer camp for game designers. The setting is the same: There are canoes and cabins and campfires. The workgroups have facilitators ? the grown-up?s answer to counselors. Their idea is your hands should be...

Project Horseshoe: Begin with a Yee-Haw! In the Texas wilderness, this European executive is able to freely show his game to others, encourage them to play and get feedback, all because Project Horseshoe has a "Code of Secrecy and Blabbing" that unifies the small group. Of the 28 members...

This is Project Horseshoe Deep in the heart of Texas, at a place known as Canyon of the Eagles, a little gathering called Project Horseshoe took place last weekend. If you haven?t heard of it before, that?s because it?s one of the game industry?s best-kept secrets ? and maybe its most...