London Game Festival 2009

London Games Festival

Next week is the fourth London Game Festival. A collection of 12 events during the week, a format that seems to be working nicely. Here is a list of all the events:

I will be going to two of these. The Best of British on Wednesday 28 October has a very promising programme of speakers:

10.00 – 11.00 Registration and networking
Host (Gareth Edmondson, Reflections studio introduces the event).
11.00 – 11.30 Ed Vaizey, discussing the games industry and its importance to the UK economy.
11.30 – 12.15 KEYNOTE: Charles Cecil, MD of Revolution studios will take a look at the British games industry where are its roots and what made Britain the birth place of the games industry. What are the key USPs of Britain moving forward?
12.15 – 13.30 Lunch and Networking
13.30 – 14:15 “Darwinia + playthrough”: Mark Morris MD of Introversion will talk about the benefits of being a British independent studio and how they have managed to transform from a small time indie to professional console developer. Mark will be talking about the influences of their latest and most exciting game Darwinia+ which is due to be released on XBLA later this year.
14:15 – 15:00 “Marketing Browser games” Simon Seefeldt is Head of Business development at Jagex – a world-leading developer of high quality, browser-based games and the largest independent games developer and publisher in the UK creating games such as Runscape and funOrb. Simon will talk about how they build their communities and market their games and how Britain is a great place to make games
15:00 – 15:30 Tea Break and Networking
15.30 – 16.00 Title: “I, myself and iPhone”: Paul Farley, MD Tag games will be talking about how Tag games started and what the benfits are of being a casual games company in the UK. Paul will also be highlighting the pros and cons of iPhone versus some of the other platforms.
16.15 – 17.00 “Give us a break”

Gareth Edmondson and a panel of leading developers and games experts will be discussing the prospects for a Games Tax Relief and the implications for the industry as a whole if the measure is implemented. Games Tax Relief could benefit developers by reducing their over-reliance on publisher funding, promote original IP development and encourage a move to more sustainable online business models. The availability of government subsidies overseas is making the UK less competitive, not only from the point of view of costs, but also of skills as government support in other countries has attracted key staff away from the UK. The panel will be looking at what the Government reaction has been so far to TIGA’s lobbying and what are the next steps in ensuring tax breaks happen.
17.00 – 17.05 The decision – what is the best ever British game? All delegates will be asked to nominate a game at registration the top 10 nominations will then be voted on by the audience.

Then on Friday I am going to Eurogamer Expo. A consumer event with lots of games, development sessions and a career fair. And which is sold out!

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