The build-up to next March's Game Developers Conference in San Francisco has officially begun. The show's organizers are now working hard to craft the event's robust session lineup, and today they announced the first three talks that have made the cut.
The first talk to join the GDC 2013 roster is "Rendering Assassin's Creed III," a Programming track lecture that will offer a detailed look at the game's weather system, lighting solution, and much more. Speaker and Ubisoft lead graphics programmer Jean-Francois St-Amour will also share some of Ubisoft's tricks for improving current-generation titles when porting them to DX11 PC hardware.
The other two debut talks come from GDC 2013's Business, Marketing, and Management track. In "The Beauty and Challenge of Mixing Physical and Digital Games," a robust panel of industry veterans will take a moment to examine the blurring line between physical and digital titles.
During this session, speakers including Eric Hautemont (Days of Wonder), Soren Johnson (Zynga), Magic: The Gathering creator Richard Garfield (Three Donkeys), Joel Goodman (Playdek), and moderator Tom Chick (Quarter to Three) will detail how developers can benefit from straddling the line between video games and board games.
The third GDC session, also in the Business track, is a roundtable examining the intricacies of microtransaction-based business models. You can attend "Free to Play, Pay for Stuff: Virtual Goods Win" and join Three Rings CEO Daniel James (Spiral Knights) and Iron Realms chairman Matt Mihaly as they discuss the dangers, opportunities, and ongoing trends in the free-to-play and virtual markets. This will be the ninth successive year of this popular roundtable.
More talks will debut in the near future, and all of the above sessions will take place as part of GDC 2013's Main Conference, which is open to All Access and Main Conference pass holders (a special Audio-specific pass is also available). Discounted Early Bird registration is now open on the show's official website, and GDC 2013 itself will take place March 25-29 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco.
Be sure to keep an eye out for even more updates on GDC 2013 in the coming weeks, as the show's organizers have plenty more to announce for the upcoming event. For all the latest information on the Game Developers Conference, visit the show's website, or subscribe to regular updates via Facebook, Twitter, or RSS.
