On February 14th and 15th I attended Game Focus Germany, a game industry conference in Hannover Germany, organized by Nordmedia.

There's a 3 minute video (partially in German) showing some of the speakers after the jump.

(I think that's the first ever video I've embedded here.)

Kind of like a reverse trailer. Anyway, it was good fun. I got in because I helped out by suggesting some people I knew as speakers.

Risa's speech was great. I think a lot of people expected it to be dry or boring, but at some point I had current or former co-workers from three different companies sitting next to me, all nodding their head at what she was saying about common production problems. Completion bonding for games has been around for a while, but I don't know anyone who can explain it as clearly and logically as Risa: not so much how it works, but how having a neutral third party changes the dynamic between developer and publisher and solves or reduces the inherent problems caused by the motivations and incentives of both parties.

I missed the speeches by Uwe Boll and Lee, I hope they will be available on video at some point. Thad's speech was good (he wrote about the conference here). I met Dr. Richard Bartle, who is a very nice guy. I also got to know Barbara Lippe a bit better, which is ironic since we both live in Vienna and I had been seeing her around in the Viennese game development party scene (yes, there is such a thing) for years.

Small conferences with high-profile speakers, like this one or FMX or Imagina (in 2004 at least), are a lot of fun because you can spend a lot more time having interesting conversations than at a mass event like GDC.

This was the first time GFG took place. It went well for a first go. I hope it becomes a regular event.

Update: Fixed the links.