What are the games industry fads and trends of 2016?

[Music] these poor speakers don't really know what they're letting themselves in for I have tried to explain but I have really given them much of a of an explanation essentially what we're going to try and do is just call it game show for words of a better phrase and we're going to talk about various topics related to the games industry and basically try and work out whether we think they're here to stay and therefore their trends or if they are instead and fly-by-nights and therefore will use the word fad and just trying to find the projector two seconds that's the trouble with notes hand over time I like to keep everyone in the room but does have its downside when you're going to use your own pc it's a dude [Music]

power point where are you now I also have put in a few special effects spot okay really crudely recorded sounds but of me saying unusual things so let's see if the sounds work [Music] now just going to put these slides on haha can we see if we can get that up onto the main screen so obviously let's let's just check this out working before I go any further but do you have that on audio track 11 oh yes that's more like it I kept it more on noise on there so let's go back to winning hello people hi Oscar how you doing thank you good we have beer if you want to be a cover virtually no join us right yeah

so we have an illustrious panel I'm going to do the classic hosting only laughs introduce themselves to you all and then we're going to talk about various topics that come to mind John John do it introduce yourself and say what you do so my name is gianna I work for the Swedish games industry association and their work with very very exciting drum the stuff like policy but yeah policy rule pouring things so you don't have to do it hmm sounds good hi my name is Jana and i'm running a swedish games accelerator coats to gun we have a lot of Indies there and i think that it's a good trend and it's absolutely engines are will find out we are in the indie room a pro mic hello my kinds developer evangelist from amazon i share with you guys what's going on in our store and then take any gripes or request you have and bring

them back amazon hello everybody my name is david i run the European office for game ville game bellezza Korean mobile games publisher so I'm I guess I'm the bad guy in the room today this week evil free to all but did she warn you about this cuz q relate your colleague in the earth and he he was on my first version of this in Vancouver Leon this year anyway so there are a whole bunch of random topics first up space Sims now in the advent of things like nomads guy ever space I'm sorry there are how many and how many space seems this year anyone know I have no idea I just keep seeing spacings or is the marketing got so specific to me because I have a delight of our space do you think space sims are a thing yeah I do care

yeah it's I love space but but they should do more fun things with it hmm it's mostly generic pretty boring stuff but I can go and I can explode aluminium that's fun yeah if you want to cook Twitter or doing like Adam in indoor BBQ do Bob don't you know aluminum is really good but if I said it I get to have a bigger ship isn't that an incentive let me let me ask orden guys how many you have played no man's sky how many are still playing it oh all the three of us ma I'm an air yeah so it's a it's a great I actually think it's a great day getting you anything is a great game but there seems to be a lot of them and there's a seem to be like you say there's a gap in terms of what what time don't you have a few I mean how many students space games did you have

um we've had a few both yours um I don't know exactly the number but what you're gonna say none and we thought yeah but spaces in the unending fascination and and there have been some beautiful 17 I mean I actually think no mask right is beautiful you may think it's restricted in terms of how much variation there is but you know I genuinely think is a beautiful experience and there are there is amazing kind of my particular student stuff you have so many amazingly visually attractive games I mean how does someone bring a face game to you to make that viable no not Bible you know interesting um surprises with something new something we haven't seen yer something cool and innovative we've seen different space games some of them were really stunning some of them were most more using a cool mechanics there was one game this year

it was called caves and it uses a triangles to to build the game so there was a that was already really cool concept cool like you're inundated with Speights um first of all I got asked how many different space games can well I get you thought about this before but how many different games can you name right okay let's just throw some out okay completely spaced okay I'm not hearing the audience just burst with names here yeah we've got about two or three ones that everybody knows about nobody's it most 911 faith you know CrossFit free space in this oh god there's an erection swing but it's tougher to the vigorous ability it's gonna be real stuff your rest are kind of either copy cats and their copy cats it either creating a kind of trying to get that visually stunning approach or they're trying to kind of create a more space like mechanic at some point you

just run out of physical that actually exists a little stalls I like Janice point one of the things i would love to see the next space game copycat do is scratch space and put in underwater underwater can be as beautiful if not more beautiful than outer space you get a chance to play with some new interesting mechanics some new interesting things in there so guys not another space game please so they don't want to judge one more give me something underwater or in an environment that we haven't really explored yet that can be socially impacting as well as really gorgeous and beautiful so you know what no more space sense oh you're just saying I'll show me something different okay what do you think so I don't want to play aqua knocks again I want to go to space I want to play x-wing I want a new remastered x-wing that's what I want when we're talking about space games I don't want a mining simulator which is what most space games are these days and that's very disappointing to me I want to step into the cockpit of the

Millennium Falcon again like x-wing your lines yeah I want my oculus rift to finally arrive so i can play back room yeah well yes exactly are you yeah so okay you know in general what do we think I fina sell off the audience at you've heard what we think is off-base Sims a fad or a trend are they here to stay or are they gonna go so if you think spacings are here to stay put your hands up okay those of you who think it's a fad can you put your hand up okay and those of you you think just don't I may be the lone voice of reason here alright so our conclusion is okay k me tell erectus I mean who would want who in their right mind would want to go through a organization that maybe possibly give them a bit money but basically just introduce them to lots of

you know old people like me talking about games I mean food will do what we gave accelerators let's know there's no scoping that is there I think it's great I think it's a way of the industry actually growing I'm sorry to disappoint you but but I actually yeah game accelerators are are a good thing maybe you shouldn't be there for you think that this is how you would race all the big money but sit I think it's a good way to learn mmm but who's who's gonna get benefit from that is it people with experience I mean presume in people shouldn't even bother not even worth it but people who haven't got that experience can gain a lot from it is that what you're saying I guess a game accelerator should be after a game incubator a gaming debater should be the start and then the accelerator should be when you want to move a bit forward and don't really know right now you being clever or if you're older and

love yeah that's like the student incubator okay no I mean in the best way that's exactly why we have your date is perfect but that's an interesting point because you're what you're saying is actually the really interesting stuff is how do we take people from not making games to making games to doing it in a way that's professional to doing it really well so this is that what love home students oh is that what students well it's not really what's things about but is that what accelerators should be about yeah I definitely think so as you say still gun is not exactly like that we don't really fit in the definition of accelerator but i think is the closest one so that's why we call it the accelerator but it's not we don't make an investment which i think is an important part of the an accelerator and i agree with johanna it's a it's not for its not for for everybody but it's really it can really help you with the network get some coaching on things that

you you're struggling struggling with and i also can help you with some visibility as well but i think it's really interesting like you alarm and judging a bit like we're saying that there's a difference isn't there between this kind of incubator type model the accelerator type model the promoting the environment for artistic endeavor type offer you know are there obviously new and more interesting forms you know unless you're more interesting but different forms of how we help people i mean generally thoughts on that or it's dude in the pinnacle I'm actually involved in another project in Stockholm that is also helping Indies so that is a first phase of a games incubator in Stockholm and it is called test-drive game and it's a series of seven workshops for people who have a games idea and we're gonna have each workshop has a different theme and we're gonna try to help them with different aspects of game development so that's also another way of getting some help this

requires even less commitment because it's during the evening hours so that's best one way I think there is a you can find different different things in the world cool I hope Mike first thing full disclosure I am a mentor for game founders in Estonia and Kuala Lumpur second thing you know Oscar how much do you get paid for being a mentor I'll get paid loads all of nothing yeah you know I get it twice as much nothing as you get a lot of feel worth it though the thanks is well worth it we've heard a lot of presentations today at least I did about publishers and landing a publisher they don't want to see your game until it's late beta and they want to see monetization mechanics that are already well put together if they like your game concept but they don't like something they're gonna ask you to go back to the game design phase and redo all your work seriously well a game accelerator Phil is a really good niche is where you may have an amazing game

concept but you've got some holes in your team and they bring in mentors like me and Oscar and they try to help fill those holes you have in your team so that when you do decide to approach a publisher and good mentors good game accelerators bring publishers by and they create games that are ready to be presented to those publishers so you're a lot more likely to get a lot better publisher deal with ultimately less work in the end they're typically you go relocate somewhere for three or six months and you do a serious deep dive intensive basically boot camp for your game the outcome is a much stronger game much more likely to attract publishers I think this probably isn't enough of a trend I would like to see this be more of a trend before people go out and try to land I don't have a more please I need to do more pleased as an option David so obviously you no longer have to go searching for any companies anymore you just go to an accelerator it's easy I wish there was a good one in Germany I'm not aware of any really outstanding once in German your eye shadow oh yeah

so we're lacking that and I wish it would exist as I think it's important for people to expose themselves to the wisdom of the elderly and it's also and I'm also a better wife room I'm teaching at games academy for free so I consider myself I have great hair too so yeah um I think that you know or just getting a little [Music] wish it were not yeah so important because I don't want to look at shitty games I want to look at good stuff we're prepared concepts I want to talk to people that know what they're talking about I don't it not everything has to be polished and it's not like the publisher wants a hundred percent finished product we don't want that we want to be involved in making it as good as it can be and we want to give input but unite valued I mean it I hope so anyway but I see a lot of like sloppy stuff and that's not necessary mm-hmm so I think this is all kind of you on on only game accelerator okay votes for you

guys do you think that game accelerators are a a fad are they gonna be coming and going or are they here to stay so if you think they're a fad but your hand up again it's good if you think you're a trend and it should be more of them yeah I think we well and truly is it getting to school now two trends we need something different let's talk about procedural design I know this is okay I know this is going back to no man i'm sorry i've been playing a lot of it but actually somebody actually asked me to do this one does anybody remembers with the war what I have yastas would so procedural design so the question is an eternal question and I don't think we've ever sold it is it better particular free-to-play

world from your content to be made automatically ought to be handcrafted by an artist when you consider that games basically we're looking for people to play our game for hundreds of days how can we make content by hand successfully and cost-effectively surely we have to turn it all into procedural you know what do you think so I actually have an education in Game graphic designs so i guess i have to just say no to the procedural design I also completely hate open-world games because i'm always going lost but only face my true love my true love of game designs okay yeah but your argument I presume I mean on such thing for here I premium because you want to have like perfect pixel level quality don't you but is

that really needed and can you not create that by creating template elements that allows truly smart design smart procedural design can overcome a lot of those issues anyway maybe not infinite gigaflops of whatever it is of worlds that they having no mask right but maybe you know enough to be able to do days and days of content numb but of course it's it's a it's a great game to or it's a great way to make them make a lot of content fast and especially if you do it in or especially if you know what you're doing and doing in it in the right way I don't think it's a solution to too high you're less graphic designers I think it's more tujhe maybe to create new things and different types of a world or maybe make it so that the the world's you can create can be reused more effectively hopefully I mean one of the things i always think about is last of us you know the number of corridors that were beautiful utterly beautiful and I walked past

never actually spend any time in that space at all and I just think I swore away I mean somebody spent months getting the lighting right just a lighting when yet I don't attend seka tenth of a second possibly of looking at it but there's also a lot of games that you play just because they are super beautiful like I don't know I don't think Bioshock would ever be a hitch if it wasn't for for the art design and and the environment and so it can argue that one Dada would be like I I don't know really I mean it depends on the size of your game obviously if it's worth it making the the code to generate automatically or if you I really like when when a game is beautiful and it's it's unique and it's not like you're not looking at the same thing all over so I've had so many beautifully

different worlds I've got one the moment in I'm on it I nomas go wit the islands look you know the land looks like mushroom shapes and the Brawn previously had these incredible kind of like cubes you know rock rock based tubes and it looks amazing of a and I look like I felt like I was in a new world so it can be beautiful procedural can't it I'm not convincing you a my bike gon burn my dreams why did you even why why this Oscar okay um procedural design oh absolutely not great you go ahead and hand design an endless-runner temple run every pixel placed by hand seriously okay well then maybe only procedural design wonderful do Monument Valley procedurally please seriously it depends on the game you want to do and you even left out a third option goodness maybe not procedural maybe not graphic artists but how about community content look at minecraft on the amount of money being

generated by users I'm not doing this [Laughter] so as a representative of a korean movie i believe that it's very good if players can be kept busy and they can spend a long time in your game but i also believe in the power of the grind and the level cap a level up and so we handcraft our games and increase the level cap all the time by putting in a new number in the spreadsheet and that's a very good way I'm keeping bridging the players busy it's all it takes is a design solve i think is all about the grind you just have to put in the time to level up just put in the time so with that in mind I'm the various views on some pepper but just don't do we think the procedural society is here to stay or should we just don't hands up if you think it's here to say how many think it shouldn't be done oh I'm sorry Mike but

it's here to stay rock bands in games ah I gained another one that came up you have to recuse yourself on this one I do you really do I really really do and again it was not my suggestion this one so as a port for full disclosure I am making rocky horror game if I haven't said it 15 times already I probably have so okay I'm kind of want this to work what people to like this stuff but you know obviously iron maiden is the one that comes to mind that was the one that was jetted um you know is this a good thing is this a good trend are we actually seeing something really exciting the idea of getting in a professional kind of amazing hugely popular rock and pop bands starting to get deeply involved in gaming content is that great for the industry or is there some problems that we're gonna see what do you think I worked at gameloft for a couple of years and I know they published a Paris Hilton

game like 10 years ago no but I don't James person it was a gem yes yeah something like that really like a shell muscle but no but I don't think it's a trend I think we will see it a lot in the future I think I think we already have seen it it's the soundtrack of games is more and more important than maybe but it's more depending on um on how people would like rock in general mmm yeah yeah my face and self anyone else getting views on that I would also add that it also depends on the budget of of your game as well yeah I mean that's the key thing isn't because I are we paying to have the license to have the band or are we building this game with the band how do you think you know if we're building it with the map know like if it is honest I hope is that we're building something from passion that they share whereas I think if you build a license I suspect

there's a disconnect at some level that could potentially make the game less interesting because I think you've got to make a game first don't you but making a game with a musical kind of theme has to at least have some connection some emotional connection to the music as well make sense Mike it may not be always a huge trend but it will always be a small trend because music will never cease to be an important part of our lives bands play that music and there will always be really creative ingenious developers could go out and find a new way of helping us interact with the particular two or three touch points of those bands play the music that's important to us he says so I think guitar hero metallica was really a good thing also just simply because Death Magnetic sounded better on it um I think it's very nice that rock band is coming back yeah um I'm not sure about the mating game but I feel like it

is very consistent with their weird event is a universe and I would really have loved to publish it yeah I know of at least one other a band that is going to come out with a similar game well maybe not similar but it's like the style is very very similar mmm but I'm worried that Kanye West will come out with his game and just make it like I was the biggest pop star and he'll just make like a one-million-dollar premium app and college it like jeezy whatever Christ and he would work with Adidas and then the app store will just implode I kind of like that idea though so with that a little Lewis yes so with that in mind do we think that rock bands in games is a fad for a trend if you think it's a sad please put your hand up now and those of you think is a trend

you know what I think we have our first [Music] but I think in I'll take that though I'll take that because that means it's gonna come keep popping back again anyway with games at six out there and it seems to have been a kind of crazy phenomenon from what I've seen a lot of my friends even my taxi driver on the way to the airport today was telling me a lot today when I carry on sunday was talking about him him and his kids playing six I find that he never talks about games he doesn't play games but these balance games do we think balance games as a new thing is that a new genres that new experience I mean I hope do you know the game six are we are you familiar with it I'll describe it for you just to be sure so basically you have a hexagon and you have Tetris like blocks and you explode the blocks and the idea is to keep the the hexagon on the pillar so its second

of one touch game kind of experience does this sound like something that would just immediately make you go bananas and amazed or is it is it just like a nice little kind of clever exercising no but i think the puzzle genre and in general is is really here to stay and and I also think they're there is actually a trend of new puzzle games like ghosts candy crush that's not only like the old I think we can see more and more in the developers looking at the at the puzzle game son to to find new new way of creating parcels and that's not just in the in the free-to-play that's more to like you've it thinking and problem solving in a very casual way and that's actually the games I like most to play when one like going on an airplane and then the minutes before it can take out your computer or or button or whatever

then it's very very handily handy and then yeah the inlay puzzles are usually also very very beautiful yeah actually that's what I love the way you taking that so well how do you feel young use that done that right is it is it really this just a symptom of a of a wider trend about you know intelligent you know well designed but yet simple to interact with gaming puzzles I have to say at completely agree what would you just said I ever loved puzzle games as well and I I love to see when there is a new puzzle game I've ever ever been seen before some new mechanic that I haven't seen before that's that's really cool and I her definitely hope that they're gonna stay I'm not super familiar with the balance puzzles but the puzzles in general yes to a puzzle games trend balance puzzles my I don't know yeah that's fair yeah I have no idea what you're talking about and I would like to go back to space games please so those are the someone's face gains

had narrowed into that okay I'm gonna I'm gonna go with it has interpretation of this that the innovative puzzles chain new puzzle types post can crush era I like that so i want to quote that somewhere i'm gonna write an article the post candy crush era of puzzles is that a fad or a trend those of us who think it's a fad but Hannah please okay space fans that we are those of us who think it's a trend oh I think that's carried it is a virtual reality I had to do it come on well I think my attorneys are gonna forbid me from actually answering this question so clearly there's a lot of people making virtual reality games when we discover how many people are going to have a particularity device in the next three years will they still be

making them that's the question in my mind now I personally think so but that's another subject will come back to why later ya know what do you think actually I think two things one is that there are so many really clever people out there right now trying to like crack the BR not to find out that like this superb mainstream game that everyone would like to buy a VR and such for to play and I'm really exciting just excited to see what they will come up with because I'm really trusting in these people that they will they will figure something out on the other hand I think sometimes we are expecting a bit too much out of ER we think like this will be like a very super exciting immersive experience and you need like a a

padded room to be able to find to be running and doing like everything you actually do in the game I think you should more see it as a sub as a better screen did you see it's just it's just a better screen you think Jana I think virtual reality is is really cool I actually have a room that it take their gated to VR at home yeah but you would but yeah I think I've seen many VR games that I think there's still a little bit it's still very early early days and it's very important that the first experience that you have is a good one because I saw it myself because the first virtual reality experience I had was two years ago on an early version of oculus I think it was i'm not sure but i didn't know really what to expect and they just said like put it on and like just walk and I did and I I became dizzy immediately and I was motion sick for

like an hour afterwards and ever since then when I somebody said like oh you should try this and I was no thank you because you don't really want to do something that makes you sick so it took years for me to to get persuaded that it's actually really cool I tried something else and that was that was good I don't know if you also have the AR their damn pick on you because the time I yeah so I I would say that that might be even a bigger trend for the future but virtual reality reality yes it's trying that it's cool cool Mike look at that face this is this is really hard I mean word laser discs and CDs and DVDs a stepping stone to streaming technology so were they just a fad as virtual reality is going to be a fad on the step to what you know 10 years from now we'll think was just duh obvious um or is really virtual reality the stepping stone to an augmented reality universe

something's going to change and if I knew what or when I'd probably have a different line of business I mean we're all gamers and most of us are probably also relatively hardcore gamers and when I played Eve Valkyrie for the first time a dream came true I was just like games this is how it has to be so again we have to go back to the space game space because that's what video games are all about all about so that's awesome I tired agree because that's exactly the the go-to game that converted me but then how long can you keep that up and how long can you shut yourself off from the world so I think pretty long it's yeah well not all of us are s you know strong as you oh yeah that's a fad but I mean kick so it's an awesome

experience but it's just going to have to evolve it's going to have to move through another three or four phases and then the device is going to have to be very different and maybe it's glasses maybe it's something else maybe it's going to be mixed reality not AR or we are maybe it's I don't know we're just not there yet we're not they unless my kind of view as well I think though they stopped like II buckler like said that was the one that really kind of when I first played it and I've played other sensor absolutely reinforced it and i think the magic thing for me was realization that actually it's a bit like Tesla cars right now we're in the only people who can get it a really the people are willing to spend lots of money on the kind of really elite sports version and so hardcore real passionate gamers who are willing to invest time money space life eating whatever into having this ultimate experience to be able to say I am a real gamer look at

me I have the concert I have the goggles I have everything ready to go I honestly think that's where we are at the moment and if if there's enough momentum from that hard core audience within three years we'll see the next devices that will generate a more mass market audience the mid-range as like as I'd like to think of it let me drain Tesla equivalent but it maybe it's a bit further out before we get the consumer tests or equivalent so that's kind of where I am on it asaf these guys do you think virtuality is a fad or a trend and everything is a trend and everything's a fad I think we have our answer so I'm gonna go for one more very quickly and I'm not gonna get that I'm gonna go to that one just because it's fun okay so court

clearly we have these incredible ways of telling narrative that can't be done for any other medium and we have games like this dragon cancer and various other things about my christian reads game about OCD there are these incredible story it's dugan particular you have a lot of people producing incredible materials that are about communicating ideas is the idea of game with a message something that's something that's incredibly important and is gonna stick with us or is it just designers spending too much time with their own egos what do you think i am going to be provocative that's the whole point of this format nobody actually actually you have a really good point because i'm i'm kind of tired of games with a message especially if they're not fun or enjoyable of course it can be a really good experience but it's sometimes like I have to like this game because it has a hard subject that is with a

sad story or something like that yeah is that game should be again should be fun game should be entertainment and and of course you can send a message while doing that but if you if you forget about the core about what gaming is it's it's it's an entertainment and it's it's like to providing stories that people will will of war or at least think about or making an impact about it then it shouldn't be done so basically if it's if it's just because it's a message that basically will something like that yeah yeah what do you think I also think that game should be primarily fun and if you manage to hide the message there somewhere slip it in so it's a secret chicken sneaking under my coat ego so if you're looking for it you can find it but it's not the core of the game my game play first absolutely gameplay first I mean but is it gonna be a trend well absolutely guys

can you imagine a world where no one has an ax to grind or a cause to champion I mean fun or not I don't think they're gonna go away because well yeah imagine there's no conflict daddy I think games are so relevant these days to popular culture everybody is playing you know pokemon go has the very simple message of just go outside so we and wait strangers so I managed to bring it up um I think give you five bucks like yeah I think we we have to address big issues in our games not all the time not like with a big sign not in a stupid way what the stuff that we are working on is consumed by so many people we can't just always be like yeah it's just a game don't worry we can kill them all we can do all kinds of who cares we can link their whole time shooting people that's gonna be great I saw a fantastic

student demo of the day which is basically a guy going down an alleyway beating people to death battle is the game grandeur chem i'm sure there can be a lot of fun and it doesn't maybe even nothing wrong with is I really bleak so is dynasty warriors and there's a new one every year and I really love it yes so but still we should sometimes you know say something that actually means something so we heard it here we'll games that say something that means something but is it a fad or a trend you decide if you think this is this idea of games where the message is a fad please put your hand up now if you think that games the message is a trend please we hand it now oh we have our winner there okay thank you very much and on that note now we have solved the world's problems through games and the messages that we can communicate with our wonderful medium I have to thank this panel for

their brilliant participation and hope you enjoyed the base thanks for much guys thank you [Applause] [Music] you