Off to PAX
I fly off to Seattle in a few hours, barring rain. It will be my first time ever at PAX, and I am looking forward to seeing what the hubbub is about. I will be carting some of my tabletop games with me, so if you run into me, ask about them and you may get to play one spontaneously.
I will also be talking twice. For those who haven’t noticed, there’s a little events widget on the sidebar now over to the right, listing upcoming speaking gigs. But I’ll try to be good and post about them on the blog too, since I have been neglecting it quite badly lately.
In any case, I’ll be talking at PAX Dev — for which there are apparently still tickets — giving the closing keynote. It’ll be on game grammar:
In our closing session, A Theory of Fun for Game Design author and Ultima Online designer Raph Koster introduces us to the subject of game grammar. This is a formal lens for looking at game designs, a way to think about how games work and how the parts fit together, and how to examine them for balance, tuning, and even fun before you build them.
I am still shaping the talk, but I am trying to keep it from being dry. 🙂
After that, I have a few days to check out PAX proper, and then I will be on this panel on the last day:
Damnation or Salvation: Online Games and Human Society @ Sphinx Theater
Aug 31 @ 11:30 am – 12:30 pm
From ganking culture to social movements and fundraisers, there is no question that online gaming has a significant effect on the societies we live in. Gaming without barriers has worked to broaden our social horizons and is a great leveler of race, creed, religion, age, gender, and economic or social status. Where is it leading? Will online games help human societies evolve in understanding and mutual support, or are we damned to raise generations of increasingly enabled griefers and trolls?
Panelists:
Linda Carlson [Director / Community Relations, Trion Worlds Inc.], Holly Longdale [Executive Producer for EverQuest / EverQuest II, Daybreak Games], Rich Weil [Senior Vice President, Metaverse Mod Squad], Brooks Brown [VP of Digital Development, Lightstorm Entertainment], Jo Burba [Live Director for Elder Scrolls Online, Zenimax Online Studios], Raph Koster [Virtual Community Expert/Author, Altered Tuning, LLC]
9 Responses to “Off to PAX”
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@raphkoster game grammar?
@raphkoster just read the article… man, I’d love to attend. Someday 🙂
have fun!
Hope I have a chance to say hi.
Very excited that I’ll be able to attend at least one of @raphkoster ‘s talks (only at #paxprime on Monday) http://t.co/Q5W1KgGPG7
@raphkoster Oh, hey, my game’s president/tech lead is going to be there. I’ll make sure he attends.
@raphkoster I think minigames have a real place in MMOs – long as they’re not Towers of Hanoi. Star Citizen will be doing something
@raphkoster and Wildstar had Mastermind, but it feels like there’s space for something more.
RT @raphkoster: Off to PAX, talking twice (game grammar, game culture) http://t.co/P14H0ynQKr
“Where is it leading?” Hopefully to game developers and publishers learning to take responsibility for how players have and are able to use game tools to indulge their aberrant behaviour, instead of just calling it emergent game play and looking the other way because it would be too costly to track down the code and fix it, or impose a harsh penalty for breaking the tos. Similar imv to how governments look the other way with certain industries that we are now finding have poisoned the well, in a manner of speaking.