04/01/2013: GDC and TF2 Rant

Engineer: Hey, look buddy. I'm an engineer. That means I solve problems. Not problems like, "What is
beauty?," because that would fall within the purview of your conundrums of 'philosophy'. I solve
practical problems.

Game Developers Conference

After missing last weeks meeting due to GDC, Tyler returned to tell us all about this year's experience. This is a summary of what he talked about...

The Game Developers Conference is a collection of talks and showcases technology and concepts that are innovating the video game industry. Attending is not cheap, and so perhaps the best way to attend the event is to volunteer as a Conference Associate. Associate's get a (mostly) full-access pass just for working about 20 hours during the event. It is a superb way to meet other like-minded individuals, see new technologies and games, as well as networking with company owners, potentially for internships or jobs.

There were numerous talks about everything from Intel's perceptual computing technology to Blizzard technical artist's explaining inventive ways to texture particle effects. Unfortunately, Valve did not announce Half-Life 3. -_-

Team Fortress 2 Discussion

As a club, we finally managed to get around to our first "game-talk", Team Fortress 2. To drive our conversation Patrick took the front of the room with our esteemed leader, Livio. Since most people enjoy TF2 Patrick ~~ranted~~ focused on what he disliked about the game.

The fact that TF2 is a class based first person shooter really separates it from the mainstream fps's commonly found on consoles. The nature of a multi-player, class oriented game that receives updates from the developers causes "the meta" to change around. In this case if you take a break from playing it and come back you may be just as lost on how to play most effectively as a player new to the game. In addition to the unusual (or at least was) class system it also incorporates a % chance to crit. Personally, with guns, in a straight up first person shooter this doesn't make sense to me, but there's no reason they can't have it if they want it.

That all being said, Gabe Newell is quite the man. <3 Steam (and it's now on Linux). The source engine is very versatile and goofy nudging people towards a positive mood even when they lose.

If you haven't played Team Fortress 2 yet, then play it!!!!!!