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Summit speaker and sponsor Mike Worth of Game Music Inc talked to nycgameindustry.com about the upcoming GameX Industry Summit (a GCECS partner) and the Philly video game industry. 

The first annual GameX Industry Summit is coming up next month and it’s looking to be quite an event. We took a moment to sit down and chat with the summit’s show producer Mike Worth about why you should take notice.

NYCGI: Thanks for taking the time to chat with us. Can you tell us a bit about your role at the GameX Industry Summit?

MW: I’m the show producer for the GameX Industry Summit, working with Fiona Cherbak and Tristin Hightower. I’m responsible for working with the steering committee to put together the content and speakers for the GameX Summit. After that (which we’ve just finished), I’m spreading the word to the industry about our summit, and encouraging them to attend.

NYCGI: Recently there’s been a lot of talk about establishing a stronger industry presence here on the East Coast. What does GameX Industry Summit mean for East Coast Game Development and how is it helping us grow?

MW: I think the GameX Industry Summit has several representations for the East Coast. First, it’s the first time we’ve had such a strong social and professional interaction between 5 game development areas. Boston, New York, New Jersey, Philadelphia, and Baltimore have all pooled their passion and resources to put this conference together. I think this speaks powerfully about the drive and passion of our 5 cities. What this has also done is fostered more communal cross-pollination between our cities. Philly game pros have been attending the Baltimore IGDA events run by Tronster Hartley, and  New York game pros have attended Darius Kazemi’s Boston Game Loop, for example.

This kind of cross-support has never happened in the North East game dev community before, and it’s absolutely wonderful!  Finally, the GameX Summit is showing that the East Coast game development industry is not only a vibrant, high-quality section of the game industry (hey, we already knew that!), but that the East Coast brings its’ own style and approach to solving creative and business issues with creating games. I think that there is definitely a style to East Coast games, and our summit, through its’ speakers and sessions, is showing that. Not that we only have East Coast’ers in the summit, of course!

NYCGI: Sounds great. That being said, what sort of things can attendees expect to see/learn at the event?
MW: This summit is definitely an “industry to industry” summit. The attendees will all be industry professionals, and the content will be tailored as such. Basically, the sessions and speakers are really focusing on solving specific problems (like creating realistic rag-doll physics), or laying groundwork for future innovations (like new monetization schemes for online games). The best part about our sessions is that the speakers focused on creating specific, easily-usable and easily-remembered takeaways from their sessions. We felt that the most important value from a session was that the attendee could remember and immediately apply the concepts to their own game project or company.

NYCGI: Are there going to be any cool after parties you can tell us about?
MW: Heh. You read my mind! We have two really cool after parties. First, because GameX Industry Summit is in conjunction with the consumer-focused GameX Media Expo, our industry people have full access to the consumer event. Aaaandd… the consumer event is having a VIP-only party on Friday night (October 23). This party will have executives from the major video game, film, and television presenters at the conference; and, any Industry Pass holder is invited to the party! Who-hoo!

The second party is an industry-only party on Saturday night (October 24). This party is being held at this awesome indoor “playground”, with indoor go-cart racing, hundreds of arcade games (from 8 bit classics up to Soul Caliber 3 and Rock Band), and a Laser Tag Arena! And, right next to it is a “industry hang” party room, where we can relax from the day, and listen to two video game bands; the One-Ups, and Big Daddy and the Splicers (featuring the composing team from Game Music Inc.). Oh, and did I mention free alcohol?

NYCGI: That sounds awesome, how many people are expected to attend?

MW: We expect to get about 300 industry attendees from all over the country. I have already had some friends from LA and San Francisco that are coming in. It’s going to have a really cool, intimate feel, with the ability to hang out and network with major industry players, as well as some of the top talent from game development studios up and down the east coast. It’s going to be awesome!

NYCGI: Since this is the New York City game development site we’d be lying if we said we weren’t curious… so why is this event located in Philly?

MW: Philly turned out to be a great place for this event to happen, for several reasons. First, the cost to put on the summit here is very reasonable, so we were able to get a lot of bang for our buck in Philly. In general, Philly has a very reasonable standard of living; we’re a lot cheaper than LA or San Francisco!
Second, Philly is perfectly positioned as a central “social hub” for game developers to come. We are a 2 hour drive from NY, NJ, and Baltimore, and a 2 hour flight from Boston, Research Triangle, and Atlanta. It’s so convenient for anyone to get here, it became a natural fit. Finally, Philly has a committed and excited presence to develop the video game industry in it’s’ city. Our city government has been working with universities such as Drexel University, and groups such as VGI Philly to promote and grow the video game industry here. So, the conference is another way that we can “show the brotherly love”!

NYCGI: We hear that! Speaking of VGI Philly, there’s been a lot of talk recently about how the Philly community is working together to help entice new developers to the area. There are similar initiatives springing up in various cities all along the eastern seaboard, including New York, however it seems that Philly is ahead of the game and really starting to see some positive results. Can you tell us more about this new Video Game Initiative (VGI) you’re apart of in Philly?

MW: The VGI (Videogame Growth Initiative) Philadelphia is a group that was formed by several professional game developers in the Philadelphia area. Our mission is to promote, grow, and support the video game industry in Philadelphia. Basically, we all love our city, and the surrounding areas, want to develop games that we love (from flash all the way up to AAA MMO’s), and want to work with our friends on projects we love in our favorite city! We realized that we have a ton of talent here in Philadelphia, from top students at Drexel and UPenn, to industry pros that have moved back from the west coast to set up families, to people like myself, who have never left the city, and are building our business remotely. So, the only thing that was stopping the growth of the video game industry in Philly was that no one had “connected all the parts” yet. And, that’s what we’re doing!
We are connecting every core sector of Philadelphia to develop our industry. From government to universities, existing studios to incoming studios, through our media partners and our connections to investors, we are putting all the right parties in touch with one another, and so far, the momentum has been amazing! We’ve already started to bring in our first set of studios to talk to Philadelphia, as well as having seen several “homegrown” studios set up shop here. And, we already have two flagship studios here: AMI Entertainment, focusing on touch-screen bar games, and Burst Online, focusing on MMO development. Basically, it’s a great time to be a game developer in Philly!

NYCGI: Sounds like it’s a good time to be a game developer on the East Coast! Positive growth in Philly can only result in great things for us all and we support what you’re trying to do. Thanks so much for speaking with us today!

[Editors Note] In other news it has also been recently announced that IGDA members can receive a special discount when registering.  For more information about this discount and to purchase tickets to the event please visit this link: http://gamexpo.us/summit/pass.html
To learn more about the GameX Industry Summit please visit the official event website at: http://gamexpo.us/summit/