Wonderland

Cosplay Piranha plant

Via Flickr, and from the Anime Expo.

Develop Evolve

Yesterday was Evolve, Develop's day for evolving, emerging and other-stuff from the main fodder of the conference. It's pretty safe to say that the day could be summed up as The iPhone and Facebook Day.

At least three competing talks were on the subject of social networks and how develops can tap into the large slavering mess of people on Facebook, who are just dying to play multiplayer-with-friends games - Zynga is the number one app developer on Facebook: they're the makers of Mafia Wars (and Gang Wars and Vampire Wars and Space Wars and... yes, you get the idea).

Stuart Dredge from PocketGamer did a lovely session identifying the cool things out there that we might have missed. Of his 20 examples, the room had probably heard of 3, so this was an excellent, info-rich look into the giant world of casual gaming - mainly iPhone, some Facebook, again - as done by 25 year old types while down the pub. Again, a reminder of the huge audiences out there beyond the XBox.

To wrap, David Edery did a fantastic job of covering the gamut of interesting things happening in the online world and where the long tail might help: his presentation is here. He covered digital distribution, premium downloadable content, long tail, AB testing, multiplayer solutions and Honda's little digital trophy that the car dashboard gives you if you drive efficiently.

Gaming the real world, oh, so huge...

We finished late, after Dave Green's Never Mind The Polygons. One of the games we played was Real or Fake: IGN reviewer comments!. This one I'm having framed:

 

It needs to be turned into cross-stitch and hung over the front door.

Capcom zombie tee

This is too good to just del.icio.us, so here's Kotaku pointing out that Capcom's promo Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles teeshirt is possibly the best promo shirt ever made:

"Let your darkside out" (groan), but wait:

Ta daaa! Um, I mean, arglglglarghghghgh!

Play with your food

Linn Søvig is hosting a play-with-your-food competition:

I'm a proud member of Spillpikene (the Norwegian name for game girls - yes we like to melt several words into one in Norway). [...] We've started a competition - our second one. And it's so lovely that I have to translate it for English readers!

Maren says:
Play with your food, and win a Spillpike t-shirte (homemade and lovely!)

To win one of these (indeed lovely) hipster shirts, all you have to do is play with your food - and make a games Thing out of it. I've totally done this before.

Check out the Patapon duh, Locoroco pancakey things that have already entered.

(Thanks Kim! and Faith!)

Develop tomorrow (and Weds and Thurs!)

I've posted briefly about this, but I'm chuffed to be going to Develop for all three days this time. What a treat! I'm doing a little talk at Tuesday's Games:Edu on Channel 4 and Indie Games, then that same evening joining smiley Dave Green's panel, Never Mind The Polygons:

19.00 Never Mind the Polygons Hosted by BAFTA's Dave Green
The Ambassador Room, Hilton Brighton Metropole
Never Mind the Polygons is a lively panel and game show discussion of today's game development issues, generally fuelled by alcohol and a large dose of bile. Using a lively quiz show format, Polygons gets game developers talking about the current  state of the industry.

Bile! That's me! No wait, that's beer. Maybe a bit of bile, why not.

Also, Thursday I'm doing a talk in The Den on public service gaming: that's a Women In Games thing, for which too I'm hosting a lunch on Thursday. The details for that are on Facebook somewhere, but to reprint what I got in the email:

Women in Games lunch
Time: Thursday 16th July, 12:00 onwards
Venue: Good Friends restaurant (Chinese), 24-25 Preston St.
How to get there: 0.2 mi from Develop. Exit the Hilton and turn right,
take the 4th right into Preston St. 4 mins walk.

A chance for women working in the industry to meet and network, just a
stone's throw away from the Hilton. Open to women of all games
industry sectors and disciplines, and to anyone interested in
supporting, investigating issues relating to, and celebrating gender
diversity in the industry.

Maybe see some of you there and about!

LBPL4D

All together now, awwwww:

Witch, Hunter, Boomer (bless), Smoker and TANK!

Via Offworld.

Fallout & L4D dressup

RT @Richard_Kadrey; Russian Fallout LARPG pics. http://bit.ly/12YXdy I'm waiting for @crystaltips to post LARPG L4D photos any day now.
about 13 hours ago from twhirl

jukevox

You got it, ole pal.

So here are the Fallout LARPers (don't call 'em cosplayers, they'll totally kill you deado):

That's pretty bloody hard to top. Although wait...

KAPOW.

(via The Escapist)

Cosplayers or LARPers, who wins?!

I'm quite fond of the russian paunch, I think that tips it for me, for authentic-ness. But the photoshoot is shake-head incredible.

Oh, and I also found a set of Zoeys who then (a bit predictably) strip down to bikinis. As you do when confronted with the zombie horde... *scratches head*.

Lovely things going on at the AnimeBoston Con

Judith Stephens has some fantastic pictures from the Anime Boston con.

Here's a thumbnail - see them all here.

The 99: comic superheroes inspired by Islam

Says the Guardian:

They are superheroes battling injustice and fighting evil the Islamic way, and they are teaming up with some of the west's biggest comic book icons. Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman are among those joining forces with The 99, who personify the 99 attributes of Allah, according to Islamic tradition.

What will unfold on the pages of the collaboration between DC Comics in the US and Teshkeel Comics in Kuwait is yet to be seen, but the appearance of The 99 – who already appear in comics in the Muslim world – alongside archetypal American heroes would have been unlikely during the Bush years.

Educational & Family games "most popular genre" (UK)

Brits are apparently very into self-improvement and wholesome family pastimes.
Says MCV:

Half-year sales figures show success of mass market and educational titles.

ELSPA and GfK-ChartTrack have this morning released UK video game sales results for the first half of 2009.

And thanks to Nintendo the numbers show that family games and educational titles are currently the most popular genre in the country.

Don't worry too much though, Killzone's at number 5.