Category: Blog

This is the highly informal blog of the GAME-department. We use it mostly to document the things we do outside of running one of the worlds strongest game educations. For information about our education, programs and courses, check the official site at Uppsala University.

Posted on - 1 Comment on The International Research School of Game Design
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The International Research School of Game Design

Prof. Steven Bachelder at the Gotland Game Conference 2011
Prof. Steven Bachelder at the Gotland Game Conference 2011

Presentation
SATURDAY, MAY 28TH, 10:00

IRSGD
The newly founded research school; The International Research School of Game Design (IRSGD) is a result of collaboration between Gotland University and the University of Uppsala.

Researchers and PhD students from around the world are gathered from a variety of academic disciplines around common interests and overlapping areas of inquiry. Their backgrounds stretch from professors and senior lecturers in HCI, AI, IA (Intelligent Agents), Image Processing, Motion Capture, Computer Science, and senior professionals from the game industry. The IRSGD has currently six PdD students. The IRSGD is directed towards the investigation and development of game design and its relevance and application in facilitating the advancement of other areas.

STEVEN BACHELDER
Steven Bachelder holds a professorship in artistic expression in convergent media at the University of Gotland where he cofounded the game design education in 2001. Today he is subject responsible for Expression in Convergent Media at the Institution for Game Design, Technology and Learning and is the appointed chair for the International Research School of Game Design instituted in collaboration with Uppsala University.

Bachelder has been teaching in the interactive arts and convergent media since its origin. He has been involved in major international exhibitions such as “Deposition”, Venice Biennial and
“Øtherlands, Description of the Equator and some OtherLands”, Documenta X, Kassel.

His profile in the arts is in creating large participatory immersive environments shifting the focus from the art object to the participation and cognitive processes of the viewer. Bachelder´s focus in games research is upon defining the core essence of game design and its potential as a new art form.

Prof. Steven Bachelder at the Gotland Game Conference 2011

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Closing in on Gotland Game Conference

The entire university is buzzing with energy. Everyone knows we’re just a few days away from the GGC. These are the best weeks of any big project; when all ideas and plans are rapidly falling in to place like a good game of Tetris. Here’s some photos from the run up to our most important event yet!

New events require new stuff. Start with getting rid of the old! Throwing out old, heavy, ugly arcade cabinets is very therapeutic… 🙂

Then, build some new hotness:

The animation students are hard at work too:

Speaking of animation students, check out the sign they created for the Cinema-portion of GGC:

And here it is, printed and cut-out:

These are all characters from the animation projects this year. Brilliant, ne? I look forward to seeing that beast in place at the GGC. 🙂

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Royal visitors

Her Royal Highness Victoria – Crown Princess of Sweden – and her husband Prince Daniel spent a day on Gotland today. Naturally they couldn’t ignore the presence of a certain unique and rather successfull game development education. 🙂

Victoria and Daniel recieved a live demonstration of our motion capture studio and met with several of our student entrepreneurs. Max Tiilikainen from Meow Entertainment, Marcus Petersson from Lucid Dreams and sisters Albertina and Pernilla Sparrhult from Digital Nature all showcased their work.

Posted on - 1 Comment on What happened to the GGA?
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What happened to the GGA?

Gotland Game Awards has been re-fashioned as the Gotland Game Conference.

What has changed? The short story is that the amazingly extravagant awards ceremony of the past couple of years has been replaced with more meaningful content; lectures, discussion panels and industry collaborations. We’re modelling the event closer to the international Game Developers Conferences, rather than the Oscars. 😀 Our goal is to create a better space to learn, find inspiration, connect and network.

We still have a huge public exhibition of games and animations. We still bring in experts from all over the world to play, examine and give feedback to the students. We still have a great party planned for the last evening. But we’re also opening the exhibition floor to sponsors, partners and industry. We’re having jurors perform double duty – both spending quality time with our students and giving public talks and hosting discussion panels. The focus is no longer handing out awards but rather to talk, listen and learn.

Expect a more diverse jury than ever – more journalists, more publishers, more moving pictures people, more researchers and more diversity. It is still too early to start dropping names of all attending talent, the list is still very much in flux but we’re making good progress. The website is a timeline (scroll left to go back in time), publishing names and faces as we confirm speakers, exhibitors, partners and jurors.

Stay tuned and get in touch!