A couple of days ago, Tone and I attended the inaugural meeting of the IGDA (International Game Developers’ Association) Perth Chapter. It was a combined meeting with PIGMI (Perth Independent Game Makers’ Initiative), and I wonder how long the two entities will remain separate.
Perth IGDA is listed as a “StartUp” group on the IGDA Chapters page, and the (very new) Perth Chapter page consists mostly of a list of people and a link to a Google Groups newsgroup which you can join here. Anyone in Perth interested in making games should sign up to keep on top of “what’s going on”.
The meeting had a good turnout (around 40 people) and a fairly relaxed atmosphere. The GO3 Electronic Entertainment Expo 2007 (being held in Perth!) sponsored and helped organise the event and ISG (Information Security Group) were also sponsors and provided an LCD monitor as a raffle prize. A number of restaurants also provided door prizes (gift certificates).
Meeting Rundown
The meeting was at the Velvet Lounge near the Flying Scotsman in Mt. Lawley. Upon entering the venue, Tone and I were greeted by David Kazim (GO3 organiser) and directed to a table to pick up our name tags. Arranging the name tags were the GO3 Girls, two models wearing GO3 t-shirts tied up as crop tops. Tone had not RSVP’d so he didn’t get a name tag, but it didn’t seem to matter.
After a half hour or so of mingling, Chris McCormick from Hypercube started formal proceedings by introducing IGDA and PIGMI, thanking the sponsors, and passing the microphone to Paul Turbett from Benevolent Interactive. After briefly introducing himself, Paul talked about his experience at this year’s E3 (Electronic Entertainment Expo) and offered serious warnings about staying at a certain hotel in downtown L.A. (I can’t remember the name… I hope that doesn’t mean I’m doomed to repeat his mistake).
After question time, the rest of the evening was a “mixer” session dispersed by frequent door prize draws (none of which I won), and leading to a final raffle draw (which I also didn’t win), after which everyone slowly made their way home. My lack of winning had no real effect on my enjoyment of the evening.
Final Thoughts
It seemed that a lot of attendees weren’t buying (alcoholic) drinks, and hope that we bought enough to make the Velvet Lounge consider having us back. I know that Chris was doing his part! 😛
Will from walan was drinking Red Bull… I found that very slightly amusing. I guess there was no Jolt or (caffeinated) Mountain Dew. 🙂
I wonder if future events will also feature the GO3 Girls, and I’m concerned this might deter our female game developers from attending.
Update: The official meeting report is now online.