Montreal Tech Watch

The Montreal International Game Summit will be taking place this week, with hundreds of game designers, programmers, artists, executives, and academics descending on the Palais des Congrès (map) from around the world to share ideas and techniques. What’s exciting about the conference this year is that you don’t have to be an industry professional to attend some of the events.

This Wednesday, November 19, from 3pm to 7pm, the exhibition hall will be open to the public. Last year’s exhibition hall featured booths from companies such as Nintendo, Ubisoft, and Eidos. If you’re a student looking for a job at game development studio in Montreal, you’ll find the networking opportunities invaluable.

At 5:15pm Jonathan Blow’s closing keynote will also be open to the public. I would suggest reading about his keynote at last year’s MIGS before deciding if it’s something you’d consider leaving work early for. This year’s talk is titled “A fundamental conflict in contemporary game design” and promises to be just as searing a criticism of current game design practices as his last one was.

And then at 9pm the doors of the SAT (map) will open for experimental design group Kokoromi’s GAMMA 3D. $5 at the door will get you admission and a pair of 3D glasses. Several experimental stereoscopic, or 3D-glasses-required, games were created for this event, but with the caveat that the pop-out 3D elements had to impact the gameplay in some way and not just be eye candy. The most unique games you’ve probably ever played, everyone in stereoscopic glasses, and beer. I’ll see you there.

You can read more about Kokoromi and GAMMA 3D in an article in this week’s Mirror, also available online.