Austin GDC (Everything is Better in Texas)

Our primary web developer for the GarageGames site is from Texas, and besides the fact that he says "ya'll" more than is healthy, he likes to tell me how awesome his home state is. Last week was my first trip ever to Texas for the Austin Game Developer Conference, and I have to say, we definitely had a rockin' time at the Live Music Capital of the World. I don't know if it was the city itself, the fact that we drank more mojito than water, or that we had such a great crowd at our booth the whole time that made the trip so fantastic, but the conference was a huge success for us.


Ken Holst's normal facial expression, plus mojito
So what makes a conference a success? One might think it's just raw sales, but honestly, for the expense we put down on a conference, it would be a lot cheaper to run an online ad campaign than to take up so many people's time. For GarageGames, it's more about the chance to talk to people face-to-face about what we're doing. For instance, take our recent announcement of TGEA now working on a Mac. We could have just announced that through press releases and blogs, but it is MUCH more powerful to have it running in a booth and having Matt Fairfax, who has been in charge of this project for months, answering questions in the flesh. That kind of interaction just cannot be replicated online.


Matt Fairfax really knows how to work a crowd in the booth
The second measure of success for us is to see Torque game projects in action. I pride myself on knowing about most of the games that have been created with Torque, but that illusion is always shattered when I discover new projects at conferences. Take Perfect Dork Studios, who has been made apps for clients like Right Guard and BP Oil.


They may be dorks, but they are also perfect
Like many small studios, what Perfect Dork really wants to do is create their own games, which is why they've been using Torque X to create Box Macabre. In this game, your soul has been trapped in a box, and you must jump, swing, roll and fly your way through a bunch of different levels in this platform adventure. Perfect Dork used our booth to both showcase their game and run a viral marketing campaign with little origami boxes. It was great to see people come to our booth asking about Box Macabre.


It's my soul in a box! Box Macabre, that is.
And our final measure of success is probably the best one of all: to meet Torque developers! I had the chance to meet a lot of people in our community, including Associates, frequent posters, and lurkers. We had a pretty full party going on at not-IGC, and although I took a look of pictures, my favorite one is me standing next to Donald Harris, someone whom I've got to know through the GG community, but never actually met in real life. He's a self proclaimed "spot light junkie," so Donald, this pic's for you!


There's a Sesame Street song about opposites in this picture, I just know it...
So that's it for our little Texan adventure. Thanks for supporting GarageGames, and see ya'll next year in Austin!