GDC Online: BioWare Austin Contributes To Five Sessions [UPDATED]

Here at Ask A Jedi, we try to make our coverage of Star Wars: The Old Republic as comprehensive as we can. Most of the time it’s directly related to the game, and we really try not to wander too far off of that road (except of course, in our Off-TORpic column!)

But being the armchair game designers we are, we also like to follow BioWare’s developers in some of their other industry doings where we can. Wether it’s Damion Schubert and his regular contributions to Game Developer magazine, or attending industry conferences where various developers might be speaking or participating on a panel.

Every year in the fall, the Game Developers Conference holds court in Austin for their annual GDC Online show. As you might know, Austin just happens to be the city where BioWare Austin is located. :) Due to that, GDC Online usually gets some great participation from BioWare developers, and this year is no different – perhaps one of the best ever!

GDC Online has released their final schedule, and there are no less than four five sessions where BioWare Austin developers will be featured as presenters or panelists:

• Damion Schubert: Double-Coding: Making Online Games for Both the Casual and the Hardcore
• Georg Zoeller: Rapid MMO Content Iteration and Validation with Spatial Analysis in Star Wars: The Old Republic
• Erik Olsen: Full Immersion: Taking Your Game Everywhere
• Rich Vogel & Ken Shuck: What’s Beyond Agile?
• Hall Hood, Blake Rebouche and Wynne McLaughlin: Building a Bridge Between Design and Writing

Of particular interest is the panel Full Immersion: Taking Your Game Everywhere. BioWare’s Erik Olsen will be on a panel along with ZAM’s Cody Bye and Curse’s Hubert Thieblot. Up until now, BioWare has been mum on how or even if they would be providing access to Star Wars: The Old Republic in some manner outside of the game itself, wether from your smartphone, tablet or the web. It will be interesting to see what Olsen shows and/or discusses here, as it might give us our first glimpse of BioWare’s plans in this area. Will we get a Crew Skills app? Guild Chat? It remains to be seen.

Personally, I feel there is no more important feature for a modern MMO than the extension of it  outside of the game itself, and I can’t wait to see this panel.

Ask A Jedi will be in Austin next month for complete coverage, so don’t forget to check back! We may even come back with a few surprises from the Lone Star State! ;)