http://www.digitalgamedeveloper.com and http://www.gamespot.com. Attend the Game Developers
Conference that’s held each spring in northern California and E3 in southern California.
Check out the International Game Developers Association at http://www.igda.org. There are
organizations for game developers all over the world. Subscribe to game magazines.
Looking for work? Yes, there are agents who handle experienced game developers.
However, the average agency will not read your spec material unless an entertainment exec-
utive recommends you. When you feel you’re ready, you can sniff out work yourself. Many
of the game companies in the United States are in the Los Angeles area or in northern
California, but there are game opportunities worldwide. Contact game publishers and find
out what games they own. Call the game producers. Your best bet is to call the heads of
development at smaller boutique publishers. Usually, you can talk to them directly. Game
companies have not traditionally been union shops, and as a newcomer you’ll probably be
asked to do some preliminary writing for free in order to compete.
Some of the top game companies include Electronic Arts, Sony Computer Entertain-
ment, Nintendo, Activision, and Vivendi Universal Games. Among the more active are Take-
Two Interactive (includes TDK Mediactive), Atari, Eidos Interactive, Konami, Microsoft
Games Studios, and Sega. Then there are Ubisoft, Crave, THQ, Maxis, Origin, Codemasters,
Mythic, Midway Games, and Square Enix. This is a growing field, and advances in technol-
ogy make the industry ever changing.
Handheld Wireless Devices
The wireless age has hit big time globally. Cell phone users everywhere will be listening to
songs, motivating their exercise, reading news, watching sports highlights, entertainment, and
comics, and snapping and sending photos wirelessly. In Japan one service provides a virtual
girlfriend in cartoon form.
In 1997 Nokia produced a phone that allowed users to play a simple game called Snake.
Then in 1999 the I-mode was introduced in Japan, allowing customers to send and receive
data and pictures over their mobile phones. By 2001 an upgrade allowed games to be down-
loaded and run on the phone’s memory. Soon after, Nokia prepared to launch a real-time
TV phone in Europe. Cell phones in Asia were able to play forty seconds of animation by
- Graphics improved, and services were scheduled to provide daily comic strips for cell
phones in the United States.
Games are a big part of the wireless revolution. Handheld games can be played on the
run. They tend to be popular with subway commuters, travelers, people who have to wait in
lines, teens. Typically, games are played for no more than ten minutes at a time.
Phones can access the Internet and play simple games with online opponents or down-
load games like Bowling for users to play offline. Bowling became so popular at one large
U.S. corporation that it was banned from play during meetings. Some of television’s most
popular game shows are now available on mobile phones. However, with increasing power
and faster connection speeds the capabilities of wireless gaming continue to grow, and
MMOGs have wireless versions. Location-Based Gaming (LBG) allows players to play sce-
narios based on their geographic locale. Some emphasize collecting and trading. Inter-media
games are developing combining television and wireless.
To design wireless games, keep the technology in mind. Often the games use the phone’s
up, down, left, right, and OK buttons. The games should probably remain simple and easy
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