GAME CITY 2007

Since last Thursday (25^th) until this Sunday evening (28^th) Nottingham has been host to Game City, a four day festival hosting a boat load of different video game related events and displays. Firstly I regret not going to as many as I could have, but I did end up a good number of shows and events including an exhibition put on by our very own Andy Love showcasing some interesting level design for the Unreal FPS game.

I also went along to a talk by Alexey Pajitnov, the creative mastermind behind probably the most played game in the world… Tetris! It was very interesting, talking about the mechanics behind Tetris and other puzzle games alike. I managed to ask him a few questions as well… he’s a big World of Warcraft fan so it seems and a really nice chap.

Nottingham's Market Square hosted a big tent with various consoles running inside, to be honest I wasn’t that impressed with the titles “on play”. The only game running that stood out for me was Guitar Hero, it’s been out for a while but this was my first exposure to the addictive button bashing, rhythmic frenzy that is Guitar Hero, such such fun!

I made some good contacts and swapped MSN addys with some guys from De Montfort University, Leicester, who were stewarding some of the events and are also studying games design, always good to know people in the field.

To round everything off myself and my girlfriend (Claire) managed to get our names on the guest list for a Microsoft party. Free beer, some freebies and I got my arse kicked on Gears of War (after spending 3 rounds out of 5 teaching my n00b opponent how to play, typical, I should have just PoWnEd him from the off) I had an awesome night and Claire won herself an Xbox 360 Elite in a prize draw… WOW!

I’m already looking forward to next years Game City and I really want to get involved, something that I am aiming to achieve.