Had a great time in SF this past week. As can be expected, I was flooded with data that will take some time to digest fully, but one thing is certain: We’re moving the right direction. The games industry is undergoing one of the biggest shifts ever, probably bigger even than arcade -> home entertainment consoles, and a lot of people are unprepared for (and unaware of) it. The next 3 years will be incredibly disruptive… although I’m not proclaiming that console developers will just disappear, of course not, but looking at the field of developers that have ceased operations in the current generation of hardware alone, it seems unsustainable for most. From everything I see, the enormous shift to social, mobile, and tablet platforms is beginning.  And based on personal experience with piracy (even on consoles), server-based and session-authenticated gaming is the only way forward for a lot of companies, and the vast shift away from packaged goods/single-sale games is already happening. 3D in a browser is also coming more quickly than anticipated, thanks to Unity and Flash 3D and even Google’s OpenGL solution, which puts higher end gaming in much smaller and simpler devices by the start of 2012. The main limiting factor: quality input devices. Without an analog thumbstick and proper push buttons, platforms just feel squishy. So many games are simple because Flash really only gives you a single button and pointer position for input. As I said, the next few years will bring many changes, and for once I think we’re already swimming the same direction as the wave hits rather than trying to make it to shore after the fact.

And in seven days, we’re supposed to put up our first Alpha web project.

JH

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