Search Results
Your search for "king" returned the below results for sessions and speakers.
Speaker: Lauranne Cauduro (The Game Bakers)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Marketing
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Thomas Reisenegger (Future Friends Games)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Marketing, Independent Development
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Hot Topics:
N/A
Track:
Design
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Cisco Maldonado (Midwest Games)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Business Strategy, Marketing
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Gina Hope (Riot Games)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Luminaries Speaker Series
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Will Martins (Sony Music)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Audio
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Speakers: Mikyle Mosquera (Blizzard Entertainment), Hudson Janow (Blizzard Entertainment), Isabel Merced Galindo (Blizzard Entertainment), Lance Haugh (Blizzard Entertainment)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Career
Audience Level:
Entry-Level
Format:
Microtalks
Speaker: Cole O'Brien (Respawn Entertainment)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Visual Art, Programming
Audience Level:
Intermediate
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Bronislav Sviglo (Wargaming)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Business Hall Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Programming
Audience Level:
Advanced
Format:
Lecture
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Career, Narrative & Performance
Audience Level:
Entry-Level
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Kristie Fisher (Sony Interactive Entertainment)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Career, Production & Team Leadership
Audience Level:
Intermediate
Format:
Lecture
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Audio, Visual Art
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Drew Vande Guchte (Riot Games)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Business Strategy, Production & Team Leadership
Audience Level:
Entry-Level
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Lindsay Grace (Higher Education Video Game Alliance, Mindtoggle Consulting, University of Miami,)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Design, Culture & Sustainability
Audience Level:
Advanced
Format:
Lecture
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Audio, Design
Audience Level:
Intermediate
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Jeff Hesser (Slow Monkey)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Visual Art, Production & Team Leadership
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Workshop
Speaker: Scott Crabtree (Happy Brain Science)
Pass Type:
Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass
Track:
Production & Team Leadership, Culture & Sustainability
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Workshop
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Marketing, Production & Team Leadership
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Ryo Watanabe (BANDAI NAMCO Studios Inc.)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Audio
Audience Level:
Intermediate
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Jackson Keller (Insomniac Games)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Visual Art
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Career, Culture & Sustainability
Audience Level:
Entry-Level
Format:
Roundtable
Speakers: Stephen Brown (Archetype Entertainment), Max Meisel (Archetype Entertainment), Nathan Grigg (Archetype Entertainment)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Audio
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Stef Wu (ArenaNet)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Hot Topics:
Monetization
Track:
Business Strategy, Design
Audience Level:
Intermediate
Format:
Lecture
Speakers: Lucas Immanuel (Glootschke Games), Thomas Mackinnon (Solo), Joe Buchholz (Cobysoft Co.), Lucy Blundell (Kinmoku), Chris Kohler (Digital Eclipse / Atari), Davey Wreden (Everything Unlimited Ltd.)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Design, Narrative & Performance
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Microtalks
Speaker: Em Halberstadt (A Shell in the Pit)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Audio, Independent Development
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Speakers: Debbie Gonzalez (Sound Lab a Keywords Studio), Khris Brown (Vox Point LLC), Hillel Teplitzki (Freelance), Emmanuel Lagumbay (Interleave / ArenaNet), David Fairfield (Fairfield Audio Inc)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Audio, Career
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Panel
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Narrative & Performance, Business Strategy
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Ask Me Anything
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Production & Team Leadership
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Roundtable
Speakers: Toiya Kristen Finley (Schnoodle Media, LLC), Michelle Clough (Talespinners Studio), Jennifer Allaway (Independent), Matthew Weise (Freelance), Zaire Lanier (Independent)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Narrative & Performance, Career
Audience Level:
Entry-Level
Format:
Forum
Speakers: Grant Shonkwiler (Shonkventures LLC), Veronica Peshterianu (System Era), Justin Anderson (Magic Tavern), Kasey Mulot (37Degrees Studio), Benjamin Schwartz (Microfun)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Production & Team Leadership
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Microtalks
Speakers: Michael Lee (Bit Bridge / Another Axiom), Coby West (22nd Century Toys), Daniel Lin (Bit Bridge / Schell Games / Ludoko Studios), Tim Cullings (Seattle Indies)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Culture & Sustainability, Independent Development
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Forum
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Audio
Speaker: Sebastoan Long (Player Research)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Production & Team Leadership, Business Strategy
Audience Level:
Intermediate
Format:
Roundtable
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Narrative & Performance, Design
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Roundtable
Speaker: Marcelo Sequeira (GamerSafer)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Hot Topics:
UGC
Track:
Independent Development, Production & Team Leadership
Audience Level:
Intermediate
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Shannon Cha (Red Spring Studio)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Business Strategy
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Speakers: Anna C. Webster (Independent), Alexa Ray Corriea (Gearbox), Ashley Poprik (Independent), Adam Dolin (Turtle Rock Studios), Lis Moberly (The Walt Disney Company, 20th Century Games), Alice Camp (Microfun), Emma Kidwell (Independent), Stephen Rhodes (Electronic Arts), Kelsie Mhoon (Obsidian Entertainment), Sam Winkler (Geartbox Software), Sam Maggs (Critical Role), Aysha U (Independent), Nessa Cannon (Independent), Benjamin Schwartz (Microfun), April MacArthur (Gearbox Entertainment)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Narrative & Performance
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Portfolio Review
Speakers: Sam Maggs (Critical Role), Alexa Ray Corriea (Gearbox), Judy Alice Lee (Independent), Briana White (Independent), Khris Brown (Khris Brown Voice), Amanda Rose Smit (Independent)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Narrative & Performance
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Panel
Speakers: Star Victoria Power (Slide20XX), Noa Beazley (Independent), Karina Pardus (Coy Compositions), Katelyn Isaacson (Ludogram/Freelance), Avril Martinez (Independant), Kobe Anthony (MEMODEMO)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Audio
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Roundtable
Speaker: Hannah Mackintosh (Saltworks Entertainment)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Marketing, Visual Art
Audience Level:
Intermediate
Format:
Lecture
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Production & Team Leadership
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Roundtable
Speaker: Bernard Rodrigue (Audiokinetic Inc.)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Audio
Audience Level:
Advanced
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Ryan Fontenot (Independent Game Developer)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Career, Culture & Sustainability
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Workshop
Speaker: Raja Ghosh (Remedy Entertainment)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Visual Art, Design
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Vladimir Katchadourian (Ubisoft)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Programming
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Noor Amin (Riot Games)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Career
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Microtalks
Speaker: Radka Fléglová (Warhorse studios)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Production & Team Leadership
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Speakers: Michelle Clough (Talespinners), Aubrey Isaacman (Independent), Souha Al-Samkari (Truant Pixel), Susan Lau (Freelance), Dev Presbury (Red Spring Studio), Dani Dee (Split Fate Studios), Danielle Lalonders (Veritable Joy Studios), JiaLing Pan (Crunchyroll (Games Vault)), Arden Ripley (Independent), Ashley Ruhl (Broadsword Online Games), Adanna Nedd (Independent)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Design, Narrative & Performance
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Microtalks
Speaker: Jeff Hanna (NVIDIA)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Visual Art, Programming
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Roundtable
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Hot Topics:
Mobile
Track:
Marketing, Culture & Sustainability
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Valeriia Kramp (Owlcat Games)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Hot Topics:
UGC
Track:
Marketing
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Carla Rylance (XDS Spark)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Business Strategy, Production & Team Leadership
Audience Level:
Intermediate
Format:
Lecture
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Hot Topics:
International
Track:
Career
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Production & Team Leadership
Audience Level:
Advanced
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Elizabeth Kilmer (Take This)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Culture & Sustainability, Career
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Matthew Strasser (Insomniac Games)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Audio, Production & Team Leadership
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Matthew Lee (NVIDIA)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Hot Topics:
AI
Track:
Luminaries Speaker Series
Audience Level:
Advanced
Format:
Lecture
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Programming
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Roundtable
Speaker: Kieran Crimmins (Fuse Games)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Production & Team Leadership, Design
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Chris Zukowski (HowToMarketAGame.com)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Marketing, Business Strategy
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Anton Johnsson (King)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Hot Topics:
Mobile
Track:
Design, Business Strategy
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Roc Lee (Clean Cuts Interactive)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Hot Topics:
AI
Track:
Audio, Programming
Audience Level:
Intermediate
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Atsushi Inaba (PlatinumGames Inc.)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Hot Topics:
International
Track:
Luminaries Speaker Series
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Audio
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Lecture
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Hot Topics:
International
Track:
Independent Development, Marketing
Audience Level:
Intermediate
Format:
Lecture
Speaker: Euna Park (Skydance New Media)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Visual Art, Culture & Sustainability
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Roundtable
Speaker: Katy Kellenberg (Constellation Creative)
Pass Type:
Academic Pass, Festival Pass, Game Changer Pass, Indie Pass, Start-Up Pass
Track:
Narrative & Performance, Career
Audience Level:
All
Format:
Roundtable
Title: Founder
Company: Plus Arcade
Jabari Alii is a developer, director, and community leader whose work in gaming spans AAA studios, indie studios, national nonprofits, and entertainment companies. He recently served as Oakland director for The Hidden Genius Project and as systems designer on The Walking Dead: Saints & Sinners – Chapter 2: Retribution for Skydance Interactive. Jabari is now programs and partnerships director at Hack the Hood and the founder of Plus Arcade, an entertainment company delivering large-scale social events around gaming, animation, and nerd culture. He has led workshops and talks at major events including AfroTech, San Diego Comic-Con, and the Game Developers Conference (GDC). He is also an indie developer with two games slated for release in 2027.
Title: Composer
Company: MEMODEMO
Kobe Anthony (also known as MEMODEMO) is a composer known for his signature sound full of colorful synth lines, Early 2000's inspired microsampling, and healthy doses of misdirection. He has written music for League of Legends, UNBEATABLE, Homestuck, Muse Dash, Arcaea, and much more. When he is not working on games, he loves to write electronic music on the side. His ongoing concept album series, METRO JAMMERS, serves as an expansive love letter for many of his favorite games.
Title: Tools Programmer
Company: Square Enix
Joshua Anthony is a Tools Programmer at Square Enix, working on innovative QA automation tools. He wrote the "Bug Classification and Data Analysis" section of the book "Square Enix's AI", released in Japan in 2024.
Title: Narrative Designer
Company: Perfect Garbage
Luca is a game writer and narrative designer. He is currently working as a Narrative Designer on Grave Seasons at Perfect Garbage Studios, and has worked on projects like Borderlands 4 at Gearbox Software.
Title: Composer
Company: Independent
Noa Beazley is a Boston-based multi-instrumentalist and composer for games. Her work includes games like Protodroid DeLTA and A Token War, and she's currently working on the games A Baby CEO?! and Phosfi. When she's not writing music, she teaches game scoring at Berklee, serves on the board of directors of Boston Game Dev, and speaks at venues like SXSW, GDC and PAX. Her work also includes collaborations with companies like Universal Production Music and The Golden Joystick Awards.
Title: Community Manager
Company: SYBO
Hanna Berggren is a Community Manager at SYBO, the mobile games studio behind Subway Surfers. She leads community and creator initiatives for Subway Surfers and Subway Surfers City, working across social media, influencer marketing, and community engagement to support one of the world's most widely played mobile games.
With five years of experience across marketing, social media, and community management, Hanna has led major influencer campaigns, supported esports events, and managed social channels reaching over 30 million followers. She also runs the Subway Surfers Creator Club, SYBO's creator ambassador program.
Originally from Sweden and now based in Copenhagen, Hanna is a passionate gamer who enjoys everything from RuneScape and The Sims to Animal Crossing, Baldur's Gate, and the occasional quick Fortnite match.
Title: Music Composer & Technical Music Designer
Company: Two Feathers Studio AB
Elvira Björkman is one of the music composers in the multi-award-winning composer duo Two Feathers. She's a composer with extensive experience of technical music implementation, including programming, and a deep understanding of a game project's needs, both in planning and execution. Her work spans various genres, from fantasy symphonic pieces to metal music, and for the past 14 years of working in the games industry, she's worked for both indies and AAA companies, including game titles such as Metal: Hellsinger, League of Legends, Warhammer Vermintide 2, Aragami, Angry Birds 2, and many more.
Title: Principal Technical Designer
Company: Bit Reactor
Ever since he was a kid playing Commander Keen, games have been a huge part of Zach's life. That passion has led to a decade long career working on some of the largest games of the generation, from Spider-Man 2018 to God of War: Ragnarok. He's a UI specialist, building menus, maintaining architecture, and helping design long term progression and retention systems. With Star Wars: Zero Company, he's had the wonderful opportunity to directly contribute to his favorite genre of Tactical Turned Based games and is thrilled at where the genre is headed next.
Title: Executive Director
Company: Take This, Inc
Tara J. Brannigan is a veteran games industry leader with more than two decades of experience helping studios build stronger relationships with their players through community, player experience, and live-service leadership. Throughout her career, she has led community engagement, player support, and customer experience initiatives for companies including Microsoft Xbox, PopCap Games, PikPok, Behaviour Interactive, and Stoic, partnering closely with development teams to launch, grow, and sustain successful games.
Today, as Executive Director of Take This, Tara works with game studios, publishers, and industry leaders to advance mental health and well-being across the games ecosystem. She helps organizations create healthier workplaces, foster more resilient development teams, and build player communities grounded in trust, inclusion, and long-term engagement.
Outside of work, Tara can be found whittling away at her crushing Steam backlog, tinkering on jewelry projects, taking too many cat pics, and spending too much time on Bluesky talking about esoteric metalsmithing techniques.
Title: Voice Director
Company: Vox Point LLC
Khris (she/they) has been working in VO for games, animation, and film for over 30 years. As a founding member of the Lucasfilm Games Voice Department, she pioneered the beginning of the Games VO industry, casting, directing, and leading a team of editors to create the gold standard for voice production. She has worked on numerous Academy-Award nominated films and an Emmy-award winning animation series through Skywalker Sound, and is credited in BAFTA, VGA, Golden Joystick, and countless other award-winning titles from LucasArts, Double Fine, Ubisoft, EA, Activision, Blizzard, Telltale, and more. She most recently won a Peabody Award as the Casting & Performance Director for the game "We Are OFK." She founded the Narrative Talent Group at Ubisoft Montreal and the Voice Department at Double Fine Productions, and continues to work on multiple groundbreaking, innovative projects each year.
Title: Studio Audio Director
Company: Archetype Entertainment
I began making games when I was a sophomore in High School. I wrote several games in Hypercard on an Apple IIe. At Texas A&M University, College Station, I graduated with a B.S. in Computer Science (Engineering) and a Music minor. I began working as an audio intern at Midway Austin in 2008. After a couple years I moved to Seattle where I worked at Monolith/WB Games, Gas Powered Games/Wargaming, and 343 Industries. After 15 years I moved back to Austin and worked at Certain Affinity for a couple years, then Archetype-Entertainment to found the Audio Dept over 5 years ago.
My chief professional interests are: audio, technology, and human psychology.
Title: Director
Company: Cobysoft Co.
Cobysoft Joe, who you can just call Joe, is a multi-disciplinary artist developing a visual novel set in a monster-collecting RPG known as Dome-King Cabbage. Originally made for a game jam, Dome-King Cabbage was a small project that Joe would solo-develop after school while he taught English in Osaka. It has since spiralled into a genre-bending, medium defying work— incorporating warbled beats, psychedelic 3D visuals, and rich prose. Joe's expansive vision has leaked beyond the medium of games into other spheres of art, including gallery spaces in Japan and the US.
Title: Writer
Company: Escape Velocity Entertainment
Zoe Calamar is a game writer and narrative designer based in Southern California. She is currently working on an unannounced title Escape Velocity Entertainment and has worked on projects such as Borderlands 4 at Gearbox Software and Marvel's Wolverine at Insomniac Games.
Title: Senior Sound Designer 2
Company: Blizzard Entertainment
Todd Castillo is a senior sound designer and composer with over a decade of experience in the game industry. He began his career in 2015 as an in-house composer and sound designer at Hex Entertainment and Six Foot. He went on to contribute to multiple titles at MobilityWare before founding his own audio company in 2020, working with studios including Mythical Games. In 2023, he joined Blizzard Entertainment full-time as a senior sound designer on Diablo Immortal, where he leads audio for the game. His work on Diablo Immortal contributed to the title receiving a 2024 G.A.N.G. Award for Best Audio in a Casual or Social Game. He previously presented "The Universal Language of Monsters" at GDC 2026.
Title: Marketing Manager
Company: The Game Bakers
Lauranne is the marketing manager for the Game Bakers, working with the publishing team to define and execute the marketing strategy for The Game Bakers' released and upcoming games. Slightly obsessed with tracking spreadsheets!
Title: Director of Business Development
Company: Red Spring Studio
Shannon Cha is an artist and the Director of Business Development at Red Spring Studio, where she oversees marketing and merchandise creation for the studio's debut title, TOUCHSTARVED. In addition to working in games, she's also a merchandising specialist and Kickstarter consultant.
Title: Founder
Company: Exigent Hope
Brie is a queer woman with over fifteen years of industry experience in gameplay and AI engineering and team leadership. She's worked on Project Spark, Microsoft Hololens, Halo 5: Guardians, unannounced things with Riot Games R&D, and was the lead engineer for Halo Infinite's multiplayer bots. Brie has mentored dozens of developers across disciplines at varying stages of their careers, and cares deeply about fostering the next generation of incredible game developers. She's currently hard at work at a new indie studio working on a new game, The Healer's Journey. In her spare time, you'll usually find her gaming, cooking, or subjecting people to terrible puns.
Title: Principal Software Engineer, World of Warcraft – Graphics/Engine
Company: Blizzard Entertainment
Engin Cilasun is a Principal Software Engineer at Blizzard Entertainment, working on the World of Warcraft Engine Team. With an extensive career in AAA core systems and engine architecture, he has contributed to major franchises including Call of Duty: Vanguard. Previously a Principal Core Engineer at Activision, his technical credits also span high-profile open world action titles such as Mad Max, Just Cause 3 & 4, and Rage 2.
Title: Game Writer, Editor, Narrative Designer
Company: Talespinners Studio
Michelle Clough is a freelance game writer, editor, and narrative designer, and a partner in the game narrative co-op Talespinners. Her work includes Destruction All-Stars, Purrfect Date, Choices, Albert Wilde: Quantum P.I., and Destiny 2. Co-founder of the IGDA Romance and Sexuality Special Interest Group and the Forum for Erotic and Romantic Interactive Media (FERIM), Michelle has been speaking at GDC since 2014 on topics related to sex, sex appeal, and sexuality in video games, and has written a book on the subject, Passion and Play: A Guide to Designing Sexual Content in Games, intended as a resource for exploring intimacy and sex in writing and game design.
Title: CEO / Founder
Company: Iron Root Games
I am the Founder, CEO and Creative Director at Ironroot Games. I'm a combat designer at my core and I've been in the games industry since 2009. After the difficult layoff I experienced in the summer of 2025 I decided to create my own path and form my own studio with friends and past co-workers. My goal was to create a truly collaborative and safe work environment where we all took ownership of the project and culture to get back to why we joined the games industry to begin with. We are working on a genuine passion project that we all believe in and I am truly humbled by all of the support and love I get to experience everyday.
Title: Chief Happiness Officer
Company: Happy Brain Science
Scott Crabtree is the founder and Chief Happiness Officer of Happy Brain Science. His mission is to help the world apply science to thrive more at work. Before founding Happy Brain Science, Scott was a professional video game developer, then worked at Intel. He's presented over 600 sessions to repeat clients including DreamWorks, Google, Nike, Intel, Activision, Blizzard Entertainment, NBC/Universal, EA, and Epic Games. He's led the development of many videogames through the years. The most recent game he designed and led production on was Choose Happiness @ Work Online — a video game designed to boost the science of happiness on teams. He's also served as programmer on titles such as Yourself!Fitness by ResponDesign, NRL Rugby League, and many children's educational games such as Arthur's Thinking Games.
He loves playing strategy games the most. When not gaming or presenting, he's usually outside in beautiful Central Oregon where he lives, or playing music in multiple bands.
Title: Release Manager
Company: Unknown Worlds
Sydney-based remote developer, Jessica Damerst has run the gamut in games. With experience ranging from journalism, to community management, to release management, she's like a cat with 9 lives. Her experience covers a wide array of topics in many corners of business, production, and communications, spanning over a decade. When Jessica is not working, she can be found spending time with her family, scuba diving, or running long distances.
Title: Founder
Company: Coquito Games
Jarory is a creative and playful game developer who specializes in narrative design, implementation, and programming. As a developer he's worked on properties such as Star Wars Jedi Survivor, Madden 20, Marvel Strike Force, and Saros. Jarory focuses on character interactions and crafting worlds in his writing. He is passionate about creating and implementing systems that blend gameplay and narrative, using gameplay to drive dialogue and worldbuilding. He also currently serves as president of the board for Global Game Jam.
Jarory has taken the skills he's fostered in AAA games to his indie studio, Coquito Game, where he leads development on Where the Chips Fall, a Balatro inspired blackjcak game, and Concrete Rose, a hip-hop inspired JRPG. Jarory inspires his colleagues and next generation developers through collaborative projects, teaching, and public speaking. His speaking engagements include GDC, DevCom, and a plethora of podcasts.
As a developer of color, he seeks to amplify minority voices through inclusive design, unique perspectives in narrative, community service, and activism. Jarory is also a community organizer for Black in Gaming (BiG) and a member of the Latinx in Gaming community. Outside of games, Jarory is an accomplished Poet, Musician, and Chef.
Title: Head of Global Talent Acquisition
Company: Side
Christina Drake is the Head of Global Talent Acquisition at Side, leading global hiring strategy across one of the video game industry’s largest service providers. An award-winning talent strategy leader, she is widely recognized for advancing talent acquisition in the games industry and was the first and only recruiter to be featured at The Game Awards.
A LinkedIn leading voice with more than 60,000 followers, Christina is a sought-after speaker and thought leader who regularly shares insights on hiring, leadership, AI, and the future of talent acquisition. She has spoken at leading industry events including GamesBeat Summit, San Diego Comic-Con, GDC, IGDA, and Women in Games International, helping to shape conversations on modern recruiting and leadership.
Alongside her work in talent acquisition, Christina is a passionate advocate for working mothers and inclusive leadership, championing workplace cultures where people can build exceptional careers while balancing family life.
Title: Systems Designer / Lead Game Designer
Company: Magic Soup Games / Co-op Kitchen
Ziyad Duron is a game designer with vast amounts of experience developing on a multitude of platforms: from mobile to PC to VR. By day, he is a Systems Designer with Magic Soup Games helping cook up unannounced fun, and by night, he is the Lead Designer and Co-Founder of Co-op Kitchen, an indie game company that released the hit mobile cooking game Family Style. He was previously an Advanced Game Designer with Schell Games where he worked on their flagship original titles including I Expect You to Die 3 and Silent Slayer: Vault of the Vampire.
Title: Community Manager
Company: Firaxis Games
Sarah Engel is a Community Manager at Firaxis Games, where she works to bring developers and players closer together. A lifelong gamer, Sarah originally set out to work in games through game design, studying the discipline at Rochester Institute of Technology before switching to Marketing and earning her B.S. She quickly realized that while she loved making games, she loved talking about them with the people who played them even more.
Sarah began her career in games as a Social Media Manager at Private Division, where she helped bring titles including Penny's Big Breakaway and After Us to audiences around the world. She joined Firaxis in 2024, bringing that experience in building passionate gaming communities to the studio. Today, she works closely with Firaxis developers and 2K partners, helps shape the studio's community strategy, and serves as a bridge between the people making games and the people playing them.
A longtime strategy game player herself, Sarah has found a particularly fitting home at Firaxis, where she currently works on Civilization VII and leads community efforts to make players a more direct part of the conversation around the game.
Title: Visiting Assistant Professor of Game Design
Company: Hampshire College
Jess is a writer, game designer, and educator focused on subversive and thoughtful storytelling through interactive media. After completing a BA in English at Harvard University, they completed an MFA at the NYU Game Center and a fellowship with SUNY Buffalo's Palah Light Lab. Currently, Jess is a game design and development lecturer at University at Albany.
Erion has worked as a senior writer, editor, and narrative designer on games like Red Thread Games' Dustborn, Carnegie Hall's Tune Crafter, Six to Start's All Hands to Freedom, and Studio Chyr's Hotel Infinity. Currently, they are working with Red Thread Games on survival RPG Hello Sunshine and other unannounced projects.
Outside of work, Jess is often reading speculative fiction, watching baseball, and replaying old Harvest Moon games.
Title: Senior Manager
Company: Nvidia
Geoff Evans has been working on tools and adjacent technology for 20 years including long stints at Infinity Ward and Insomniac Games. Prior works focus on asset pipeline design/optimization, content editing tool construction, and erecting/optimizing internal studio services.
Title: Associate Animation Director
Company: Ubisoft
Vanessa Fillion-Tremblay is an Associate Animation Director at Ubisoft Montreal, where she has spent over 10 years working across For Honor and Assassin's Creed Origins. She has contributed to For Honor throughout a decade of live development, growing from Gameplay Animator to Animation Team Lead and, in most recent years, Associate Animation Director. She contributed to the creation of new Heroes, from hands-on Gameplay Animation to Motion Capture Direction, while adapting to the evolving needs of a long-running production.
Prior to Ubisoft, she worked as a Gameplay Animator at Warner Bros. Games Montreal on titles including Batman: Arkham Origins, Batman: Arkham Knight – Batgirl: A Matter of Family, and LEGO Legends of Chima Online. Throughout her career, Vanessa has consistently specialized in combat-focused gameplay animation, making fighting animation a defining part of her expertise. Her creative background began when she graduated in Fashion Design. That training brings a strong sensitivity to silhouette, character identity, and visual storytelling into her approach to animation.
Mentoring and coaching are an important part of Vanessa's approach to leadership, supporting animators in developing their skills and growing in their careers.
In 2025, she was nominated by her peers in the "Creative Powerhouse" category at Ubisoft's Women in Tech recognition event and served as an ambassador for UQAC's graduating class.
She's been working in the video game industry since 2012.
Title: Narrative Designer, Game Writer, Editor, Consultant
Company: Schnoodle Media, LLC
Nashville native Toiya Kristen Finley, Ph.D., has been a freelancing writer and editor her entire adult life. She earned a doctorate in literature and creative writing from Binghamton University. Over her career, she has published more than 80 works of fiction, nonfiction, comics/manga, and games, and has over 20 years of experience writing in a range of genres, tones, styles, and voices. She gained editorial experience interning at Henry Holt's imprint, Owl Books. At Binghamton, she founded the literary journal Harpur Palate and served as its managing/fiction editor.
In 2011, she cofounded the Game Writing Tutorial at GDC Online with Tobias Heussner and served as an instructor in 2011 and 2012. In videogames, she has worked as a game designer, narrative designer, game writer, editor, and diversity/narrative consultant (or some combination of the five) on everything from AAA titles to mobile games to games for children to small indie projects. Recent work includes writing visual novel Siren Song (Stardust Works), copyediting for Destiny 2 (Bungie), developmental editing on Insecure: The Come Up Game (Glow Up Games), writing/editing on Ritual of Raven, writing for the Interview with the Vampire TTRPG, and editing Our Brilliant Ruin.
A presenter at conferences throughout the year, she has lectured on freelancing and storytelling and led workshops on narrative design and game design. She is a member of the IGDA Game Writing Special Interest Group's Executive Board. The Game Narrative Toolbox (CRC Press), a book on narrative design she coauthored with Jennifer Brandes Hepler, Ann Lemay, and Tobias Heussner, was published in 2015. Narrative Tactics for Mobile and Social Games: Pocket-Sized Storytelling (CRC Press), which she edited and contributed to, was published in 2019. Her latest books are Freelance Video Game Writing: The Life & Business of Digital Mercenary for Hire (2022) and Branching Story, Unlocked Dialogue: Designing and Writing Visual Novels (2023) both from CRC Press. Of late, she has been working on her own visual novel series, beginning with Incarnō: Everything Is Written.
Speaking History: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B-vZf3N5I_8Nclp0dkZ1UVpBcTQ/view?usp=drive_link&resourcekey=0-Hw0yQbGXjCsqC1CiPu9lmA
Title: Lead producer
Company: Warhorse studios
Radka Fléglová is a Lead Producer at Warhorse Studios. She joined the studio in 2021 as a Producer on Kingdom Come: Deliverance II, where she worked across the game's production, overseeing features and quests and collaborating on the development of production pipelines and processes. She is now Lead Producer, focusing on production and development pipelines across the studio.
Title: Developer Evangelist
Company: Arm
I am a Content Creator and Developer Evangelist in Arm's Performance Education team, where I help to show developers how to make more efficient mobile games using profiling and analysis tools. I started my career in the games industry as a composer and asset publisher, before moving into content creation after writing articles about my work on audio systems in Unity. Before joining Arm in 2025, I spent 5 years teaching game development basics on YouTube, where I specialized in making C# scripting easier for new developers. Passionate about challenging best practice with real research, I've brought my deep-dive approach to content creation to my work at Arm in an effort to make performance optimization easier, and more accessible, to developers of all skill levels.
Title: Senior Software Engineer
Company: Walt Disney Imagineering
Megan Friedenberg is an Imagineer at Walt Disney Imagineering who specializes in multi-gpu rendering and real-time technologies. She has spent the last 5 years working in both AAA gaming and the entertainment industry as an engineer, programming everything from low-level RHI layer optimizations to animation tools. Megan originally got her start through the animation industry by developing tools for real-time animation productions such as Big City Green's Virtually Christmas special. She has worked in AAA gaming for Sony Interactive Entertainment at Insomniac Games and San Diego Studio as both a technical artist and graphics engineer with credits on Marvel's Spider-Man 2 and the MLB The Show series. As an Imagineer, Megan is part of the engine team working on Walt Disney Imagineering's custom fork of Unreal Engine.
Title: Realization Director
Company: Freelance
I have been kicking around the industry since 2009 across QA, Cinematics, Animation, Design & Realization - building teams, content, tech & pipelines across multiple full-cycle projects.
I work with teams to find the gaps between the team & what they're trying to build, focused on narrative presentation in all it's flavors.
Title: Technical & Creative Director
Company: Independent
David "Rez" Graham is a senior AI programmer currently working independently on a self-funded unannounced project. He is also the Director of Game Programming at the Academy of Art University's School of Game Development where he built the entire Game Programming curriculum from scratch. He has worked in the games industry as an engineer since 2005 spending most of that time working on various kinds of AI, from platformer enemy AI to full simulation games. Most recently, he was the Lead AI Programmer on The Sims 4 at Maxis. Prior to that, he worked at PlayFirst, Slipgate Ironworks, Planet Moon Studios, and Super-Ego Games. He is the co-author of Game Coding Complete, 4th Edition, has multiple articles in the Game AI Pro series, and regularly speaks at The Game Developers Conference. Rez spends his free time acting, performing magic, and running tabletop RPGs.
Title: Composer
Company: Archetype Entertainment
Nathan Grigg has been fully immersed in music composition, design, and direction for interactive media for three decades. His work for games is fueled by a passion for carrying a creative vision through complex systems. He lives to reward an active, problem-solving gaming audience with aesthetic, emotional experiences, impactful themes, a sense of mystery and potential, and the underlying message: "You're smart."
After launching his career in 1993 scoring 16-bit console games, Nathan worked as an Audio Lead with Microsoft's Sports Games group, a Music Supervisor for MSN during its launch phase, and a Music Director for MS Studios, serving as a front door for custom music needs company-wide. With the intention of keeping games center stage, he joined Monolith in 2001, kicking off a 23-year run of critically acclaimed game scores including No One Lives Forever 2, TRON 2.0, F.E.A.R., the BAFTA-nominated score for Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor, and Middle-earth: Shadow or War. Nathan supported WB Games projects abroad as a Music Designer/Director for Day 1 Studios' F.3.A.R., and a composer of stage music for NetherRealm's Mortal Kombat 11 and Mortal Kombat 1. He currently lives and works in Seattle as a freelance composer and audio designer, contributing to games such as Valve's DOTA 2 and Archetype's Exodus.
Awards:
Nominee: D.I.C.E. Awards - Outstanding Achievement in Music Composition - Mortal Kombat 11 - 2019
Nominee: G.A.N.G. Awards - Best Original Song - "Fires of War" - Middle-earth: Shadow of War - 2018
Nominee: BAFTA Game Awards - Music - Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor - 2015
Nominee: G.A.N.G. Awards - Music of the Year - Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor - 2015
Nominee: G.A.N.G. Awards - Audio of the Year - Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor - 2015
Nominee: G.A.N.G. Awards - Best Original Instrumental - "Fort Morn" - Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor - 2015
Nominee: G.A.N.G. Awards - Best Interactive Score - TRON 2.0 - 2004
Winner: GameSpy - Best Music - No One Lives Forever 2 - 2002
Winner: Computer Games Magazine - Best Music - No One Lives Forever 2 - 2002
Title: Producer / Designer
Company: Ironwood Studios / Co-op Kitchen / Lucky Tree Studios
Charlie Harper is a Game Designer and Producer based in the Greater Pacific Northwest. Since entering indie development in 2013, Charlie has donned numerous roles, demonstrating adaptability and a comprehensive understanding of game creation. Her journey began as a 2D artist at Whimsy Games, and most recently, they contributed to the successful launch of "Pacific Drive: Whispers in the Woods" at Ironwood Studios as Producer.
When not working at Ironwood Studios, Charlie divides their extra time between artistic duties for Co-op Kitchen and design work for Lucky Tree Studios. Over the past decade, they have cultivated a diverse skill set spanning multiple disciplines, with a particular focus on production. Harper's passion lies in pushing the boundaries of gaming, aiming to evoke new emotions, craft compelling narratives, and overcome emerging technological hurdles.
With a career marked by versatility and innovation, Charlie continues to be a dynamic force in the indie game development scene, consistently seeking to expand the medium's potential.
Title: Director, Programmes & Events
Company: Global Game Jam
Richard is a multi-award-winning academic and Director of Programmes & Events at Global Game Jam where he oversees the organisation's global events, partnerships, and strategic initiatives,
At GGJ, Richard plays a key role in shaping and scaling programmes that reach a global audience of game creators, educators, industry professionals, and technology partners. His leadership has helped build GGJs position as a year-round platform for talent development, innovation, entrepreneurship, and community engagement. Working across international partnerships, funding programmes, educational initiatives, and large-scale events, he has contributed to opportunities that have supported hundreds of thousands of developers worldwide.
With more than 23 years' experience spanning academia, innovation, and the games industry, Richard founded Games Talent Wales, the first nationally funded game talent development programme in Wales. Through funding, mentorship, and business support, the programme helped establish and scale more than 40 independent game studios.
Title: Composer
Company: Independent
Ryan is a two-time BAFTA-nominated composer and sound designer, currently living in Seattle, Washington. He's written for award winning games like West of Loathing, Where the Water Tastes Like Wine, and Wizard With a Gun.
When not making audio, Ryan is likely preparing talks and online content on how to navigate the game industry. At events like PAX West, Indiecade, and GDC, he's given talks designed to help people start or further their work in games, with an emphasis on emotional and mental health.
Title: Junior Cinematic Sound Editor
Company: Sweet Justice Sound Group
Josh is a sound designer and composer. After graduating from the University of Miami in 2023 he took a sound design course at Vancouver Film School. Currently he works as a Junior Sound Editor at Sweet Justice Sound, working on cinematic sound design and technical sound design with the team.
Title: Vocalist, Lyricist, Composer
Company: Independent
Composer, vocalist and instrumentalist Laura Intravia is internationally renowned for her multi-faceted musical career in opera, concert music and video game/film soundtracks.
Laura has won several awards for her original vocal works, including the Jack Downey Vocal Composition Prize and 2nd place in the New York Treble Singers Composition Competition. Laura has additionally worked as a lyricist and co-composer on several projects. Her most recent collaboration was with AURORA and Brendon Williams on the 2026 World of Warcraft anthem "A Place to Call Home." Other songwriting projects include providing lyrics and vocals for Sterling Maffe's "Dawn of the Moon" song for Mobile Legends: Bang Bang, and co-writing "Walk Past the Storm" with Chad Seiter for Arkhangel: House of the Seven Stars.
An avid arranger, Laura's solo piano arrangements of Austin Wintory's Grammy-nominated score Journey were published by Alfred Music in 2013. Laura has arranged and orchestrated several pieces on the Video Games Live album series, and has released two solo piano video game arrangement albums, Through Time and Space and Shall We Play?, both featuring pianist Brendon Shapiro.
On the stage, Laura has performed in a variety of concerts and operatic works. She has sung several contemporary opera roles with companies including Beth Morrison Projects, Juventas New Music Ensemble, Catalyst New Music and Mass Opera, including world premieres in The Body Politic (Hurley/Osborne) and En la ardiente oscuridad (Najmi). Laura has also performed as a singer and instrumentalist for a variety of video game themed concerts. She toured as a principal wind and vocal soloist for the Video Games Live concert tour from 2009-2018, appearing alongside orchestras such as the Polish National Radio Symphony, Pittsburgh Symphony, Utah Symphony, Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra, Colorado Symphony, Orquesta Nacional de España and the Qatar Philharmonic. Other notable engagements include Pokemon: Symphonic Evolutions, Journey: LIVE with Austin Wintory and Ace Combat: Three Aces with the Tiberian Sons.
Equally at home in her recording studio, Laura's voice and winds can be heard on over 80 video game, TV and film soundtracks, including the Destiny and Destiny 2 franchise, Mortal Kombat franchise, Star Wars Outlaws, Darksiders III, Honor of Kings and World of Warcraft.
Born and raised on Long Island, Laura holds degrees in Composition and Vocal Performance from Ithaca College. She was the Keynote Speaker for the North American Conference of Video Game Music in 2024, and has appeared as a speaker at NYU, Stetson University and GameSoundCon. Laura is a visioning partner for Catalyst New Music and a core member of the video game funk-fusion band DiscoCactus.
Title: Sound Designer/Composer/Singer
Company: Ludogram/Freelance
Katelyn Isaacson is an American sound designer, composer, and vocalist based in Paris, France. She was on the audio team at ArenaNet where she worked on season 4 of Guild Wars 2's Living World before relocating to France to be the studio sound designer at Ubisoft Nadeo for Trackmania. She now splits her time behind doing audio for the French independent studio Ludogram and as a freelancer, sound designing, composing, and translating for various European indie studios. As a vocalist, Katelyn started singing in her first choir at the age of 9 and never stopped. Classically trained at the University of Southern California's Thornton School of Music, she enjoys singing in a variety of genres. She sang backup for Elton John at the 2013 Emmy Awards, in the Kingdom Hearts Orchestra World Tour, and on video games such as Tap My Katamari and Elsinore. She's currently singing soprano in l'Ensemble Vocal Syllepse and Soli Tutti, for a number of lyricists and composers, and regularly performs in cover bands and as a backup singer.
Title: Creative Director
Company: Runaway Play
Emma Johansson is an award-winning Creative Director, Game Designer and Artist with more than 20 years of experience in the games industry working in Sweden, Germany and New Zealand. In 2009, Emma joined Runaway Play as the company's first lead artist and game designer. As the studio quickly grew, doubling in size in 2016, Emma was appointed Art Director. Emma has led the creative vision for multiple award winning games, including 'Flutter VR' and 'Old Friends Dog Game'. In 2018, Emma became the Creative Director of Runaway Play and now works across all games in the portfolio, guiding and supporting teams in their Creative Vision and ensuring adherence to our Brand Values.
Title: Senior Game Designer
Company: King
Anton Johnsson is a Senior Game Designer at King, where he has spent the past five years working on Farm Heroes Saga. With over eight years' experience in the mobile games industry and a background in game development from the University of Skövde in Sweden, Anton specializes in match-3 difficulty balancing. He has played a key role in evolving farms' difficulty strategy, helping to identify problems and spearhead solutions that drive meaningful impact across the game.
Title: Environment Artist
Company: Insomniac Games
Jackson Keller is an Environment Artist at Insomniac Games. He's been at Insomniac for over 4 years, working on both Marvel's Spider-Man 2 and Marvel's Wolverine. Before that he worked in Indie Game Development at Synodic Arc (Abyss of Neptune and Zombies Noir), and as a Hard Surface Artist for flight simulation at Collins Aerospace. He enjoys the opportunities Environment Art presents to create a variety of assets and spaces that have their own technical and artistic challenges. He particularly enjoys working on natural environments and assets and loves spending time outdoors.
Title: CEO
Company: VFX Apprentice LLC
The visionary and chief pixel pusher of VFX Apprentice, Jason Keyser is a renowned FX artist, as well as a devoted VFX educator and student advocate. Jason has worked in entertainment as both a 2D FX and 3D VFX artist for 13 years, animating for the Powerpuff Girls, Arlo on Netflix, and multiple titles for Riot Games - including League of Legends, Teamfight Tactics, and several R&D projects.
While working full time at Riot, Jason created over 60 FX and VFX education videos on his YouTube channel, designed and taught courses for artists internally at Riot, mentored prospective FX artists, facilitated the VFX Bootcamp at GDC, and spoke at conferences to students and pros alike.
Jason ultimately left Riot to commit full time to VFX Apprentice, training and lifting up FX artists across the world.
Title: Editorial Director
Company: Digital Eclipse / Atari
Chris Kohler is Editorial Director of Digital Eclipse, overseeing the company's award-winning interactive documentary games such as Tetris Forever, The Making of Karateka, and Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration. Prior to Digital Eclipse he spent 24 years in the gaming media including as the founding editor of WIRED's first online gaming vertical.
Title: Technical Art Director
Company: Tencent
Nate LaMartina has been working professionally in the gaming industry for over 20 years. His career has spanned across Electronic Arts, Ubisoft, and NetEase before arriving at Tencent. He started out as a character artist, switch to art direction for a bit, and then dedicated himself fully to technical art after realizing how much he missed it. He's had the privilege of working on some of the biggest titles in the industry, new franchises and old, such as Dragon Age, Anthem, Assassin's Creed, Immortals Fenyx Rising, and more. At every company that he has worked, he has been part of respective global technology initiatives, looking for ways to align, share, and drive tech forward together.
Title: Senior Sound Designer
Company: Interleave / ArenaNet
Emmanuel Lagumbay is an audio designer based in Ontario, California. He has crafted sounds in-house for projects like Guild Wars 2, League of Legends, Legends of Runeterra, Teamfight Tactics, and worked freelance for projects like Torchlight III, Draw and Guess, and Puzzles and Dragons, and Sol Mates. When he's not working in game audio, he enjoys playing with his cats, Dorian Sixth & Octavia, his dog, Coda, practicing historical fencing, and speaking in the third person.
Title: Partner and Publishing Producer
Company: Full Metal Bagel Games
Tsz Wai Lam has spent over a decade in game publishing across China, working at the intersection of international titles and Chinese players.
From 2020 to 2023, she was Publishing Producer at Pixmain, the indie publishing label under ByteDance, where she shipped titles including WitchSpring R, A Guidebook of Babel, Inked, and The Heroic Legend of Eagarlnia across PC and mobile. Before that, she held marketing and business development roles at YOOZOO Games and Happy Elements, covering both domestic and overseas markets.
She is now Partner and Publishing Producer at Full Metal Bagel Games, a startup indie studio currently developing Hell Express, a co-op PvE PC and console game.
Tsz Wai brings the developer side of this conversation. She has navigated the same platform and localization decisions from inside a studio, and watched how the same market information lands differently depending on whether you are sitting in Shanghai or in a Western indie team trying to read Chinese review sentiment from a distance. The practical know-how for China is not hard to act on once you know what to look for.
Title: Lead Generative AI Analyst
Company: NVIDIA
Matthew Lee is a Lead Generative AI Analyst at NVIDIA, researcher, designer, and Chair of the IGDA Serious Games SIG whose work explores how games and other disciplines can learn from—and benefit—one another. For more than a decade, he has built bridges between game developers, researchers, educators, healthcare professionals, and industry, advancing interdisciplinary collaboration through research, speaking, and community leadership. His work spans artificial intelligence, serious games, healthcare innovation, player engagement, and interactive design, with a focus on translating ideas across disciplines to create more engaging, meaningful, and resilient interactive experiences.
Title: Graphics Programmer
Company: Tencent Games
Yuzhi Liang earned his Ph.D. from the State Key Laboratory of CAD&CG at
Zhejiang University and joined Tencent's Morefun Studios in 2024. During his time there,
he has been responsible for the improvement and performance optimization of the global
illumination solution for Roco Kingdom: World, and has also contributed to the graphics
development of Arena Breakout: Infinite. His research interests focus on adaptive path
tracing and reconstruction algorithms, real-time graphics performance optimization, and
the application of neural rendering in video games. His paper "Automatic Mesh and Shader Level of Detail"
was published in the journalIEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics,
and "Adaptive Sampling and Reconstruction for Gradient-Domain Rendering" was published
in the journalComputational Visual Media.
Title: Principal Technical Artist
Company: Bit Bridge / Schell Games / Ludoko Studios
Daniel Lin is a Principal Tech Artist at Schell Games, co-founder of Ludoko Studios, and an organizer for Bit Bridge, a local game development community in Pittsburgh, PA. Dan usually wears a lot of hats including working with art performance and optimization, figuring out art pipelines and tools, shaders, visual effects, low poly modeling, pixel art, and more. He also has participated in over 30 Ludum Dare online game jam events and helps organize the Global Game Jam event in Pittsburgh.
Title: Managing Director
Company: Player Research
Sebastian Long is MD of Player Research (a Keywords Studio), the leading agency for insight into players and play. As a gameplay researcher Seb led design-improving playtest studies for hundreds of games, spanning all genres, audiences and platforms - including for beloved IPs Star Wars, FIFA, Sonic, World of Tanks, LittleBigPlanet, Talking Tom, Hungry Shark, LEGO, Dark Pictures, Life is Strange — and seminal games including Control, Elden Ring, and Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty. Seb has consulted on gamedev insight strategies for teams including EA, PlayStation, Xbox, Tencent, Bandai Namco, Ninja Theory, and hundreds more. As Managing Director Seb leads a 25-person consultancy based in the UK and Canada, providing world-class research that drives game development decision-making. Seb is a member of BAFTA, community leader within the IGDA Games User Research SIG, prolific speaker and educator, and is based in Brighton on the UK south coast.
Title: Game Developer
Company: Solo
Thomas Mackinnon is an independent developer based in Dundee, Scotland who makes experimental games that have a focus on getting people talking - artistic experiences that push the medium to new and exciting places while telling great stories to boot. His main works include "THE CORRIDOR" with Humble Bundle, "It Takes a War" with Pantaloon, and also the side project party game "Forest of Deceit" with Jaleo PR.
Title: Brand Manager
Company: Saltworks Entertainment
Hannah is the Brand Manager at Saltworks Entertainment, an internal publishing studio built from the success of Black Salt Games (DREDGE) and now supporting Disc 2 Games (Canvas City) and Team Trifold (Nothing Lost).
Coming from a 2D game art background of over 8 years, Hannah uses her skills to showcase each studio's unique charm, style and gameplay and deliver it to the right audience. Outside of work, Hannah spends her time cosplaying, making art, bouldering and discovering new and interesting places to eat.
Title: Senior Animator - Valorant Agents team
Company: Riot Games
Corin McCrate is a Senior Animator on Valorant's Agents team at Riot Games, where he has spent the last year and a half creating character driven abilities and gameplay highlighting animations. Specializing in hand-keyed animation, rapid prototyping, rig and pipeline development, Maya to Unreal engine implementation, and close collaboration with design, VFX, tech art, and modeling.
Previously, Corin spent more than a decade at Blizzard Entertainment working on Overwatch 2 and World of Warcraft expansions, creating animation for heroes, creatures, mounts, raid bosses, and the occasional space demon. He is passionate about practical animation workflows, collaborative problem-solving, and finding clever tricks that help teams move from idea to polished gameplay faster. Corin earned a certificate in Entertainment Design and Digital Production from Gnomon School of Visual Effects in 2013 and began his career with an internship at The Third Floor Previs Studio.
Title: President & Chief Creative Officer
Company: Blackbird Interactive
Rory has spent the last 20+ years working with major studios on game design & IP development. He drives Blackbird Interactive's creative strategy, builds strong partnerships, and shepherds Blackbird Interactive's innovative games from concept to launch.
Title: Sr. Director Product Inclusion
Company: Scopely
Tülay Tetiker McNally is a senior strategic leader with over twenty years of experience in the global games and VFX industries. With a professional history spanning Germany, the UK, Canada, Sweden, and Spain, she brings a globally informed perspective to developer- and player-centred design.
Following foundational experience at Microsoft, Square Enix, and SEGA, Tülay joined BioWare in 2010 as Director of QA & Central Development Operations. She later led strategic cultural transformation initiatives within Studio Operations at EA DICE before being appointed as Electronic Arts' first Director of Inclusive Design & Product Development. In this role, she helped integrate the frameworks required to embed inclusive design into global production pipelines. Currently, she is the Senior Director of Product Inclusion & Central Ops Partnerships at Scopely, a strategic programme she created and leads to provide teams with guidance on accessibility and inclusive content, ensuring culturally informed decisions throughout the development process.
Tülay holds an MA in American Culture, History, and Society from Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München and a Postgraduate Diploma in Innovation & Design Thinking. She is an ICF Certified Coach and a CQ® Certified Facilitator and serves on the GDC Advisory Board and is a Patron of the mental health charity Safe In Our World.
Title: Sr Sound Designer
Company: Archetype Entertainment
Sound designer and Foley artist who specializes in Game Audio. I have been a musician practically my whole life and have developed a strong passion for music, sound, and all things audio over the course of my life. Video games, along with music, have played a huge role in my development as a person. It only made sense for me to take my passion for audio and games and focus it into something I can build my life around.
There are few things as satisfying to me as breathing life into a game through sound design. Taking a game from concept to release through the lens of sound is such an amazing and important experience for me both personally and professionally.
A mentor of mine once said that great sound design shouldn't always be noticed. The best sound design is the kind that draws the listener in, and for a moment, they can believe they are somewhere they are not. My goal is to make the listener believe they are in that world or moment.
Title: Studio Design Director
Company: Zunzun Studios
Jolie Menzel's decade of experience as a narrative designer, writer, and artist informs their holistic approach to storytelling. Beginning their career as a cinematic artist on Telltale games like The Walking Dead and The Wolf Among Us, they leveraged their passion for story in their transition to the design team on Tales from the Borderlands. Their unique ability to combine storytelling, design, and production brought them to lead cross-disciplinary teams as the lead narrative designer on Gears 5: Hivebusters at The Coalition and on South Park: The Fractured But Whole at Ubisoft.
Title: Senior Narrative Designer
Company: Obsidian Entertainment
Kelsie Mhoon is a narrative designer and game writer with a focus on RPGs and expansive branching dialogue. During her 8 years in the industry, she has worked on a number of projects including Pixelberry Studios' "Choices: Stories You Play" and most recently, Obsidian Entertainment's "The Outer Worlds 2". Based in the Pacific Northwest, she spends her free time hiking, birdwatching, and cheering on her favorite teams.
Title: Vice President
Company: CyberConnect2 Co.,Ltd.
Miyazaki joined CyberConnect2 in 2010 after working as a salesperson for a trading company specializing in software and game development machine, and then in CG production. He currently oversees personnel, finances, business orders, national and international contracts, as well as the selection of outsourcing companies. He is also in charge of the company's Operations Department.
Title: Line Producer
Company: 37Degrees Studio
Kasey is a Line Producer who has been working across VFX, games, and real-time production for the past 10 years. At 37Degrees Studio, Kasey helps bridge the gap between creative ambition and practical execution, producing complex projects that combine emerging technology, storytelling, and large-scale collaboration with a focus on world building and digital environments. Outside of work, you'll find Kasey riding her bike, flying a plane or taking her kid to the neighbourhood playground.
Title: Senior Writer
Company: Brass Lion Entertainment
Evan Narcisse is the Senior Writer at Brass Lion Entertainment, the game studio behind Wu-Tang: Rise of the Deceiver. He's worked as a screenwriter, producer, and narrative design consultant in video games, comic books, film, and TV, often focusing on the intersection of blackness and pop culture.
As a journalist and critic, he wrote for The Atlantic, Time Magazine, Kotaku, and The New York Times, in addition to teaching game journalism at New York University and appearances as an expert guest on CNN and NPR. He's also the author of the Rise of the Black Panther graphic novel, Marvel's Black Panther: Wakanda Atlas, and The New Day: Power of Positivity.
As a narrative design consultant, he's worked on Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales, Redfall, Marvel's Avengers, Gotham Knights, and the award-winning Dot's Home. He also served as story producer on the HBO Max documentary Milestone Generations, documenting the rise, fall, and rebirth of the groundbreaking black-owned comics company Milestone Media. A native New Yorker, he now lives in Austin, Texas.
Title: Expert Audio Programmer
Company: CD Projekt Red
For about 20 years Tomas worked on multiple AAA titles and game engines with extensive audio production needs like Crysis, World of Warcraft, Warcraft 3 Reforged, Overwatch, and an "Unannounced Survival Game". Since he joined CD Projekt Red he contributes to the shared audio tech to multiple exciting projects across The Witcher and Cyberpunk 2077 franchises. Tomas is driven to fully unlock the creative potential of the audio professionals he has the privilege to work with. As an engineer exclusively working on audio tech, Tomas has worked across different code disciplines from game client and server, game and audio tools, and asset management systems to deliver importance-based audio mixing, server authenticated voice system, or other complex audio features.
Title: Sr. VFX Artist
Company: Sucker Punch
Has been working as a Visual Effects artist for over 15 years. Started out working in Film and transitioned to Game Development in 2017.
Title: Principal Technical Artist
Company: Respawn Entertainment
Cole is a Principal Technical Artist at Respawn Entertainment working on Apex Legends. Having over nine years of experience in the industry, he has supported art tools across characters, animation and environments.
Title: Senior Producer & Voice Actor
Company: Crunchyroll (Games Vault)
JiaLing can be described as Your Resident ADHD Chaos Gremlin. One may call them unfocused, they would say they're indulging in diving deep into all their curiosities and interests with aplomb.
Amongst the many pursuits, they've applied themselves to 15 years of production experience across mobile and AAA games, with a particular focus on pipeline optimisations while balancing creative and business needs. Additionally, they're a trained and working voice actor and illustrator. In recent times, they're pursuing their lifelong love affair with the written word by expanding their writing repertoire. Who knows where that may go?
This passion and pursuit of creative endeavours has led them across the globe, from South East Asia to the United Kingdom to land in the United States. They do not take the privilege lightly and thus endeavour to imbue cross-cultural learnings and understanding across their body of work.
How do you find them between all that, you ask? Well, their friends and family say you can hear them before you see them - so follow the cackling, mirthful laughter you hear in the distance. (or ya know, email)
Title: Senior Producer
Company: Riot Games
Nik Pantis is a Senior Producer at Riot Games, leading multiple teams on an unannounced project. Prior to this, Nik led teams at Ubisoft on Assassin's Creed Shadows, and worked in the Australian indie scene before that at a number of studios. Outside of their day job, Nik runs leadership programs for the IGDA Foundation non-profit, founded the Game Production Guild mentorship program, and runs the Game Developers of Australia community. Outside of work, Nik enjoys hiking and writing and hanging with their two cats that have travelled the world with them.
Title: Senior Writer
Company: Independent
Ashley Ash Poprik is a video game and comic writer. Her credits include Destiny 2, Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, Clue: Disney Villains, Marvel's Spider-Man 2, and Transphoria, to name a few. Ash pushes to create a more diverse games industry through mentorship, speaking, and advocacy.
Title: Creative Director
Company: Red Spring Studio
Dev Presbury is a writer and creative director at Red Spring Studio, an indie studio currently developing their debut title, TOUCHSTARVED. Her credits include Apex Legends Mobile and Netflix Stories. When she isn't writing, she enjoys drinking matcha lattes and doomscrolling.
Title: Production Director
Company: Owlchemy Labs
I develop and produce games, apps, and hardware projects — from genre-defining franchises like Rock Band at Harmonix, to XR experiences like Job Simulator and Dimensional Double Shift at Owlchemy Labs, to solo projects like Neutralize and Colorbolt.
When I'm not making and playing games, I tinker with apps and make music — often about food.
Title: Design Lead
Company: Blizzard
Toby Ragaini is a design lead on the World of Warcraft development team at Blizzard Entertainment. As a specialist in the intersection of product management, game design, and development, Toby's abiding goal is to delight players and create an environment where other developers can thrive and realize their best work. On World of Warcraft, Toby is focused on player housing, where he leads the content design effort for the neighborhoods and the newly launched endeavors.
Toby joined Blizzard Entertainment in 2022 for World of Warcraft: Dragonflight, and has worked on every WoW expansion since. A true pioneer in the MMO space, Toby directed the design efforts on the classic MMOs, Asheron's Call and The Matrix Online before co-founding his own game studio.
Toby graduated with distinction from Worcester Polytechnic Institute, earning a Bachelor of Science degree in Biotechnology. When not working on games, Toby enjoys spending time with his wife and daughter, reading One-Punch Man, and acquiring forgotten treasures.
Title: Lead Writer and Narrative Designer
Company: Independent
Alexa Ray Corriea is a writer, narrative designer, and narrative systems designer with a decade of experience. She has worked with major blockbuster IP, including Marvel, Middle-earth, and Call of Duty. She is currently working on several unannounced projects across games and film. Alexa is a host of the AIAS Game Maker's Notebook Podcast and mentors within the games industry, working closely with several industry organizations including the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences, BAFTA, and GDC.
Title: Senior Narrative Director
Company: Electronic Arts
Stephen Rhodes is an award winning writer and narrative designer with over 16 years of game development experience working on AAA, AA, and indie titles. Alongside his work on video games, Stephen also writes for comics, TV, film, and TTRPGS. He is currently a Senior Narrative Director for Electronic Arts and is working on the Iron Man title at the EA Motive Studio in collaboration with Marvel Games.
Title: CEO and Managing Director
Company: Nordicity
Kristian is the CEO and Managing Director of Nordicity, an international consultancy focusing on the creative economy. Kristian is also one of the world's leading experts in the design, implementation, and evaluation of games industry support systems.
From tax credits around the world to local-level industry development, Kristian, and his team at Nordicity act as the translation matrix between industry, investors, and the public sector. Over the last few years, Kristian has become one of the games industry's leading voices on ecosystem development and economic policy, building on almost two decades of experience working with video game industries around the world. In fact, Kristian got his first job at Nordicity in 2007 by answering the question "What do you know about the games industry?" He provided so much detail that they hired him to make him stop.
Title: Senior Animator
Company: Riot Games
Originally from Venezuela, Brendan has been in the industry for a hot minute. He currently animates at Riot Games but previously he did everything from PreVis for Marvel and StarWars, multiple Disney Jr. projects, worked on indie titles such as Shantae Half Genie Here at Wayforward, freelanced doing motion graphics and even worked in the circus as a juggler! Making him a go to reference guy.
Title: Senior Accessibility Design Researcher
Company: Insomniac Games
Sam Schaffel is a Senior Accessibility Design Researcher at Insomniac Games who recently shipped Marvel's Wolverine. Previously Sam worked at Naughty Dog and Santa Monica Studio helping design, implement, and ship award winning accessibility for The Last of Us: Part 2 and God of War: Ragnarök respectively.
Sam was born with Cerebral Palsy, which affects his left side; from a young age he problem-solved and dreamed of making games more accessible for everyone. Since 2018 he has been working diligently with amazing teams to make that dream a reality.
Title: Senior Narrative Designer
Company: Microfun
Books Schwartz is a professional narrative designer and game writer. They started in video games with the mobile smash hit Lifeline, and have gone on to work at places like Ubisoft Stockholm, CD Projekt, Possibility Space, Sony Santa Monica Studio, and Studio Drydock. They currently work on narrative-focused mobile games at Microfun. Prior to working in video games, they spent a decade designing and running larps at summer camps for kids and teens and in Polish castles for adults.
Title: Senior Narrative Designer
Company: Microfun
Books Schwartz is a nomadic narrative designer with experience across AAA, mobile, and indie games. They've worked on blockbuster series like The Witcher and God of War and chart-topping mobile titles like Lifeline and Gossip Harbor. Prior to working in video games, they spent a decade professionally designing larps for kids, teens, and adults.
Title: Senior Game Writer
Company: Respawn Entertainment
Jaclyn Seto (she/her) is a Chinese Canadian writer with experience in AAA and mobile games, currently working on Respawn's Apex Legends as a Senior Game Writer. She graduated from the University of British Columbia with a degree in Kinesiology and worked as a kinesiologist and medical writer for a number of years before deciding to pursue her dream of writing for video games. She graduated from the Writing for Film, Television & Games program at Vancouver Film School (VFS) in 2020 and was the recipient of the Academic Achievement Award. Since entering the industry, she has been committed to mentorship, promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion, and creating powerful stories that resonate with players.
Title: [prior] Senior Creative Director, Candy Crush Saga. Now Independent
Company: CitizenKenny Consulting
Kenny Shea Dinkin is a veteran game designer and creative leader known for building durable franchises that leave a mark on popular culture. Most recently, he spent eight years at King leading creative for Candy Crush's Metagame Studio during a period of sustained global growth.
Previously, Kenny served as VP and Studio Head for Disney's San Francisco studio and as Chief Creative Officer at PlayFirst, where he helped grow the Diner Dash franchise to hundreds of millions of players worldwide. He is also co-creator of the cult hit The ClueFinders.
A frequent GDC speaker and early contributor to the Game Designer's Notebook series, Kenny now curates conversations that spotlight emerging voices and enduring insights in game design.
Title: Leadership Coach & Consultant
Company: Shonkventures LLC
Grant Shonkwiler first started making games when he was 12 years old, starting with modding and programming. Since then he has filled many different roles in the game industry: programmer, lead designer, technical producer and currently is a leadership coach and production consultant. His career has taken him from casual games at Megatouch Games, to AAA shooters at id Software and to Epic Games to work on Fortnite. Grant currently runs his own consulting company, and is the co-author of four books including Gear Up: Advanced Game Development Practices. Grant also enjoys building communities within the industry working with the IGDA and the GameDevDrinkup.
Title: Dialogue Lead
Company: Insomniac Games
Based in Seattle, Kareem Shuman has been a game audio professional for over 13 years, with a specific focus on dialogue over the last 9 years. He's worked on: indie titles, Guild Wars 2, Halo 5, many Destiny 2 seasons and expansions, and most recently as the Dialogue Lead at Insomniac Games working on the upcoming title Marvel's Wolverine.
Title: Audio Engineer, Dialogue, Sound Design & Music
Company: Independent
Amanda Rose Smith is an audio engineer, composer and sound designer based in NYC, with twenty years of experience working in games, film, tv, animation, audiobooks, and podcasting. She specializes in capturing and creating high quality dialogue and spoken word audio across multiple genres with credits including GANG best dialogue winner Telltale's The Walking Dead, Just Cause 4, Orange Is The New Black, The New Adventures of Peter Pan, Orphan Black: The Next Chapter, and many more. She holds a BA in Music Composition from Smith College and a MA in Music Technology from New York University. She's passionate about the convergence of art and technology and using new tech to bring an artist's vision to life, whether that art be her own or someone else's. The rest of her time is spent walking with her adorable dog and watching old episodes of Star Trek TNG.
Title: Tool Design Director
Company: RYStorm Consulting
Robin-Yann Storm is a freelance Tool UX & Workflow Designer. In the past he has worked as a full time Tool UX Designer in the AAA games industry on the 'Glacier 2' editor on which the Hitman series is built, where he was present for the end of Hitman 1 and the beginning of Hitman 2, and the 'Decima' editor on which the Horizon series was built, where he was present for the end of The Frozen Wilds, and the beginning of The Forbidden West. He has also consulted on Unity asset store level editors, and spent a few years working at Apple on AR creation tools such as Reality Composer and Reality Converter, which has made him well acquainted with the workflows of Pixar's USD framework. Next to that, he created and organizes the Tool Design Roundtables, talks at conferences around the world, and has contributed a chapter about Tool Design in the book 'An Architectural Approach to Level Design, Second Edition.
Title: Managing Director
Company: Swedish Games Industry (Dataspelsbranschen)
Per Strömbäck started out as a QA tester in 1996, then progressed to making games at Monsterland. After game development, Per moved to the dark side as head of publishing at PAN Vision. In 2005, Per discovered an even darker side and became a lobbyist. Since then, he has worked for Sweden’s games industry association, at times tirelessly. Per has played 663 [so close!] sessions of Battle of Polytopia and his favorite tribe is Bardur.
Title: Technical Artist, Indie Dev
Company: Beep Beep Fish Accident
Aster Sun is a technical artist and indie games developer. They graduated from DigiPen Institute of Technology in 2024 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Digital Art and Animation. From 2024 through 2026, they worked as a Technical Artist at Disbelief. Since Spring of 2026, they've been working as part of Beep Beep Fish Accident, a two-person game studio currently developing their first release.
Title: Engine Director
Company: Wargaming
Bronislav Sviglo is Engine Director at Wargaming. In 2020, he started the company's new proprietary engine from scratch and has led the team building it ever since — the engine behind World of Tanks: HEAT (May 2026, day-one release on PC, Steam Deck, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 5 Pro, and Xbox Series X|S) and the company's future titles.
He has spent 18+ years at Wargaming (since 2008), working on World of Tanks from its earliest days: generalist, then graphics programmer, then long-time Rendering Team Lead — through the 1.0 render rewrite, the multi-core restructuring with up to 41% average FPS gain, and the enCore RT ray-traced shadows technology developed with Intel.
He is a three-time GDC speaker (two sessions in 2018, one in 2020) and spoke at 4C 2017.
Title: Senior Animator
Company: Firaxis Games
Chandrahas Tanguturi is a Senior Animator currently working at Firaxis Games. After graduating with a degree in Mechanical Engineering, Chandrahas followed his passion for animation and transitioned fields early in his career—starting as an animator in visual effects, television series, and ultimately switching to a career in Games.
Grounded in a strong foundation of core animation principles and holding a Master's degree in Animation from SCAD, Chandrahas joined Firaxis Games, where he has spent the last four years as a major contributor to Sid Meier's Civilization VII. He presented on the craft behind designing leaders for the iconic, world-renowned franchise at GDC.
With eight years of industry experience across games, TV, and visual effects, Chandrahas remains focused on pushing creative boundaries to deliver impactful character animation. Throughout his journey, he has also actively served as a mentor, guiding students and aspiring animators as they enter the field.
Title: Audio Lead
Company: Mobius Digital
Akash Thakkar is an award-winning sound designer based in Seattle. His portfolio includes contributions to critically lauded titles such as "Hyper Light Drifter," "Outer Wilds: Echoes of the Eye," "Concrete Genie," and "High on Life," among others.
Beyond his creative work, Akash is dedicated to educating and empowering the next generation of audio professionals. He frequently shares his expertise through international speaking engagements and educational content for aspiring sound designers. Akash is also a vocal advocate for fair compensation in the gaming industry, actively working to ensure audio professionals receive appropriate recognition for their contributions.
Title: Senior Casting & Voice Director
Company: Self / formerly Blizzard Entertainment
Andrea Toyias is a veteran Casting and Voice Director whose career has been spent at the intersection of performance, storytelling and games. She founded the voice-over department at Blizzard Entertainment and spent 20 years overseeing casting and voice direction across some of the company's most celebrated franchises, including World of Warcraft, Diablo, Overwatch, StarCraft, and Hearthstone.
During her two decades at Blizzard, Andrea helped build the studio's VO pipeline from the ground up, collaborating with creative teams and performers to populate worlds with thousands of characters—from legendary heroes and terrifying villains to the smallest NPC with only a handful of lines.
Known for bringing energy, curiosity and a deep love of actors into the recording room, Andrea has spent thousands of hours behind the glass directing performances and helping creative teams discover possibilities they may not have known were on the page.
Today, she brings that experience to the broader game development and acting communities through directing, casting, consulting, coaching and education. After a career spent creating heroes, demons, dragons, orcs and the occasional talking spoon, Andrea remains fascinated by the same thing that drew her to voice-over in the first place: the extraordinary things that can happen when great storytelling meets great performance.
Title: Division Manager, Creative Division
Company: Lasengle Inc.
Atsushi Ueno began his career at SEGA in 1996 as a game programmer. He later became a lead programmer, working on arcade and console titles, focusing on maximizing the potential of the hardware. In 2013, he became an engineering manager at SEGA before joining DELiGHTWORKS (now Lasengle Inc.) in 2019. Since 2021, he has served as Technical Director for Fate/Grand Order. He also leads Lasengle's Creative Division, overseeing technical investment, engineering quality, and the operational foundations that support Fate/Grand Order through its second decade of live operation.
Title: Principal Insights Analyst
Company: Riot Games
Drew Vande Guchte is a Principal Insights Analyst at Riot Games and a lifelong student of both digital and tabletop gaming. With an academic background in computational physics and a decade of experience leading data science teams and delivering analytics in the games industry, he specializes in making data-driven decision-making collaborative and approachable for cross-functional partners. When he is not playing The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom for the n-th time or building his latest Dungeons & Dragons campaign, Drew enjoys reading, running, and spending time with his family in the beautiful Pacific Northwest.
Title: Engineering Manager, Pokémon GO
Company: Scopely
Ashwin Vasan is an Engineering Manager on Pokémon GO, focused on the systems and tools behind large-scale live gameplay. Since joining the team in 2021, he has helped increase the capacity of a single battle instance from hundreds to thousands of concurrent players and led a multi-region rollout of real-time battle infrastructure serving one million requests per second. Before working on games, Ashwin built infrastructure at AWS for major live sports streams, including the Super Bowl and English Premier League. He holds a master's degree in computer science from the University of Colorado Boulder.
Title: Audio Director, Composer, Technical Sound Designer
Company: Elsewhere Studios
Josué Vera is a Puerto Rican audio director, multimedia composer, and technical sound designer based in NYC. His work has been heard on different platforms, such as Amazon Prime, Apple TV, and Nat Geo. Josué works with multiple indie studios to help ideate and develop their audio pipeline and design. He's currently an adjunct instructor at NYU where he teaches compositional and implementation techniques for video game music.
He's a firm believer in community. He co-founded Game Sound Summit, the only game audio conference in Puerto Rico. He also co-organizes NYCGameAudio, and has been a Conference Associate at GameSoundCon and [GDC] Festival of Gaming. Josué holds a Master's degree in Screen Scoring from NYU Steinhardt and a BM in Music Composition from the Conservatorio de Música de Puerto Rico. Outside of music, Josué is an avid fan of the tabletop game Dungeons & Dragons, hiking, and hot chocolate.
Title: Audio Director / Manager
Company: BANDAI NAMCO Studios Inc.
Ryo Watanabe is an Audio Director and Manager at Bandai Namco Studios, where he has worked since joining Namco in 2005. His work spans composition, sound design, implementation, interactive mixing, spatial audio, haptics, and large-scale audio direction.
He is best known for his work on the ACE COMBAT series, including serving as Audio Director on ACE COMBAT 7: SKIES UNKNOWN and ACE COMBAT 8. Across these projects, he has led the design of immersive aerial-combat audio, real-time mixing systems, radio presentation, music integration, spatial audio, and controller haptics, while coordinating multidisciplinary teams across multiple companies.
Watanabe has also contributed to a wide range of Bandai Namco titles and franchises, including THE IDOLM@STER, TEKKEN, RIDGE RACER, SOULCALIBUR, PAC-MAN, Taiko no Tatsujin, Katamari Damacy, and Denonbu. His experience covers both hands-on creation and production leadership, from composing music and designing sound effects to establishing workflows, review methods, and shared creative principles for large teams.
A central theme of his work is translating abstract creative intent into practical production decisions. He has developed approaches for aligning music, sound effects, dialogue, cinematics, spatial audio, and haptics around a unified player experience, and for balancing realism, clarity, emotional impact, and gameplay feedback in complex interactive scenes.
He has presented at CEDEC and IGDA Japan SIG-Audio on topics including interactive mixing, audio direction, spatial audio, Wwise, and AAA game production. His speaking history includes CEDEC 2014, 2016, 2019, and 2024, as well as GDC audio report sessions in 2018, 2019, 2024, and 2025. At CEDEC, he served for many years as a lead organizer of the sound program, contributing to its programming and overall operation. He has also participated in the Game Developers Choice Awards nomination process.
Watanabe was also featured on a television program produced by NHK, Japan's public broadcaster, where he introduced the creative and technical process behind game audio production.
He continues to explore how game audio can create stronger emotional and physical connections between players and interactive worlds, and how creative judgment can be made shareable and actionable across large development teams.
Title: Producer
Company: Unknown Worlds
Nico is a Producer at Unknown Worlds, where he enables multi-disciplinary teams to do their best work within realistic constraints of schedule, resources, and budget. He has worked on a wide variety of projects, from R&D explorations, to full-production client and internal game titles, to multi-day location-based experiences. When Nico isn't working, he can be found playing volleyball, participating in a D&D campaign, or searching for the best hot chocolate in town.
Title: Associate Viewmodel Animator
Company: Respawn
Ben Wolcott-Schickler is a Viewmodel Animator at Respawn Entertainment. Having grown up playing games with his brother, he chose to go to school to learn about game dev and animation. Now Ben has started his career as an animator working on first person animations on Apex Legends.
Title: CEO / Tech Director
Company: Soft Crunch Games
Grzegorz Wątroba is a gamer of over 30 years and a game programmer since 2010, fulfilling his childhood dream of making games. A Metal Gear Solid and Devil May Cry fan, he has worked with more than a dozen companies in Poland and abroad, contributing to titles including Gears of War: Reloaded, Cronos: The New Dawn, Gord, The Thaumaturge, ROKI and God's Trigger. He is Technical Director and CEO of Soft Crunch Games. Across 16 years and 20+ projects he has worked on in-house and commercial engines using both C++ and C#, targeting nearly every platform of the last three console generations, with a focus on programming, optimization and the production and leadership side of development. Beyond making games, he speaks about them at conferences and on his podcast Okiem Deva, where he shares a practitioner's perspective on the industry.
Title: Founder & Director
Company: Dire Lark
Trevin has been leading game dev teams for over 15 years, shipping games which bring together engaging entertainment and real-world impacts. While he's first and foremost a game designer, he's also a researcher, speaker, and author, investigating how games and play are part of effective interdisciplinary interventions in complex contexts (like, for example, the climate crisis). As a senior fellow with the Atlantic Council's Climate Resilience Center, Trevin led the development of the Gaming for Climate Action report, collecting and sharing the best practices from game developers working on pro-environmental games from across the globe. In 2022, Trevin founded Dire Lark, a game design for change studio, where he and a small team conduct research, make games, and support other studios to bring rich, meaningful experiences to players.
Title: Head of Player Experience
Company: SYBO
Celia Zimmermann is the Head of Player Experience at SYBO, the mobile games studio behind the global hit Subway Surfers. With nearly a decade of experience in mobile and free-to-play games, she has spent the past seven years creating community-first experiences and leading player engagement across Subway Surfers, Subway Surfers City, and SYBO.
Together with her team, Celia has created entertaining, culturally relevant moments that have reached millions of players around the world, helping Subway Surfers remain one of the most recognizable and enduring brands in mobile gaming.
Outside of SYBO, Celia is passionate about the positive impact games can have on people and the planet. She actively supports industry initiatives that help developers create games for good. When she's not working, you'll likely find her trail running, gardening, or thrifting for vintage treasures.