Agenda
You Have to Have a Happy Life: RJ Mical on Four Decades of Inventing Play
Chris Melissinos (Principal Evangelist and Game Historian, Amazon Web Services (AWS))
RJ Mical (Director of Games, Google)
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Track:
Luminaries Speaker Series
Format:
Fireside Chat
Vault Recording: TBD
RJ Mical wrote Intuition, the Amiga's graphical interface, helping shift computer work from being something only for spreadsheets to a tool for artists, musicians, and game creators. He co-created the Atari Lynx (the first handheld game system with a color screen) and the 3DO console, and since then he has earned 12 patents, founded five startups, and led teams at Sony PlayStation and Google. Many developers working today learned to make games on hardware he helped design.
Chris Melissinos, who curated the Smithsonian American Art Museum's "The Art of Video Games" and received the 2013 Game Developers Choice Awards Ambassador Award for that work, asks RJ about the decisions behind those machines: what constraints - memory, cost, or schedule - led to different ideas, which of those compromises held up, and why some of his ideas outlasted the hardware they were written for. The second half turns to what comes next, with RJ explaining where he expects game technology to go as technology and new creation tools change who is able to make games. "You have to have a happy life," is RJs motto, and this conversation is a call to invent boldly, build with joy, and make magic that inspires the next generation.
Chris Melissinos, who curated the Smithsonian American Art Museum's "The Art of Video Games" and received the 2013 Game Developers Choice Awards Ambassador Award for that work, asks RJ about the decisions behind those machines: what constraints - memory, cost, or schedule - led to different ideas, which of those compromises held up, and why some of his ideas outlasted the hardware they were written for. The second half turns to what comes next, with RJ explaining where he expects game technology to go as technology and new creation tools change who is able to make games. "You have to have a happy life," is RJs motto, and this conversation is a call to invent boldly, build with joy, and make magic that inspires the next generation.
Takeaway
Attendees will hear industry legend RJ Mical talk candidly about the constraints; memory, cost, schedule, that shaped the Amiga, Atari Lynx, and 3DO, and which of those design choices held up over time. He'll also share where he thinks game technology is headed as new tools open up and expand who is able to become a game creator, and what games will look like. RJ’s motto, “You have to have a happy life," is woven throughout as he calls us all to invent boldly, build with joy, and make magic that inspires the next generation.