Dallas IGDA Candidate statement (Or I’m at it again)

I’m running for the board of Directors of the Dallas IGDA chapter, below is my candidate’s statement. If you are voting please feel free to ask me any questions you may have!

Dallas is set to be one of the power houses of the US game industry, the area is brimming with local talent and more is arriving every day. Because of this, the Dallas IGDA has the opportunity, the need even, to become one of the largest, most active and exciting chapters in the world. Local chapters are the heart of the IGDA and, if elected to the board of directors, I will help take it to the next level. My number one priority is to strengthen and grow the community. This will be accomplished in number of different ways, including:

• Develop and implement regular monthly meetings with high-quality speakers, panels, and round tables. These presentations will focus on building games, growing individuals, and strengthening studios all at the professional level.
• Formally implement social and networking events (in addition to the regular monthly meeting), to unify the community, and create professional connections and friendships.
• Help local students learn about and break into the industry, by holding at least two special student focused meetings a year.
• Working closely with the national IGDA board of directors to give back to the community and strengthen our local chapter
• Record the monthly meetings and make them available online for those who can’t attend

Now about me, I have loved games my entire life and first started making them when I was 12 years old. I attended Full Sail University and got my BS in Game Design and Development. After college I moved to the Philadelphia area to work at a local casual game studio, Megatouch Games. I worked there for 3 years  first as a programmer, then as a designer and later, lead designer. While at Megatouch, I shipped over 25 casual titles . Along with local members of the IGDA I helped founded the VGI Philly in May of 2009 to help foster industry growth. I have spoken at several conferences including: Wizard World, GDC, GameX, PAX East, Gameloop Philly and GCECS. I have also worked on giving back to the student community by speaking at local schools and writing for GameCareerGuide.com. In 2010, I was elected as Chair of the Philly IGDA chapter and helped make it one of the premier chapters in the USA. As chair, I helped charter the chapter, implement regular monthly meetings, hosted several game jams, and local studio showcases (averaging around 200 attendees), and grew the chapter from around 10 average participants to 70. In May of 2011, I accepted a job at id Software as a Technical Producer on Rage and Doom 4, which brought me to the beautiful city of Dallas. If elected to the board, I will use all of this experience to help make the Dallas IGDA a great chapter.

Moving On

It is with excitement that I’m announcing that I have accepted a Technical Producer position at id Software in Dallas, Texas!! This is a huge move for me and my career and I’m extremely excited. But this means I will be leaving Philly and the all the awesomeness that is here. I have included my letter to the Philly IGDA Chapter.

Hello Chapter, 

It is with mixed emotions that I write this letter to inform you that I will be stepping down as the Chair of IGDA Philly later this month. The reasons for my departure though are not sad but are in fact super exciting for me personally, I have accepted a Technical Producer position with id Software in Dallas, TX. This is a huge opportunity for me and my career and I could not pass it up. But it is with sadness that I leave Philly and the Philly IGDA. I would like to thank all of you for be so excellent over the last year that I have been the chair of this chapter.  Together, you the members and our awesome leadership team have made the Philly IGDA one of the premier chapters in the USA, one that is looked at as “doing it right”. So from the bottom of my heart I thank you.

Now on to what is happening next. Matt Brenner, the current Vice-Chair, will be stepping into the interim-Chair position when I depart. Matt has been crucial to the success of the chapter and I couldn’t have done it without him. Matt will be an excellent leader of the chapter and I pray that you all treat him with as much excitement, kindness and enthusiasm as you have treated me. The IGDA Philly is bigger than any one person, the Chair is a figure head position who serves YOU, the members of the chapter, so lets not let this slow down the growth and awesomeness of this chapter. We have a ton of great events planned for the next few months and it is going to be a great year in Philly!! (May and June alone will see 8 games released locally). There is also a LOT of work to be done still, so if you can please step up and volunteer with the chapter, we can always use the help. The goals that we on the leadership team set for the chapter this year have only partly been reached, but there are still 7 months left! 

I want to also thank Tristin Hightower and Allison Berman for there work for the organization. Tristin has been part of the leadership longer than anyone and does more than you guys will ever no behind the scenes, I would have been a crappy Chair without her always pushing me to get things done and keeping me organized. Alli stepped up in a big way when we needed a new secretary and has always been a great help even when she didn’t have internet. Treat them well, the chapter needs awesome people like them. 

The May 14th meeting (A marketing meeting!) will be my last meeting, followed by (as usual) drinks and food at Mikey’s. I would love to see all of you one last time at this meeting, so please come out in force.

It is hard for me to leave Philly during such an awesome time, and again I thank you from the very bottom of my heart for an amazing last year here. I couldn’t ask for a better chapter to help runs, you guys are great friends.

See you soon,

Grant Shonkwiler

Chair IGDA Philly (for one last time)

Top Films of 2010

So here we go my top 13 films of 2010, it was a pretty awesome year so it was a long drawn out fight for the top spots. There were also a ton of movies I didn’t get to see that I wanted to, so if you have any suggestions please let me know.

The Social Network

Black Swan

Inception

Scott Pilgrim Vs The World

Toy Story 3

The King’s Speech

Shutter Island

The Fighter

Restrepo

Blue Valentine

True Grit

How to Train Your Dragon

The Other Guys

Honorable Mention:

Red, Easy A, Kick-Ass, 127 Hours, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1, Tron: Legacy

Worst movie of the year(that I saw): Percy Jackson & the Olympians

PS I really want to see Howl but I can’t find it anywhere.

Candidate Statement

So a bit of a cross post from my other blog, but I wanted everyone to know about this. Below is the candidate statement that I have submitted to IGDA National, thanks to everyone who helped me refine and edit this down to a strong and pointed statement.

I believe the IGDA can be a catalyst for change in the way our industry is viewed and the way we, as game developers, view our passion and our livelihood; but our biggest problem is lack of excitement and engagement in our members. We, the members, are the heart of the organization and the best way to help and engage members is by empowering our SIGs and Chapters. As Chair of the Chapter in Philadelphia, I was able to help raise the excitement in the community by engaging with developers and discovering their needs. This excitement resulted in industry-relevant meetings and grew the Chapter by more than 50% in less than one year. If elected to the IGDA Board of Directors, I have seven main tasks that I would like to work on.

• East Coast IGDA Conference: the West coast has its own IGDA conference and it is time one on the East coast is organized by the Chapters in the region.
• Webinars: they were incredibly valuable; I would love to bring these back.
• Increase value to members: I want to make the current benefits more visible to members. There are a lot of great benefits that most members don’t take advantage of.  I want to increase the value of membership so people feel they NEED to be a member. We can accomplish this by finding out what members need and providing it by partnering with organizations that will fulfill those needs and more.
• Fix the website: I will help elevate the website to the same standards the rest of world holds their industry organizations to.
• Regional Super Volunteer: Chapter leaders currently only have Gordon and each other to go to for advice and solutions; there should be a volunteer whose sole purpose is to support Chapter leaders. These volunteers would be assigned to 3-6 Chapters and would support the leaders in any way needed, as well as escalating problems to the board.
• Empower the Chapters: By helping Chapter leaders find sponsorships, connecting leaders with other Chapter leaders, helping Chapters formalize, removing obstacles for international Chapters formalization, and helping Chapters develop and present powerful and useful content to their members.
• Empower the SIGs: By increasing the visibility of the SIGs and their work, encouraging the SIGs to publish periodic white papers and articles; finding space for SIG meetings at conferences, and helping SIG leaders wherever else needed.

 

Top Albums of 2010

Okay so several of you have asked me where this post is and why it is late. Well to be honest I had a terrible year in music last year, not that there were bad albums, I just forgot to buy them… So yeah here is my list. I’m sorry I missed some of my favorite bands but I was overloaded by “new” old music. Also you will see a lot of Soundtracks, that is because I’ve done a lot of writing this year and these fuel my work flow.

Cloud Cult – Light Chasers

Sufjan Stevens – The Age of Adz

She & Him – Volume Two

The Arcade Fire – The Suburbs

Spoon - Transference

Amy MacDonald - A Curious Thing

Daft Punk – Tron: Legacy (OST)

Hans Zimmer – Inception (OST)

Nigel Godrich – Scott Pilgrim vs The World (OST)

LCD Soundsystem - This Is Happening

MGMT- Congratulations

Gorillaz – Plastic Beach

Cee Lo Green – Ladykiller

And that is it, those are all the albums I got this year I know there are a ton I’ve missed please let me know which ones you think I should check out.

IGDA Board Of Directors

I have officially announced that I’m running for the Board of Directors of the IGDA this February. I have created a facebook page and a blog to keep people informed of what I’m working on and my campaign. I’ll also keep this blog updated. www.facebook.com/GrantForIGDA http://grantforigda.wordpress.com/

Note: Elections are open from February 21st through March 18th. You must be a paid member to vote.

An assortment of stuff and things

So I have a bunch of things to update, first off I got one of those twitter thingys, pretty fun. You can see the new link to the left there. Also for you longtime readers you see I have a new layout! It was about time for an update. Next we have a foot of snow so we are off work today, so I’m getting ready for the Global Game Jam here in Philly tomorrow. I did an interview with the Philadelphia Business Journal about the event http://bit.ly/g4OSUf, thanks to Tristin for setting that one up. Also there are a bunch of updates going on over at http://igda.org/philly so check those out. We are working on a lot of fun things this year for the chapter so get ready!

Now I must get back to writing my talk for a conference that will be taking place in Mid-March (announcement to come soon).

IGDA Philly

So I would like to announce that I have the honor of coming back to be chair for two more years of the IGDA Philly chapter. After the announcement yesterday we had a town hall meeting that got a lot of awesome ideas floating around on things the IGDA chapter can do to be amazing in Philly. It was really exciting and humbling to see how excited people are about both the community and the organization here in Philly. Great things are happening in the organization, stay tuned for exciting updates

Philly IGDA Elections Take 2

So a brief history. The Philly chapter of the IGDA was officially chartered this year, part of chartering was writing our bylaws. Within the bylaws are the rules on elections. When writing this section we decided that there should be elections every year in December, the positions would be held for two years,  and two positions would be up for reelection each year. So to get things started rolling correctly the position I currently hold, Chair, and Secretary are up for reelection. I have decided to run again because my work here is not finished yet! So here is my candidate statement. This was actually a really good idea because it allowed me to think about what we have done in the last few months, and what we are going  to do in the months to come.

 

It has been an exciting and crazy year here in Philadelphia, both for sports and for the game industry. Let me start by recapping some of the amazing accomplishments we have made within the IGDA Philadelphia Chapter this year. Before I do that, let me say “Thank You” to our awesome chapter members; without you guys this chapter would be nothing. Your support and enthusiasm has made our chapter become one of the premier chapters in the organization. I also want to thank our awesome leadership team who did a great job this year.

Now to recap what has happened: First off, the chapter is chartered! This is great news because it allows us to get insurance, get a bank account, and start raising support and get grants from IGDA National to buy cool stuff. Secondly, we locked down a time and location for monthly meetings. After doing this, we saw attendance and participation rise, thanks to UPenn and Drexel being our gracious hosts this past year. We held our first student focused meeting, which was an amazing event and we can’t wait to do it again. In addition, we had an awesome local showcase, which is going to become an annual event and just last month we got a new, awesome logo! We also had a ton of amazing speakers and some great after parties. Those are just some of the highlights of this year.

I’m sure you are wondering, “Okay that is cool, but where do we go from here?” Well let me answer that for you. If I’m re-elected to chair, I will continue all of the awesome initiatives and events that we started this year, including the student meetings and the showcase. The industry is growing extremely fast here in Philly and it is time to use the IGDA to take this growth to the next level.  As Chair, my number one priority will be to strengthen and grow the community. This will be accomplished in a number of different ways:

1. Further develop and enhance regular monthly meetings with high-quality speakers, panels, and round tables. These presentations will focus on topics that you, the local developer, find interesting and tangible.
2. Formally implement social and networking events, which unify the community, and create professional connections and friendships.
3. Work on developing and relaunching the Philly Game Jam
4. Work with studios, the government, and investors to foster the growth of the industry in the Greater Philadelphia area
5. Help sponsor local events, including a potential local game conference
6. Work closely with the national IGDA board of directors to give back to the community and strengthen local chapters
7. Record our meetings and make them available online for those who can’t attend the meetings
8. Host a Global Game Jam site in January

Now about me: I have loved games my entire life and first started making them when I was 12 years old. I attended Full Sail University and acquired my BS in Game Design and Development. After college, I moved to the Philly area to work at a local casual game studio, Megatouch Games. I started with the studio as a programmer, and I am currently a designer. Along with local members of the IGDA, I helped found the VGI Philly in May of 2009 to help foster growth of the industry. In 2009, I was a speaker at several conferences, including: Wizard World, GDC, GameX and GCECS. I am focused on giving back to the student community by speaking at local schools and writing for GameCareerGuide.com. In 2010, I was elected as Chair of the Philly IGDA chapter and have helped make this chapter awesome with the rest of the chapter leadership. If re-elected chair, I will use all of this experience to help make the Philly IGDA a great chapter.

Life and work in the Greater Philadelphia Area

So once again a lot of awesome things happening here in Philly. I just wanted to share some quick updates. First off last Saturday was our first ever, hopefully annual, IGDA Philly showcase! The showcase brought together a bunch of local developers and allowed them to play each others games, as well as anyone else who wanted to, and get feedback on games currently in production. And it was a rousing success. We had ten different studios/developers showing off a wide range of games. We had an awesome turnout and can’t wait to do it again soon. We will have an official recap on the IGDA site soon but here are two recaps from teams that showed off games. Naveen Nattam, Space Whale Studios

My next bit of news is work related. We have finally released a video of our newest release. I got to work on every one of the games in this release as a designer and even did some coding on the Poker and Trix game. Check them out and let me know what you think!