The 2024 Game Developer Conference will take place next month in March and as part of this, both Microsoft and the Xbox team will be there to "engage and empower" developers, publishers as well as technology partners across the globe.
"Our message is simple: Microsoft and Xbox are here to help power your games and empower your teams."
GDC will feature speakers from Xbox, Activision Blizzard, Zenimax, and even King who will "demonstrate groundbreaking in-game innovations" and "community-building strategies". Microsoft will also host talks that spotlight new tools, software, and services that can benefit developers and grow player engagement.
Below is the full schedule courtesy of the Microsoft website. Some of the titles featured include Call of Duty, Hi-Fi RUSH, Warcraft, Diablo IV, Minecraft and Pillars of Eternity.
Monday, March 18
Skyscraper Zombies: Advancing 'Call of Duty's' Systems for Giant AI
Speaker: Andrew Hoyt (Gameplay Engineer, Treyarch)
Date: Monday, March 18
Time: 3:50 pm - 4:20 pm
Tuesday, March 19
H2O in H3LL: The Various Forms of Water in Diablo IV
Speaker: Aaron Aikman (Lead Technical Artist, Graphics, Blizzard Entertainment)
Date: Tuesday, March 19
Time: 10:50 am - 11:50 am
The Synergy of Architecture and Structural Engineering in Game Art and Design
Speaker: Joshua Haun (Expert Environment Artist, Activision)
Date: Tuesday, March 19
Time: 10:50 am - 11:50 am
Harvesting 10 Years Of Success: How Farm Heroes Saga Has Super-Served It's Players For A Decade
Speaker: Sabrina Carmona (VP Head of Farm Heroes Saga, King)
Date: Tuesday, March 19
Time: 2:40 pm - 3:40 pm
Audio Summit: How do you make casual games players turn their audio on?
Speaker: Dominique Devoucoux (Head of Audio, King)
Date: Tuesday, March 19
Time: 4:40 pm - 5:10 pm
Wednesday, March 20
Developing Hi-Fi RUSH "Backwards" and Finding Our Positive Gameplay Loop
Speaker: John Johanas (Game Director, Tango Gameworks)
Date: Wednesday, March 20
Time: 9:00 am - 10:00 am
The First 30 Years of 'Warcraft': The Making of a Game Universe
Speaker: John Hight (Franchise General Manager, Warcraft Franchise, Blizzard Entertainment)
Date: Wednesday, March 20
Time: 9:00 am - 10:00 am
The Pillars of Hell: Achieving the Artistic Vision of Diablo IV
Speaker: John Mueller (Art Director, Blizzard Entertainment)
Date: Wednesday, March 20
Time: 9:00 am - 10:00 am
Sugary Statistics: What we have learned about Candy Crush content after 10 years and over 15,000 levels
Speakers: Jan Wedekind (Head of Central Insights, King) and Xavier Guardiola (Data Science Director, King)
Date: Wednesday, March 20
Time: 9:00 am - 10:00 am
Xbox’s Product Inclusion Framework & Inclusive Growth Doorways
Speaker: Katy Jo Wright (Senior Director, Gaming for Everyone, Microsoft)
Date: Wednesday, March 20
Time: 12:30 pm - 1:30 pm
Automated Testing of Shader Code
Speaker: Keith Stockdale (Senior Software Engineer, Rare Ltd)
Date: Wednesday, March 20
Time: 2:00 pm - 3:00 pm
Diablo IV – Audio Systems Deep Dive “Living Audio”
Speakers: Kris Giampa (Audio Director, Blizzard Entertainment) and Michael Bartnett (Software Engineer, Blizzard Entertainment)
Date: Wednesday, March 20
Time: 2:00 pm - 3:00 pm
Optimizing Game Development Workflows with Visual Studio and AI
Speakers: David Li (Game Developer Product Manager, Microsoft) and Greg Denton (Principal Product Manager, Microsoft)
Date: Wednesday, March 20
Time: 2:00 pm - 3:00 pm
All things Azure & OpenAI for Game Development
Speakers: Jon Kefaloukos (Strategic Account Director Gaming at Azure , Microsoft) and Uthappa Kattera Chengappa (Lead Cloud Solution Architect Gaming at Azure , Microsoft)
Date: Wednesday, March 20
Time: 3:30 pm - 4:30 pm
10 Years in Tamriel: Success of The Elder Scrolls
Speaker: Matt Firor (Studio Director / President, ZeniMax Online Studios)
Date: Wednesday, March 20
Time: 5:00 pm - 6:00 pm
3D Toon Rendering in Hi-Fi RUSH
Speakers: Kosuke Tanaka (Lead Graphics Programmer, Tango Gameworks) and Takashi Komada (Graphics/Physics Programmer, Tango Gameworks)
Date: Wednesday, March 20
Time: 5:00 pm - 6:00 pm
The View From Above: Designing Compelling Quests for 'Diablo IV'
Speaker: Harrison Pink (Senior Quest Designer II, Blizzard Entertainment)
Date: Wednesday, March 20
Time: 5:00 pm - 6:00 pm
Thursday, March 21
'Diablo IV': The Art of Open World Sanctuary
Speakers: Mahreen Fatima (Senior Environment Artist, Blizzard Entertainment), Sam Gao (Environment Artist, Blizzard Entertainment), and Justin Whitehead (Associate Material Artist, Environments, Blizzard Entertainment)
Date: Thursday, March 21
Time: 10:00 am - 11:00 am
Levelling Up: How AI's Transformative Role in Level Automation Production Adds Business Value in 'Candy Crush Saga'
Speaker: Anna Hernandelius (Product Director Content, King) and Sahar Asadi (Director of AI Labs, King)
Date: Thursday, March 21
Time: 10:00 am - 11:00 am
Keeping Online Communities Healthy
Speakers: Jennifer Mills-Perov (Principal Product Manager Gaming Trust and Safety, Microsoft) and Ivory Harvey (Senior Technical Program Manager Gaming Trust and Safety, Microsoft)
Date: Thursday, March 21
Time: 11:30 am - 12:30 pm
DirectX State of the Union Featuring Work Graphs and Introducing DirectSR
Speakers: Shawn Hargreaves (Dev Manager, Direct3D, Microsoft), Austin Kinross (PIX Developer Lead, Microsoft), Wessam Bahnassi (Principal Engineer, Developer Technology, Nvidia), and Rob Martin (Fellow Software Engineer, AMD)
Date: Thursday, March 21
Time: 12:45 am - 1:45 pm
Minecraft Players at the Center of the Universe of Big Data
Speaker: Francisco Rius (Head of Data at Mojang Studios)
Date: Thursday, March 21
Time: 12:45 pm - 1:45 pm
MergeBot: Activision's Merge and Resolve Infrastructure
Speaker: Damianos Gkouzkouris (Senior Tools Engineer, Activision)
Date: Thursday, March 21
Time: 3:00 pm - 3:30 pm
How PlayFab Helped Texas Chainsaw Massacre Succeed
Speakers: CJ Williams (Director of Product Management Microsoft Game Creator Services, Microsoft) and Rob Fox (Designer and Producer Gun Interactive, Gun Interactive)
Date: Thursday, March 21
Time: 4:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Operation Innovation: How Xbox Employs Military Talents in Gaming
Speakers: Fiona Cherbak (Lead Talent Program Manager, Xbox Game Studios), iAsia Brown (Senior Producer, Xbox Game Studios Publishing), Lisa Elswick (Vice President, USO Transition Programs , USO), Jenn Panattoni (Head of Xbox Social Impact, Xbox/Microsoft), and Jason Coon (Director of Xbox Safety Operations, Xbox/Microsoft)
Date: Thursday, March 21
Time: 4:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Friday, March 22
Game Career Seminar: Who Are You? Building Your Profile Outside the Job
Speaker: Ashley Poprik (Writer, High Moon Studios)
Date: Friday, March 22
Time: 10:10 am - 10:40 am
Shipping Diablo IV
Speakers: Michael Bybee (Production Director, Blizzard Entertainment) and Tiffany Wat (Production Director, Blizzard Entertainment)
Date: Friday, March 22
Time: 1:30 pm - 2:30 pm
Building the 'Minecraft' Creator Platform Block-by-Block
Speaker: Kayla Kinnunen (Executive Producer, Mojang Studios)
Date: Friday, March 22
Time: 3:00 pm - 4:00 pm
Embracing Art Performance on 'Diablo IV'
Speaker: Evan Edwards (Senior Technical Artist I, Graphics, Blizzard Entertainment)
Date: Friday, March 22
Time: 3:00 pm - 4:00 pm
Visual Effects Roundtable Day 3
Speaker: Gabriel Boileau (VFX Artist, Activision Blizzard)
Date: Friday, March 22
Time: 3:00 pm - 4:00 pm
Xbox will also be sponsoring the Independent Games Festival which also includes a networking event and will take place on 21st March 2024.
Of course, if any interesting news comes out of these conferences, we'll be sure to let you know. Would any of the above conferences interest you? Leave a comment below.
[source developer.microsoft.com]
Comments 8
Lots of Diablo IV stuff in there.
Looking forward to finally seeing Direct Super Resolution (I feel like this has been in the works for years now).
It will be interesting to see 1) how it compares to FSR and DLSS and 2) if the Xbox Series X|S will actually be able to use it with the hardware-level Machine Learning capabilities (so far only AutoHDR uses it)
@GamingFan4Lyf i have Diablo 4 on both Series X and PS5. The HDR on PS5 looks washed out. The Series X running Dolby vision looks outstanding in D4. Kind of wish i didn’t double dip it on sale for PS5. Dolby vision on my Lg Oled C2 looks incredible. I am excited to see what advancements MS does to its hardware with Ai and in house tech.
"The View From Above: Designing Compelling Quests for 'Diablo IV'"
Do they need the whole hour for that? It's gonna be a short presentation. Don't get me wrong, I loved playing Diablo 4 but the quests were mostly "go here, kill this thing" or "go here, kill these things and pick up this thing".
I completed Diablo 4 and if you held a gun to my head I would struggle to describe one quest in detail.
@HonestHick Dolby Vision is definitely a double edged-sword.
I think I might have figured out how to get even better results with Dolby Vision with regards to peak brightness (as it never seems to "pop" quite as well as using HDR10 and HGIG Mode (Game HDR in my Vizio).
I have a Discussion post about it that talks my thought process behind it - more as a guide and also for people to provide feedback for a sanity check. I'd be interested in your thoughts on this.
The bottom line is to essentially set your HDR Calibration to the Lowest and Maximum values (for any games that actually use the system calibration) and then, in the game, setting your HDR Peak brightness to the max (and lowest value to 0 if applicable).
The idea is that Dolby Vision for Games is supposed to act like it does for movies:
Essentially a min/max for the film that is set by whoever did the master could be higher/lower than the peak brightness/darkness that your TV supports so it adjusts accordingly.
The problem with games, the sliders for the games don't necessarily give you that information so the sliders could be "wrong". By setting everything to absolute min/max, you let Dolby Vision for Games work "properly".
https://www.purexbox.com/forums/xbox-series-x/dolby_vision_for_games_decoded
@GamingFan4Lyf wow that is for sure interesting. I will have to play around with that. I love the way Dolby vision looks on default for Diablo 4. The HDR on PS5 for D4 is just washed out. To the point that the brown dirt looks like it has a thin layer of white snow on it. So a pretty big difference. As i mentioned i have a LG Oled C2 model and those don’t get as bright as a Led. But the black levels and color accuracy is really good. The only thing about the LG that is annoying is it has a handshake issue with the HDMI if i have the Xbox setting at 120fps. It goes away if you select 60fps. Thanks for sharing this info with me. I like to nerd out on this stuff. 😊
@HonestHick I'd be interested in the results.
I don't have an OLED. My TV is a budget-friendly Vizio M7 Quantum. It's nice because it can support both Dolby Vision and HDR10+ as well as VRR and ALLM, but sadly, unlike the Quantum's that came out the following year, only a 60Hz display.
@GamingFan4Lyf well 60 gets the job done. Mine is 120 and not to much takes advantage of it. At this point i just want some great games to drop. Not much on my list of needs at the moment. So i am still playing most of last years titles and trying to earn more trophy and achievements. Plus of course my daily seasonal Diablo 4 fix.
@HonestHick I just hate that 40fps modes are tied to 120Hz because my TV can handle 40fps via VRR.
I hear you on older games. When I am taking a break from Final Fantasy 16 (e.g. missus is using the TV), I am playing PS2/Gamecube era and older games on my laptop. I am really going deep into gaming history. LOL!
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