GDC: Hump Day

I was hoping I’d have time to sit down and write little vignettes about GDC a few times a day throughout the week. Things haven’t worked out that way. I’ve been running around like a chicken with my head cut off from one appointment to the next, spending most of the day starting my sentences off with “Sorry I’m late, but…”

When I finally do manage to escape the con’s orbit, all I have time for is to swallow a fist-full of sleeping pills and hope my insomnia doesn’t kick in at 3 in the morning, like it usually does.

Today was interesting. I got to meet Paul Barnett.

Paul is the kind of guy who I’ve always wanted to interview. Watching some of his first Warhammer videos from years ago where it looked like he had downed twelve shots of Jagermeister before being pushed in front of the camera… now that was journalism!

He was a very interesting man to talk to, and our topics of conversation got into areas very far removed from his twelve shots of Jager appearances.

Pro Tip to anyone interviewing him in the future: Ask him “Is there anything that you personally are interested in talking about?”

On a side note, I’m sure anyone even remotely interested in gaming has by now heard that the REVOLUTION I was talking about in last night’s post is the OnLive system.

Sitting in the foyer before the event nursing a Red Bull, a reporter with an Australian accent sat down next to me.

“How did you get roped into this thing?” I asked.
“Oh, my editor wanted me to be here,” she said.
“I got a call about two weeks ago saying that they couldn’t tell me what the thing was, or even if our site should be covering it, but that it was REVOLUTIONARY and that I would want to be here.”
“That’s what they’re saying,” she agreed.
“Well, they say that every year, I’ll believe it when I see what it is.”
She looked at me funny. “You know what it is!”
“No… I don’t.”
“Variety broke the embargo hours ago, everyone knows what it is!”
“I don’t… I’ve been in appointments all day long.”
“Right!” she laughed.

Suffice it to say OnLive was a frequent topic of discussion among many of the people I met with today. The most commonly overheard remark: “Bullshit.”: