Was the casual game conference useful?

[James Gwertzman]

I helped organize the casual game conference, and I'd like to know whether the folks who went from these forums found it useful. Did you:
a) find it educational?
b) find it useful from a networking / make connections standpoint?

and:

c) would you go again next year?

We'd also like to hear any comments or feedback you might have on ways to make it better.

[Mike Boeh]

Personally, I found some production resources and met some people that made it worth the trip completely worth it- so I plan to go again next year. I had a lot of fun too. Thanks for all the work in putting it together!

a) somewhat, but i never thought that would be the real value anyway...
b) yes
c) yes

[James C. Smith]

Yes
Yes
and Yes

I really enjoyed the show and found it very worthwhile. I would go into more detail but I am still trying to catch up with everything else.

Mike may have found it even more educational if he didn’t skip some of the sessions I enjoyed a lot like the music one.

[alfie]

Will there be any online info regarding the sessions and their content?, even if it's in PDF format... its ok by me :)

[Mike Boeh]

Of the sessions I *did* go to, I think the multiplayer one was my favorite. It was very informative.

[Phil Steinmeyer]

Out of curiousity, how big was the attendance?

[Mike Boeh]

Out of curiousity, how big was the attendance?

I was shocked, 480 people!

[alfie]

Of the sessions I *did* go to, I think the multiplayer one was my favorite. It was very informative.

Strange that you mention the multiplayer session. Within the casual games white paper they define the downloadable market as single player only, which when reading it I thought it was a bit odd... or maybe people are just coming round to the opportunities it offers.

[arcadetown]

It was good overall. On scale of 1 - 10...

a) 3 - the panels discussions looked interesting from bullet points but conversations lacked much useful and sometimes were flat out misinformation based upon how panelists want world to work (or didn't want to piss off developer crowd) versus how it is in reality. For example, royalty discussions panel with various guys saying portals get just 20 - 50%.

b) 8 - as always was great, even met up with you for first time James.

c) 10 - yes. Any excuse to get out of office is a good one.

What I'd like to see included next year if possible...

Improving purchase nagging techniques - I truely feel the industry let's itself down with simple 60 minute demos without any built in upsell features, etc.

Drawing out the male casual gamer - He's out there and strongly buying select male oriented titles but there's very little good to appeal to him so it's not happening nearly as much as could be.

[luggage]

It was very good, had a great time.

a) It was quite informative in places.
b) Very good, probably the reason we went out there more than any other.
c) Yes, for sure.

I'd like to see some discussion on difficulty levels and how they affect gameplay. Oh, and some information on how to develop that hit game from a more technical point of view - API's, OS, machine specs, development language, etc.