IGDA Finland May: Talking about project management

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IGDA Finland Presentations in association with Sulake was organized along with the usual IGDA Finland Gathering at the Cuba Cafe. This time we teamed up with Sulake, the company behind Habbo Hotel. Sulake kindly offered a venue for IGDA Finland Presentations at the city center of Helsinki. Project Management issues were discussed by Jon Leslie from Hansoft, Joonas Tamminen from Redlynx and Jan StorgĂĄrds from Aalto University. The presentations session was also streamed online and the recording can be found from: USTREAM.

On a general level Hansoft talked about agile project management, Scrum as a process and Hansoft tools. RedLynx has over 10 year of experience in game development and their CTO Joonas Tamminen gave a nice overview of different attempts, different type of projects, platforms and technologies as well as described how their take on project management has changed over time. Jan StorgĂĄrds is a PhD candidate at the Aalto University in Finland. He has been studying brand value creation process. In his presentation he went through results of the study based on interviews conducted in 19 Finnish game studios and 26 persons representing the game industry. If you want to get more in depth with the topic, see the interviews with Joonas ja Jan IGDA volunteer Reina Magica made after the presentations.

The IGDA Finland Presentations session got fully booked (nearly 100 people joining) within first 12 hours and the room surely was packed! Still everything worked smoothly. A big hand goes to Sulake for hosting this and future IGDA Finland Presentations sessions.

After the presentations, it was time to head to the Cuba Cafe just a few blocks away. This time IGDA Finland Gathering attracted 115 developers. The evening continued with topics touching project management. All lecturers were present at the Cuba Cafe. There were also lots of people from Remedy due to the fact that Alan Wake was done and shipped. Congratulations Remedy!

The last Gathering before summer holidays will be on Tuesday June the 8th. See you there!

Invitation: IGDA Finland June Presentations & Gathering

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IGDA Finland Season 2009-2010 ends with a blast! The last IGDA Finland Gathering before holidays will take place on Tuesday 8th of June. We will provide everything and more! The evening starts with IGDA Finland Presentations titled “Startup Stories” in association with Sulake and continues as IGDA Finland Gathering at the Cuba Café. On top of that IGDA Finland is collaborating with AVEA research project (by Helsinki Institute for Information Technology HIIT). They will organize a seminar on virtual economy at Kiasma seminar room. The seminar will start at 12PM and you are most welcome to join the event. Sign up here: http://bit.ly/9blTED.

AVEA Seminar on Research in Virtual Economies 12.00 Opening words Kai Huotari, Research programme Manager, HIIT

12.15 Virtual Consumption Dr. Vili Lehdonvirta, Researcher, HIIT

12.50 Virtual goods sales as a business model Juho Hamari, Researcher, HIIT

13.25-14.25 Coffee Break

14.25 A micro-economic approach to MMOs Juha Tolvanen, Researcher, HIIT

15.00 Does a player driven virtual world need economic management? CCPs approach to managing the economy of EVE Online. EyjĂłlfur GuĂ°mundsson, Chief Economist, CCP

15.35-16.00 Closing discussion

IGDA Finland evening starts with IGDA Finland Presentations on “Startup Stories”. Finnish game startups will share their thoughts how and why they founded the company, what lessons have they learned and what are they up to at the moment. We will have six startups: Relationship Games, Rocket Pack, Ookoohko, Ironstar Helsinki, Uplause and Fantastec sharing their stories and inspiring the rest of us. Also Ilari Kuittinen (Housemarque) and Trip Hawkins (Digital Chocolate) will share their stories how they got started!

IGDA FINLAND PRESENTATIONS Place: Sulake auditorium, Korkeavuorenkatu 35, 00130 Helsinki Time: Tuesday, 8th of June, 17:00 Obligatory registration SORRY BUT THE EVENT IS FULL! The room will fit first 100 so act now! Only the ones replying “yes” will be on the list. Do follow the video stream at http://igda.fi on Tuesday 8th of June (5PM>)!

IGDA Finland Presentations will also be streamed online at igda.fi. The live stream starts on 8th June at 5PM.

After IGDA Finland Presentations, it is time to head to the bar – super-super party at Cuba! Singing! Drinking! Having fun! Chatting! Chilling!

Mighty Housemarque “The First Game Start-up still alive” together with Rocket Pack, Relationship Games, Uplause, Fantastec and IronStar Helsinki are sponsoring special drink ticket game. Also Microsoft Lipshack singing booth is open! Let’s celebrate current and upcoming Finnish game success stories and one of the most active IGDA chapters in the world!

IGDA FINLAND JUNE GATHERING Place: Cuba Bar, Erottajankatu 4, 00120 Helsinki (map: http://igda.fi/?page_id=5) Time: Tuesday, 8th of June, doors open at 19:00