Evolve London

The man behind Corrie Nation - the online social gaming app based on Britain’s longest running soap Coronation Street, which launched on Monday – is the latest heavyweight speaker to join the Evolve in London conference line up.

Andy Rogers is the managing director of enteraction, which specialises in developing multi-platform social games for brands, media owners and rights holders. His games, it’s been reported, are designed to bridge the gap between two of the world's biggest entertainment industries – games and TV.

He will share his experiences with developers at Evolve in London, the one day conference on developing games for new platforms, new technologies and new markets, which takes place Thursday 8 December. During his session ‘Risk and Reward: Social Gaming for Brands and Media Owners’, Andy Rogers will explain how to best design social games that are ‘on-brand’ and will also discuss the experiences of brands, rights holders and media owners as they attempt to enter the social gaming space.

He explained: “This is a high risk industry full of sensitive metrics, changing platform features, potentially high entry and on-going running costs. On the flip side, get it right, and the rewards are huge. My talk investigates how brands are currently looking at this space, how this may change over the next 12 months, and what the hidden pitfalls and potential returns are.”

Other sessions confirmed include:

KEYNOTE: What We've Learned, How We've Evolved & Why We Did It

Neil Young, CEO & Founder, ngmoco

From zero to the leading mobile social games company in just over 2 years - Find out what ngmoco has learned, how we've evolved & pivoted our company around that learning ahead of the market. We'll share why we did it, what we're doing next and what we think the road ahead for the games industry looks like.

KEYNOTE: Social Gaming: After the Revolution

Kristian Segerstrale, GM and Co-founder, Playfish

Early social games have spawned a billion dollar industry that’s gone mainstream. Discover how social games will continue to evolve, what is driving this evolution and why it’s not too late to get a piece of the action.

Music Games: What’s New / What’s Next?

Paulina Bozek, CEO, INENSU

Covering music games on console (the year of dance,) social networks and smartphones, this talk looks at what’s new in music games and what’s next.

SingStar Product Development: Harnessing Ideas From the Community

Kevin Mason, Principal Designer and Dave Ranyard, Game Director, Sony Computer Entertainment Europe

The SingStar team use a variety of techniques to engage with their audience. In this talk they will share their findings, discuss the importance of engaging with your audience and show how it has guided design choices.

As We May Game

Richard Banks, Senior Interaction Designer, Microsoft Research in Cambridge

Richard will give insight into the potential of the future of digital interaction - what new experiences may soon be possible, or simply desirable, in the future. Expect examples from Microsoft Research, new technologies and emerging experiences.

How to Thrive as a Modern Game Studio

Oli Christie, Neon Play; Mills, ustwo; Simon Oliver, Hand Circus; Matthew Wiggins, Wonderland

What lessons have the pioneers in the digital marketplace learned about how to develop and maintain games in a business environment where publisher advances are all but unknown, shelf-lives are unbounded, and the competition is practically limitless?

The Worms Have Turned: Why Team 17 Went Back to Self-Publishing

Martyn Brown, Studio Head, Team 17

Martyn explains why Team 17 has gone full circle, how digital distribution makes it possible, and whether he foresees a new Golden Era for independent publishers.

The New Video Games Industry Cycle

Ian Baverstock, Partner, Tenshi Ventures

Find out how can games companies compete in an era of massive disruption - where the hot hardware platform of yesterday is replaced by the coolest new social network platform of the hour.

ENDS

Notes to editors:

About Andy Rogers: Andy Rogers is managing director of enteraction, a UK-based social gaming company specializing in multi-platform social games for brands, media owners and rights holders. Prior to this Andy was managing director of Lightmaker a global digital agency, where he developed flash and mobile games for the likes of Sony, Nickelodeon, Warner Bros and Pepsi among many others.

About Evolve in London:

Following its success running alongside the Develop in Brighton Conference for two years, the Evolve Conference will take place as a stand-alone event at DeVere West One, 9-10 Portland Place, London on Wednesday 8 December 2010.

Evolve in London is a daylong conference focusing on how to develop games for new platforms, new technologies and new markets. The programme will explore emerging platforms, new business models and the integration of Internet services and user-generated content. It will help game developers tackle the issues arising from emerging platforms and digital marketplaces, connected gaming, user-generated content, and the crossover between games and Internet services.

To register for Evolve in London, please visit www.evolveconference.com

About Tandem Events:

Tandem Events has over 20 years of experience in organising market-leading exhibitions, conferences and events across a number of industry sectors, including Evolve in London on 8 December 2010, Develop in Brighton, Develop in Liverpool, Evolve in Brighton, GAMES:EDU, Games Marketing Forum and Games Grads.

www.tandemevents.co.uk

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