The Taipei Game Developers Forum had an impressive showing today. Howard Tsao and Johnson Lin posted on Gamasutra that TGDF was expecting more than 800 attendees for 2016 and the venue was packed. I attended four different English talks on the first day and had a chance to try out a few games by Taiwanese developers and a few other foreign devs as well.
Taipei Game Developers Forum 2016 by Hotdogtopus
The first talk that I attended was by Dan Adelman: Assessing the Western Market for Video Games. I ended up 10 minutes late because I should have gone straight, but I ended up taking a left turn at Albuquerque. The standout advice from the session was to consider how your game could be interesting to watch and fun to play for let's players and their viewers on Youtube and Twitch. He also addressed the current issues of market saturation and games sales – specifically, the Steam Summer Sale with over 12,000 games currently on sale. Adelman stated that 12,000 games on sale was scary to him as a developer.
Adelman talk at TGDF by Hotdogtopus
Adelman's talk also covered how genres vary in popularity across international markets – often, in unexpected ways. I did manage to ask whether he had any advice for indie developers in terms of genres to pursue, but I got nervous unexpectedly and forgot most of what he said other than that pursuing specific genres because they are popular isn't necessarily the best strategy for developing a hit title.
People Playing Super Phantom Cat by Hotdogtopus
During the break, I stopped by Veewo and watched people playing Super Phantom Cat. I also had a chance to meet Win from WTH Studio and checked out his new game DiD (pronounced 'D.I.D.'). The abstract horror pixel art really helped DiD to stand out from the other games.
DiD Setup from WTH Studio by Hotdogtopus
I stopped and took a couple of business cards from Ching-Heng Chen and Henry Wang from Red Candle. They are currently working on a Japanese horror game called Detention. It was creepy and really stood out as well, yet also fit in well with the other games in the horror section of the booths.
Red Candle Devs Displaying Detention at TGDF by Hotdogtopus
Part 2 of Day 1 is coming soon. Please follow me at http://hotdogtopus.newgrounds.com/follow to get updates as soon as it posts.