Wherein I Get Sappy

by Darius Kazemi on August 24, 2008

in boston,friends,gamejam,gameloop,memories

Today, my friend Scott Macmillan and I ran a conference here in Boston that we’ve been planning for about three months. I’m not going to say much about it just now because I am super tired. However, I do want to say this.

I am so lucky to belong to an industry full of brilliant, wonderful people, many of whom I can count as not just colleagues, but friends. The last week or two especially have involved a lot of interaction with game developers, both faraway folks I’ve known for a long time and nearby folks I’ve just met. I’ve done a lot of that connecting-people-with-people thing that I tend to do.

And running around with Scott, putting together stuff for the conference in the past week, I’ve done a lot of reminiscing. I’m sure I’ve said this here before, but I just get sappy when I think about all the developers I know. They are just such… high quality people. I think back to past conferences, and visits to cities where devs have been nice enough to let me crash on their couch, or host me at their studio for a few hours, and I just can’t help but feel happy.

One of the joys I get in organizing events like the Boston Post Mortem, or the Boston Game Jam, or Boston GameLoop, is that I’m hopefully creating the kind of place where these memories are forged for other people.

I don’t really want to name names because I don’t want anyone to feel left off this list, but at this very moment I’m feeling particularly thankful for the amazing group of friends and mentors I made while I was at the 2005 Indie Game Jam (wow I was such a n00b back then). Especially Chris Hecker, Doug Church, Casey Muratori, Randy Smith, Robin Hunicke, Chris Butcher, Austin Grossman, Brian Sharp… I’m sure I’m missing a few. Some are friends, some are mere acquaintances, many live in that nebulous place in between. All of these people have helped me a lot with their advice and support, even if it is sometimes as little as a few minutes of conversation a year wedged between conference sessions. They’re actually a huge part of how I was able to rapidly grow from starry-eyed newbie to the kind of guy I am now. Um, whatever kind of guy that might be.

I’m especially indebted to Chris Hecker, whose “You want something cool to happen? Fuck it, just make it happen” attitude has informed everything I’ve done for community-building in Boston. Actually, it’s informed everything I’ve done, period. But yeah, I want Boston to get better and better as a game development community. And thanks to Chris, I have no patience for, “Oh why do we never have any conferences here in town?” Scott and I said, “Hey, let’s just make it happen.” It’s nights like these that I feel like it’s really working. So… thanks Chris. You really do deserve that IGDA community award.

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