Our next speakers for our upcoming GamesBeat Summit event are Rich Hilleman of Amazon Game Studios and Chris Roberts, the CEO of Roberts Space Industries and maker of the upcoming Star Citizen and Squadron 42 games.
They will talk about our theme of technology and games at our event entitled GamesBeat Summit 2017: How games, sci-fi, and tech create real-world magic. GamesBeat Summit 2017 will take place on May 1 and May 2 at the historic Claremont resort hotel in Berkeley, California, just a short distance from San Francisco. You can secure your seat here. Use “VB6” at checkout for 10 percent off.
Above: Amazon Game Studios’ Rich Hilleman
Hilleman announced in August that he was joining Amazon after a long career at Electronic Arts. Hilleman joined EA in 1982 as its 39th employee, and he went on to work on hits such as Madden NFL Football and the EA Sports brand.
Chris Roberts is one of the most recognized game developers in the world, with a career that spans decades. He sold his first computer game at the age of 14. By 20, he had three No. 1 hits. In 1987, he joined Origin Systems, Electronic Arts acquired in 1982. In 1990, he created Wing Commander, which generated more than $400 million in its first five years.
He went on to cofound Digital Anvil and make Freelancer and Starlancer for Microsoft. He created the Wing Commander movie and spent more than a decade in Hollywood producing films such as The Punisher, The Jacket, Lord of War and Lucky Number Slevin.
Today Roberts is chief creative officer at Cloud Imperium Games, which he co-founded in April 2012. The company’s first title, the crowd funded Star Citizen, is currently under development and to date has raised more than $144 million. The game is recognized by Guinness World Records as the top Crowd Funded Project ever.
Above: Chris Roberts of Roberts Space Industries.
Hilleman and Roberts join a cast of speakers who are among the who’s who of games, as well as the related industries that are inspiring game makers. Other speakers include Akshay Khanna of the Philadelphia 76ers, Greg Richardson of Team Dignitas, Ted Price, CEO of Insomniac Games; Mike Gallagher, CEO of the Entertainment Software Association; John Underkoffler, CEO of Oblong Industries and science advisor for Minority Report; Gary Whitta, the screenwriter for Rogue One: A Star Wars Story; Richard Marks of Sony PlayStation; Tim Sweeney, the CEO of Epic Games; Owen Mahoney, the CEO of Nexon; and Jamil Moledina of Google Play.
Inspiring moments lead to disrupting the worlds of gaming, tech, and entertainment. Who hasn’t been influenced by great novels like Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash, which gave us virtual worlds, or Tom Cruise’s data gloves and gesture-controlled computer in Minority Report? Now, those things have become real, and we want to see what’s coming next.
Our theme is about what inspires game developers, executives, and investors to be creative. Part of the event will focus on the inspiration cycle that is accelerating as the walls between science fiction, video games, and real-world technology come down. We don’t think there’s another conference that focuses on the seams between these industries.
This event will focus on inspiration and creativity. So much of what used to be science fiction is coming true, and it is inspiring even more accelerated visions of the future in games and other entertainment. We hope to inspire you by taking you to the moments that led to great ideas across multiple industries. You’ll leave refreshed and ready to change the worlds of gaming, technology, and more.
We think this conference will offer a rare chance for cross-pollination and networking between high-level people in different industries, and we believe that insights in one place can lead to inspirations in another.
This conference is for high-end gaming executives, startup CEOs, developers, investors, publishers, marketers, tech experts, entertainment industry professionals, sci-fi experts, AR and VR executives, and other professionals. I should also point out that this is where we try to create an actual GamesBeat community with our supporters, readers, and attendees. We gather the right people in the room and encourage everyone to get to know each other. Join us.
If you’re interested in sponsoring, message andie.rhyins@venturebeat.com. Thanks to our initial sponsor Samsung.
Breakout sessions
- Intersection of sci-fi, games, and tech
- Monetization: How to acquire and retain your user base
- Deals: Follow the money
- Esports and community
- Emerging markets for games
- Platforms: Where to place your bets? VR, AR, and more
- Creativity and diversity
Advisory board
- Sam Barlow, game developer of Her Story and creative director at Interlude
- Michael Chang, senior vice president at NCSoft
- Daniel Cho, chairman at Innospark
- Jay Eum, managing director, Translink Capital
- Clinton Foy, chairman of the Immortals and managing director at Crosscut Ventures
- Megan Gaiser, co-CEO at Spiral Media
- Lee Jones, global business lead Google Ads
- Perrin Kaplan, principal at Zebra Partners
- Roy Liu, general manager at Linekong USA
- Wanda Meloni, executive director of the Open Gaming Alliance
- Jamil Moledina, game strategic lead at Google Play
- Adam Orth, founder at Three One Zero
- Mihai Pohontu, vice president of emerging technologies at Samsung
- Mike Sepso, cofounder of MLG and senior vice president at Activision Blizzard
- Mike Vorhaus, president of Magid Advisors
- Margaret Wallace, CEO of Playmatics
- Marco DeMiroz, cofounder, The Venture Reality Fund
- Phil Sanderson, managing director at IDG Ventures
I’ve been writing about our theme for a while. I’ve written about the accelerating cycle of inspiration between tech, games, and science fiction. I interviewed Shane Wall, HP’s chief technology officer, about the connection between sci-fi and tech. The Westworld TV show also explored the seams between artificial intelligence, virtual reality, and video games.
