20 years of making games: from a childhood dream to my own company and the game Hidden City

What the talk is about

Anton Bolshakov looks back on 20 years in games and the three biggest hits he worked on: Cossacks, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. and Hidden City. He tells how he earned money for a PC as a teenager, co-founded GSC Game World and learned game making by taking other games apart. For each title he names the core idea: huge battle scale in Cossacks, an open world and photorealistic graphics in S.T.A.L.K.E.R., and a deeply detailed world in Hidden City. He covers the hard parts: choosing the right publisher, an overly ambitious design that had to be scaled back, two years of tuning balance and monetization in free-to-play, and explosive team growth with crunch. What the hits share: a new experience for players, polished gameplay, a leader with vision and a strong team. Useful for people making a first game or building a studio.