The Odd Gentlemen, Neil Gaiman's Wayward Manor added to 'GDC Next 10' talks

GDC Next 2013 organizers have announced that The Odd Gentlemen and Neil Gaiman's ghostly game collaboration Wayward Manor is the newest inductee of the ‘GDC Next 10’ session series. As part of the November LA-based 'future of games' conference's cutting-edge content, representatives from each game’s creator will be invited to give a world-exclusive talk about the conception, inspiration, and design behind the title. Every 'GDC Next 10' game has been picked by GDC's organizers as a game to watch for the future, and a title that is doing something decidedly different in today’s increasingly crowded game market. This week's inductee to the Next 10 is Wayward Manor [trailer], a serial game collaboration between comics writer and screenwriter Neil Gaiman (Coraline, The Sandman, Stardust) and developer The Odd Gentlemen (P.B. Winterbottom, Flea Symphony). The Odd Gentlemen president and creative director Matt Korba's talk, titled 'An Odd Collaboration: How Neil Gaiman and The Odd Gentlemen Decided to Make Wayward Manor Together', will cover how a game developer and a writer came together and brought their ideas for a haunted house game to life -- by prototyping with Lego. "With these simple [Lego] tools, we were able to develop the story beats, systems, and character relationships at a minimal cost," says Korba, "Simultaneously, we defined old Hollywood tropes to develop a game that captured those fun, iconic characters and scenarios which exemplified the genre." Wayward Manor joins previously announced GDC Next 10 inductees Capy Games's Super T.I.M.E. Force, Team Dakota's Project Spark, Double Fine's Broken Age, HumaNature Studios's Doki-Doki Universe and Grand Cru's Supernauts, all of which are the subject of detailed behind-the-scenes talks at the show. More information on the Broken Age talk has been released, as well; the talk will feature Double Fine studio head Tim Schafer, along with brand manager Greg Rice, project lead Lee Petty, and lead programmer Oliver Franzke. GDC Next is the spiritual successor to GDC Online, and will take place alongside the App Developers Conference on November 5th-7th, 2013 at the Los Angeles Convention Center. This new event aims to highlight the future of video game development, with tracks including 'Next Generation Game Platforms', 'Free To Play & New Business Models', and 'Smartphone & Tablet Games', as well as cloud and indie game tracks. Check out the GDC Next Session Scheduler to see the other announced talks and begin your planning. Previously announced talks include Animoca's Henry Oh on choosing your next game platform, and D&D: Neverwinter developer Cryptic Studios on avoiding pay-to-win in F2P MMOs. Registration is now open for GDC Next and the co-located ADC. For all the latest news on GDC Next, subscribe for updates via Facebook, Twitter, or RSS. Also, check out ADC's recently announced programming talks from Intel on building scalable and secure APIs for enterprise apps, and ChaiONE on pairing the latest wearable technology with smartphones.