Being funny is hard. Making a video game that's consistently funny seems nearly impossible, especially if that game is played by millions of different people.
The Stanley Parable is a game that was played by millions of people and did manage to be funny; at GDC 2015 in March one of the men who made it happen, William Pugh, will lead a talk titled "How To Make Your Game Just Completely Hilarious: The Stanley Parable."
We weren't quite sure how to sum it up, so we thought we'd defer to Mr. Pugh and copy in the description he wrote himself:
"William Pugh (The Stanley Parable) takes you into a world outside of GDC to a land bereft of seriousness and ethical considerations. He hates how games do comedy and he also hates writing descriptions in the third person.
How can we escape this awful trend of procedural humour simulators and get back to the way things were always supposed to be: Writers writing jokes for other video game writers. Octodad and Surgeon Simulator reign supreme in the court of YouTube celebrities. Let's work together to usurp them and replace them with ourselves.
Watch William Pugh desperately attempt to deconstruct The Stanley Parable to find an excuse for its success. Be amazed as he lists pre-prepared top tips for making your game funny. Leave in awe at his complementary speaker pass."
If all that doesn't interest you, don't worry -- conference officials look forward to announcing more GDC 2015 sessions in the months ahead.
A list of all announced talks is available in the online GDC 2015 Session Scheduler, where you can begin to build your conference week and later export it to the up-to-the-minute GDC Mobile App, coming soon.
GDC 2015 itself will take place March 2-6 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco. For more information on GDC 2015, visit the show's official website, or subscribe to regular updates via Facebook, Twitter, or RSS.
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