Learn about the making of Disco Elysium, Observation and more at EGX on October 18th

Do you like hearing indie devs spilling the beans about the secrets of game design? Would you also like to see the lovely faces of RPS coaxing said developers to spill those beans at the same time? Well then, you better get yourself over to the Rezzed Sessions stage on Friday October 18th at EGX 2019, as we'll be hogging the stage from 2.30pm onwards as we grill some friendly developers that just happened to walk into our big indie dev net. From the making of NoCode's space horror game Observation to how to make an RPG like Disco Elysium, here's the line-up for the second day of EGX 2019, which runs October 17th-20th at London's ExCeL.

Here's the Rezzed Sessions schedule:

Friday 18th October:

12.30pm - RICO vs Dead End Job: Postmortem Battle
Two indie games. Two Developers. Two stories of success and/or failure. James Parker and Tony Gowland go head-to-head on the lessons learned making and releasing their big second titles. CHEER as they find funding, WINCE at their hunt for publishers, and GASP at sales figures! (Also maybe a fight.)

1.30pm - Designing via game jams
Designer David Dino reveals the challenges and enormous benefits of running internal game jams across multiple studios with Sumo Digital. He’ll share insights and lessons learnt along the way, including how the process birthed the indie hit Snake Pass, and how his upcoming 2D brawler Pass The Punch has grown and changed since first starting as an internal game jam project.

2.30pm - From GTA to Autonauts – Gary Penn’s 35 Years in the Gaming Industry
In this special interview session, Rock Paper Shotgun's Katharine Castle sits down with games industry veteran Gary Penn as he talks about his 35 years making and writing about video games. During this special retrospective Gary will discuss his time as editor of Zap64!, his role as Creative Director at DMA Design during Grand Theft Auto, and his work on 50+ other games including big-budget AAAs like Crackdown, TV Games, GBA classics (ahem, Go! Go! Beckham! Adventure on Soccer Island) and his brand spanking new colony and AI coding game, Autonauts!

3.30pm - RPS Presents: The making of Observation
No Code's creative director Jon McKellan joins Rock Paper Shotgun's Matthew Castle for a dive into the making of this year's critically acclaimed sci-fi thriller Observation, showing a behind the scenes look at its origin and development. From initial prototypes and production, through to turbulent story evolution and cinematic title sequences, explore never-before-seen footage and learn how a small team made a big game.

4.30pm - How to make an RPG like Disco Elysium
Lead designer/writer Robert Kurvitz and writer Argo Tuulik discuss the best and worst bits of creating an original IP and turning it into a video game with a 5 year development cycle. TL;DR - it's not very easy.

5.30pm - RPS Podcast Live!
Join Rock Paper Shotgun's Alice Bell, Matthew Castle and Katharine Castle for a sensorally enhanced live edition of the Electronic Wireless Show podcast. Watch: them sit on chairs. Hear: them talk about PC games. Taste: the delicious flavour of banter. Touch: their ears with your own questions. Smell: nothing. There will be no smells, thank you.

We'll be announcing all the other Rezzed Sessions from EGX's remaining days on Friday later this week. All the talks will be livestreamed on the EGX Twitch channel and archived afterwards on the EGX YouTube channel. But you should come anyway, because science says knowledge is best absorbed by being in very close proximity to members of the RPS Treehouse. Tickets are on sale now.