Develop November – December: Community Driven

This is the final issue of Develop. From February 2018, we – along with esports pro – are merging under the MCV banner in order to better serve the breadth and depth of the video games community with a single, specialist, brand.

It’s been an honour and a privilege serving the global video games community as editor of Develop over the last year and a bit. I’d like to take this opportunity to thank the team here at NewBay, along with all our excellent contributors during that time for helping to make Develop the best place to find game development analysis and insight.

A big thank you to all of our readers, too. That means you. Your hunger to keep on top of the latest trends and (hah) developments is what fuelled us over the months and years.

Fear not, however. Our content won’t disappear, in many ways it will improve. MCV is evolving too, and will bring development-focused content to you across the website, monthly magazine and socials with more focus and investment than ever before. MCV represents an exciting opportunity for us to create something new while staying true to our roots.

In the meantime, we have a huge final issue for you this month. Our last issue is a recruitment special, with a cross-industry state of the union on the games job market, as well as a cover feature on CCP and the rise of community-driven dev.

Thanks again for being such a fantastic audience. We hope you look forward to the changes in the new year.

You can read this issue on your browser or mobile device here.

Here’s a full overview of what to expect this month:

• Community Driven: Events like EVE Vegas – an annual fan meetup for EVE Online players deep in the heart of sin city – are not only key to keeping the community happy, but also helping steer developer CCP’s future development. Jem Alexander talks to CCP’s CEO, Hilmar Veigar Pétursson, about the event and how creating content for a fanbase becomes more like urban planning than actual game design.

• Finding Work In The Games Industry: We’ve scoured the UK to chat to developers and recruiters about the state of the games job market. Jem Alexander investigates the difficulties of finding a job – and decent employees – in the current climate.

• Living Games: Jagex is looking to become the home of living games, an evolution of the live games as a service phenomenon that is enveloping the industry. We speak to Phil Mansell, studio CEO, to discuss.

• Games For Everyone: Jem Alexander speaks to Ovosonico’s Massimo Guarini about catering to a larger audience, developing more personal experiences and delivering messages through games.

• The Develop Post-Mortem: Forza Horizon 3 is one of the biggest success stories in the last twelve months. Sean Cleaver gets the lowdown from creative director Ralph Fulton on what went into making the beautiful Australian environment and its expansions.

• Driverless Cars: Jem Alexanderspeaks to Ivan del Duca, technical director at Milestone, about the potential for neural networks to vastly improve the artificial intelligence of computer-controlled racers in driving games.

• Jobs Section: A jam packed jobs section for the Recruitment Special, including a feature by Sean Cleaver on the importance of diversity in the workforce.

• Playing With IP: Jem Alexander speaks to Ubisoft Milan’s Dario Migliavacca and Davide Soliani about the role of passion in development and working with Nintendo on Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle.

• Inside A Game Academy: Jem Alexander talks to Geoffrey Davis, general manager of the Digital Bros Game Academy, about how the school seeks to arm the next generation of Italian game development talent with real world experience.

• Plus Tons More: We go out with a bang with one of our biggest issues in years!