Here I am, sat on my tod, in my bloody hotel room, at 8pm in Amsterdam.
I had a really good (and wholly useful, I might add) day at the Microsoft Partner Event and met all the key people, gave my talk (which seemed to go ok too) and eventually moved onto the Oberon Media "party" after getting caught in a shower of freezing sleet. Nice, especially in my cold and damp-proof denim jacket.
"Party" is in quotes because for some time I've struggled to really enjoy developer/industry parties unless it's either with, or I'm with, a group of people close to me who I can bail out with when we've had enough (and that's usually early - as it was tonight, a sum total of 26 mins).
It's very hard to "network" (I do hate that word and tend to just try and meet the people I think we should, when it's opportune rather than randomly targetting strangers in the hope that we might have something in common besides limbs and eyeballs) at these dark, loud, events and especially when there are probably 400 out of 420 people there that to be honest, you don't really need to meet or network with - the key people are easier to find, locate and find a quiet spot during daylight hours to have a bit of quality time.
However, I'm not sure if it's me tonight, I dunno if it's just catching up from my weekend away, lack of sleep as I've been up since before 3am and what-not, I really don't know. Maybe it's because I'm 40 and a bit of an old fart or that the thrill of a free bar has long since stopped exciting me to hang around more than it's practical or entertaining. I just couldn't connect with the crowd in there, they weren't the gamers, developers or publishers I'm used to (Microsoft and a few UK souls aside).
I guess it didn't help that Craig had volunteered to help out at the party dishing name badges out, but I don't think I could have managed much longer anyway - and I think it's probably the fact that I spent quality time with great people at the weekend so I'm so much more less reluctant to tolerate this kind of thing, although that's not really a fair reflection on the actual event, which may be perfectly suitable for the other attendees and not some cynical, weary old bugger.
So I take back that I'm not one for retiring early to my hotel room... because I obviously am! I think it's only the 2nd or perhaps 3rd time in 16-17yrs, but hey ho... and the night is young...
Time and blog will tell.
Oh and those Microsoft folks, they're really pumped about Worms for XBLA!
I had a really good (and wholly useful, I might add) day at the Microsoft Partner Event and met all the key people, gave my talk (which seemed to go ok too) and eventually moved onto the Oberon Media "party" after getting caught in a shower of freezing sleet. Nice, especially in my cold and damp-proof denim jacket.
"Party" is in quotes because for some time I've struggled to really enjoy developer/industry parties unless it's either with, or I'm with, a group of people close to me who I can bail out with when we've had enough (and that's usually early - as it was tonight, a sum total of 26 mins).
It's very hard to "network" (I do hate that word and tend to just try and meet the people I think we should, when it's opportune rather than randomly targetting strangers in the hope that we might have something in common besides limbs and eyeballs) at these dark, loud, events and especially when there are probably 400 out of 420 people there that to be honest, you don't really need to meet or network with - the key people are easier to find, locate and find a quiet spot during daylight hours to have a bit of quality time.
However, I'm not sure if it's me tonight, I dunno if it's just catching up from my weekend away, lack of sleep as I've been up since before 3am and what-not, I really don't know. Maybe it's because I'm 40 and a bit of an old fart or that the thrill of a free bar has long since stopped exciting me to hang around more than it's practical or entertaining. I just couldn't connect with the crowd in there, they weren't the gamers, developers or publishers I'm used to (Microsoft and a few UK souls aside).
I guess it didn't help that Craig had volunteered to help out at the party dishing name badges out, but I don't think I could have managed much longer anyway - and I think it's probably the fact that I spent quality time with great people at the weekend so I'm so much more less reluctant to tolerate this kind of thing, although that's not really a fair reflection on the actual event, which may be perfectly suitable for the other attendees and not some cynical, weary old bugger.
So I take back that I'm not one for retiring early to my hotel room... because I obviously am! I think it's only the 2nd or perhaps 3rd time in 16-17yrs, but hey ho... and the night is young...
Time and blog will tell.
Oh and those Microsoft folks, they're really pumped about Worms for XBLA!
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