This year’s Game Developers Conference (GDC) is nearly upon us, and now that talks for the week-long event are published on the GDC website, it appears Google will be taking the stage to introduce a number of new products and tools for game devs. While it’s not explicitly stated whether the talk will be primarily focused on AR/VR, Google’s product manager for AR/VR developer tools Nathan Martz will be speaking, making us think there might be something interesting around the corner.
Presented at Google Developer Day keynote on March 19th, Martz will be joining Instant Apps PM Lead Jonathan Karmel and Mark Vela, Head of Games Merchandising at Google Play Americas. Here’s the brief, but tantalizing listing:
Google Developer Day: Keynote (Presented by Google): The Google Developer Day kicks off with new product announcements, tools and opportunities for game developers to build high quality, engaging experiences for a growing global audience.
While there’s only a quick blurb on the schedule itself, when talking to Martz recently GDC organizers called the keynote an “announcement-filled extravaganza.” Martz then told GDC organizers that “[t]his year we’ll be focusing on helping developers get the most out of Android, including deep dives into new platforms like AR Core and best practices for optimizing your app both pre and post launch.”
Google most recently released its 1.0 version of ARCore, which brings the augmented reality developer tool to a number of flagship smartphones including Samsung Galaxy S8, S8+, Note8, S7 and S7 edge, LG’s V30 and V30+, ASUS’s Zenfone AR, and OnePlus 5.
Martz’s team has also recently built a number of tools to help developers create, iterate, debug, and release their AR/VR apps including; Poly – the free 3D asset repository, Instant Preview – the tool for rapidly iterating on device), and GAPID – a tool to help debug GPU behavior.
We’ll have feet on the ground at this year’s GDC, so check back soon for the full details. GDC is taking place March 19-23 in San Francisco, CA.