Member Spotlight June 2011

Know of a superlative IGDA member? Nominate them for our Member Spotlight by emailing the IGDA Community Manager, Ryan Arndt, at ryan@igda.org.

Nicolas Leymonerie

After time growing up in France, working in the game industry and attending meetings with IGDA Paris, Nicolas moved to Vietnam. There was no chapter there at the time, so Nicolas decided to create one. He was convinced that the IGDA could help to develop the industry through networking. Currently, with meetings in both Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, Nicolas has helped to bring over 200 developers to the local meetings.

What the IGDA means to Nicolas:

• It’s a great unifier for game communities thanks to its worldwide legitimacy as representative of game developers’ interests.
• Having an IGDA chapter in a country or a city is a springboard toward international recognition of an emerging game development community.
• Without the IGDA, he would have certainly never thought about founding such association and maybe no other comparable game developer association would have been created until now. Vietnamese game developers, including Nicolas, are grateful for that and he is sure that IGDA Vietnam will continue to grow and have a key role in the game community here and internationally.

Email Phenix: nicolas@ph-enix.com Email IGDA: vietnam@igda.org

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Jay Margalus

Jay Margalus is from the future. He co-owns a web development company, helps run a hackerspace (Workshop 88), and most importantly for this bio, co-owns an independent game studio called Lunar Giant where he markets, builds websites, and does a bunch of other stuff. Because of his prescient futuristic intuition, he can tell you that the zombie game bubble will soon implode on itself, and dwarven mining games like Delve Deeper will take over. Also, everyone really does love Tang in the future. Recently, he’s been helping the local Chicago IGDA in its reboot efforts. The IGDA is important because it helps local game developers connect and support each other; he’s met a lot of really cool developers through the organization. In the future, it is an integral part in combatting SkyNet, a wholly owned subsidiary of Head On, Applies Directly to the Forehead. He lives in a fortified compound replete with futuristic technology in Mokena, Illinois with his wife and 120 pound dog, and has been known to write bios in the third person. If you would like to send a message to him from the past, present, or future, email him at jay@lunargiantstudios.com.

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Hazel McKendrick

Hazel was an IGDA student scholar at GDC this year, where she witnessed first-hand the benefits of membership and became keenly aware of the various exciting endeavours which other members were involved in. Upon returning to Scotland she felt that her country was missing out, and got to work on encouraging local interest in the IGDA and in particular in a national chapter. Gathering support from numerous companies, organisations and volunteers the fledgling chapter has grown from a few mentions on twitter to its first packed meeting, with events in other cities across the country soon to follow. Hazel herself is currently completing her masters degree but hopes to work as a programmer within the games industry upon graduation, and to continue to support fellow students and developers throughout her career.

What the IGDA means to Hazel:

• Being part of a global community, and learning from other members all over the world; it’s particularly amazing to see the huge diversity in how different chapters operate.
• More locally, a chance for developers across Scotland to meet in person and share their experiences, and for industry to communicate further with academia.
• Opportunities for personal improvement, for example through talks, scholarships and SIGs, as well as for the progression of the games industry as a whole.

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Corey Nolan

Corey is the chair of IGDA PHX. She’s not an Arizona native. Actually, she hails from New York! Lived there most of her life, and went to college at RPI, which is an upstate school near Albany.

Corey came out to Arizona for work after graduating. She pretty much instantly fell in love with the climate and the people there. There’s a scene of independent developers who are inspiring to watch and work alongside, game dev-focused colleges with motivated students, and various fun things like barbecues, hiking and dodgeball (a surprisingly popular sport here)!

About 9 months after she moved, a friend and local developer Pete Jones went about reviving the IGDA branch here in the Valley region. IGDA had always been a big part of Corey’s life: she attended all the Albany IGDA meetings while she was in school, and was lucky enough to see some of Boston’s famous Postmortems while living in Boston for an internship. So Corey ran for the board, hoping to help this branch get rooted, and to give back to IGDA in general. She’s been helping run it ever since!

What does IGDA mean to Corey?

• Personal Growth: Whether through developer talks, workshops or game jams, IGDA is a place to learn and create.
• Motivation: It’s like having your own personal “fan club,” a network of people who are genuinely interested in what you do and watching your progress. Kind of like “gym buddies” for game development!
• A Circle of Friends: These are people who are passionate about the same thing she is! They jam together, they meet and swap stories and laugh and help each other out. It’s a beautiful network of relationships.