Video games are arguably the most compelling and lucrative examples of "interactive techniques". Their success, evaluated by a world-wide population of players, depends not only on technology and artistic abilities, but also on production practises and, growingly, on business issues. With video games now firmly established as "big business", the context in which they are being developed has changed dramatically. Dr. John Buchanan, from industry giant Electronic Arts, will give us some glimpses into the dynamics of this industry, and consider how it is affecting the way games are being created.

We are all excited about "pushing the barrier" towards better games, but it is getting less and less clear as to what exactly this direction should be. With current games approaching near-photographic picture quality, are technological parameters, such as memory size, bandwidth, CPU speed or rendering capacity, really the bottleneck anymore? Who cares about the next-generation consoles if individuals can't afford to take risks and explore the unanticipated opportunities they might make available?

Games are created by people, and in today's world, by people working together in increasingly large groups. The successful coordination of large teams and the many human issues that go along with this are becoming increasingly critical factors in "making better games". How important will the sharing of stories and experiences become, compared to discussions of feature sets and artistic assets?

We leave John with the difficult task of addressing these issues, in his own particular open-ended style, as well as the many more that will either occur to him in mid-sentence or be suggested to him by the audience.

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