Google for Games is coming to GDC 2024

Posted by Aurash Mahbod – General Manager, Games on Google Play

Google for Games is coming to GDC in San Francisco! Join us on March 19 for the Game Developers Conference (GDC) at the Moscone Center, where game developers from across the world will gather to learn, network, problem-solve, and help shape the future of the industry. From March 18 to March 22, experience our comprehensive suite of multi-platform game development tools and explore the new features from Play Pass at the West Hall, Level 2 Lobby.

This year, we’re proud to host eight sessions for developers, designers, business and marketing teams, and everyone else in the gaming community with an interest to grow their game business. Take a look at this year’s sessions below and if you’re interested in learning more about topics from Google Play and Android, check out key product updates from the Google for Games Developer Summit.


Scaling your game development

We’re hosting three sessions designed to help scale your game development using tools from Firebase, Android, and Google Cloud. Learn more about building high quality games with case studies from industry experts.


Beyond "Set and Forget": Advanced Debugging with Firebase Crashlytics

Tuesday, March 19, 9:30 am - 10:00 am 

Speaker: Joe Spiro (Developer Relations Engineer, Google) 

Crashlytics has added a number of features that make detecting, tracking, and understanding bugs even easier, from high-level to native code. Take your fixes to another level with native stack traces, memory debugging, issue annotation, and the ability to log uncaught exceptions as fatal.


Enhancing Game Performance: Vulkan and Android Adaptability Technology

Tuesday, March 19, 10:50 am - 11:50 am 

Speakers: Dohyun Kim (Developer Relations Engineer, Android Games, Google), Hak Matsuda (Developer Relations Engineer, Android Games, Google), Jungwoo Kim (Principal Engineer, Samsung), Syed Farhan Hassan (Software Engineer, ARM) 

Learn how to leverage Vulkan graphics API to improve your graphics quality or performance, including performance tuning with dynamic upscaling. Find out how the Android Dynamic Performance Framework (ADPF) can enhance game performance and power in Unity and native C++, with easy integration through the Unreal Engine plugin. We're also sharing how NCSoft Lineage W improved thermal status and performance using ADPF.


Creating a global-scale game with Google Cloud

Tuesday, March 19, 4:40 pm - 5:10 pm 

Speaker: Mark Mandel (Developer Advocate, Google) 

This session will cover the best of Google Cloud's open source projects (Agones, Open Match, and more) and products (GKE, Spanner, Anthos Service Mesh, Cloud Build, Cloud Deploy, and more) to teach you how to build, deploy, and scale world-scale multiplayer games with Google Cloud.


Increasing user engagement

We’re hosting two sessions designed to help you increase engagement by creating dynamic gameplay experiences using generative AI and expanding opportunities on Google Play to grow your community of players with exclusive rewards.

Reimagine the Future of Gaming with Google AI

Tuesday, March 19, 10:50 am - 11:50 am 

Speakers: Gus Martins (Developer Advocate, Google), Dan Zaratsian (AI/ML Solutions Architect, Google), Lei Zhang (Director, Play Partnerships, Global GenAI & Greater China Play Partnerships, Google), Jack Buser (Director, Game Industry Solutions), Simon Tokumine (Director of Product Management, Google AI), Giovane Moura Jr. (App Modernization Specialist, Google), Moonlit Beshinov (Head of Google for Games Partnerships and Industry Strategy, Google) 

In our keynote session, senior executives from Google Cloud, Google Play, and Labs will share their unique perspectives on generative AI in the gaming landscape. Learn more about cutting-edge AI solutions from Google Cloud, Android, Google Play, and Labs designed to simplify game development, publishing, and business operations, plus actionable strategies to leverage AI for faster development, better player experiences, and sustainable growth.

Grow your community of loyal gamers with Google Play

Tuesday, March 19, 1:20 pm - 1:50 pm 

Speaker: Tom Grinsted (Group Product Manager, Google Play Games, Google) 

In this session, we’ll cover new features and insights from Google Play to create rewarding experiences for gamers using Play Pass, Play Points, and Play Games Services. Get a behind-the-scenes look at how Google Play rewards a growing community of passionate gamers, and how to use this to super-charge your business.


Maximizing reach across screens

These sessions, from Google Play, Android, and Flutter, introduce ways to expand your mobile games to PC. Learn about the latest tools that will help you accelerate growth across large screens.

Bringing more users to your Google Play Games on PC game

Tuesday, March 19, 2:10 pm - 2:40 pm 

Speakers: Aly Hung (Developer Relations Engineer, Android and Google Play, Google), Dara Monasch (Product Manager, Google), Justin Gardner (Partner Program Manager, App Attribution, Google) 

Join us for an overview of Google Play Games on PC, how it has grown in the past year, and a walkthrough of how to optimize and attribute your PC advertisements for your Google Play Games on PC titles. Learn how to use Google Play Games to increase your reach and acquisition of PC users for your mobile game, as well as how to effectively use the Google Play Install Referrer API to attribute and optimize your ads across mobile and PC.

Android input on desktop: How to delight your users

Tuesday, March 19, 3:00 pm - 3:30 pm 

Speakers: Shenshen Cui (Staff Developer Relations Engineer, Google), Patrick Martin (Developer Relations Engineer, Google) 

Give your players a first-class gaming experience with our best practices for handling input between mobile and PC games, including technical details on how to implement these best practices across mobile, tablets, Chromebooks and Windows PCs1. Learn how Android handles keyboard, mouse, and controller input across different form factors, with case studies for designing for both touch and hardware input.

Building Multiplatform Games with Flutter

Tuesday, March 19, 3:50 pm - 4:20 pm 

Speakers: Zoey Fan (Senior Product Manager, Flutter, Google), Brett Morgan (Developer Relations Engineer, Google) 

Learn why game developers are choosing Flutter to build casual games on mobile, desktop, and web browsers. We’ll cover the free, open-source tools and resources available through the Casual Games Toolkit, a collection of free and open-source tools, templates, and resources to make game dev more productive with Flutter.

Learn more about all of our sessions coming to you on March, 19, at GDC in San Francisco.


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1Windows is a trademark of the Microsoft group of companies.