Our good friend Yug has released podcast #2 in his brilliant new podcast series called "The Yugcast" which features in-depth conversations with people in the video games industry. This time round, the discussion is with Epona Schweer who has been a major contributor and a source of inspiration for Sydney's game development scene...
Epona Schweer is a former Animal Logic Technical Director, teacher at AIE and creator of the AIE Incubator, ran the IGDA Sydney Chapter, and passionately helps independent game companies through her website Indiebits.com
In the podcast, Epona gives a backstory on how she came to be in Australia and her experiences at Sydney visual effects company, Animal logic. It was her passion in helping others during her stint at Animal Logic that saw her bring her skills and know-how to improving games development in Sydney. Through Sydney's IGDA chapter and the Academy of Interactive Entertainment in Sydney, she sparked off some incredible initiatives like the IGDA developer workshops, iFest, and the groundbreaking Incubator program which prepared students with the necessary skills to make it on their own as game developer startups and self sustaining entrepreneurs. From the podcast...
(Epona) The concept of the incubator is... there is no work in the games industry.. you want to work in the games industry, you realise that you might need to start your own company to survive, but you don't know anything about starting a company. You don't necessary want to be psychotic like me and go teach yourself.
So, you sign up for a program like mine where you take the benefit of the last four years of this research and testing in my company, through other companies, turned into a framework which is easy to follow, distilled down to the essentials and you say walk me through the levelling process from 1 to 20 on how to be... a studio. Go from being a game developer to being an indie game development studio making money...
In addition to that, Epona also provides incredible content at Indiebits.com for indie games developers too. Her efforts are truly to be admired and have made a real difference in pushing games development here in the right direction. Unfortunately for us, Epona is moving back to the States, but she does plan on making a return one day! Hear her fascinating story over at The Yugcast!