Digital Dragons Diary 2023

A day-by-day chronicle of my adventures at Digital Dragons 2023, one of Europe's premiere video game conferences.

What is Digital Dragons?

Digital Dragons is one of Europe’s largest gaming conferences, with the 2023 edition attended by 2,500 people representing over fifty countries. It’s closest equivalent in the US is the Game Developers Conference (GDC) since it has a strong focus on game development with conference sessions for developers, as well as developer recruitment and networking activities, but there is more to the conference than technical tracks and resumes.

Digital Dragons takes place each year in Krakow, Poland, and in some ways is a celebration of the Polish game industry. You may not be aware of it, but a lot of globally recognized games from AAA titles to indie gems come out of Polish game development studios. Poland is home to CD PROJEKT RED (Witcher series, Cyberpumk 2077), Creepy Jar (Green Hell), Flying Wild Hog (Shadow Warrior series, Trek to Yomi), Remedy Entertainment (Control, Alan Wake series), and Techland (Dying Light and Call of Juarez series), as well as indie publishers such as 11 bit Studios and Red Deer Games - just to name a few. While there is certainly a large enough game industry in Poland alone to provide for a full games conference, there was an international presence at Digital Dragons 2023 as well. The Indie Zone alone featured games from about a dozen different countries.

Here be Dragons

”Digital Dragons” is a great name for a game conference – what gamer doesn’t like dragons? – but there’s more to the name than just gamer cred. The venue where the conference takes place, the ICE Krakow Congress Centre, is just across the Vistula River from Wawel Castle. In fact, there is a great view of the castle from within the conference center.

The first stones were laid for Wawel Castle over 1,000 years ago, and it has been the cultural heart of Poland ever since. The castle, or rather a cave beneath its walls, was also once home to a dragon, the infamous Smok Wawelski. While the dragon may be long gone, if you’re ever in Krakow you can visit the cavern under the castle it once called home, and see a fire-breathing statue tribute to the famous dragon which has become a mascot of the city as well as the inspiration for the conference’s name.

Day One

Partyin' in a Salt Mine, Goin' Down, Down

The festivities began the day before the conference opened with a trip to the Wieliczka Salt Mine just outside of Krakow. Excavation of the salt mine began in the 13th Century and the mine was in continuous operation through 2007. Salt was the original white gold, and the profits from the mine helped to fund the construction of Krakow and provide a consistent source of wealth for the Polish kings and nation. As you can imagine, you can make a lot of tunnels in 800 years, and the mine has over 150 miles of tunnels and extends to over 1,000 feet in depth.

A group of attendees and media were given a tour of the mine, and if you’ve ever toured a mine before, I can virtually guarantee that it was nothing like this one. While learning about the mine’s history and the methods used to extract the salt was interesting, what was really fascinating was that the mine was filled with monuments and statues carved entirely from salt. The highlight of the tour was the St. Kinga’s Chapel, a full-sized church within a large chamber over 30 feet in height in which everything – the statues, friezes, altar, and even the chandelier crystals – are made from salt. The church is regularly used for services and is a popular wedding venue in Poland.

At the end of the tour we emerged from a tunnel into a large banquet hall carved out of the salt for a welcome reception and dinner. I’ve been to underground parties before, but never to one that was 400 feet underground. In case you were wondering, salt was provided on the tables so there was no need to scrape the walls.

Next Stop, The Old Depot

The night didn’t end underground, though. The next stop was an above ground badge pick-up party at Stara Zajezdnia (The Old Depot in English). This was a Browar, or what we would call a brewpub in the US, that converted an old tram depot into an enormous beer hall. The event was sponsored by Creepy Jar and was a great way to mingle with other conference attendees while enjoying some of Stara Zajezdnia’s excellent beers. My personal favorite was their Pszeniczne, a Hefeweizen style pear wheat that was really smooth and that had a really nice, but not overly sweet, pear flavor. Everyone was excited to start the show the next morning, so the party was really lively from the anticipation of what was about to come.

Day Two

Time to Get to Work

Digital Dragons is not all about parties, and the next day at 10:00 AM the conference was off and running. One of the good things about Creepy Jar’s badge pick-up party (besides the beer) was that it gave you the chance to walk right into the conference and get going without the need to stand in the badge lines. From the start you pretty much had your choice of attending one of the first set of sessions, meeting up with a contact at one of the tables in the Business Zone, checking out the games on display at the Indie Showcase, or talking to the commercial publisher and developers at their booths in the expo area.

The ICE Krakow Congress Centre is a modern facility with an open architecture and pleasing aesthetics. The top to bottom windows not only provide some nice views of the city and river, but they fill the center with natural light. The center is a far cry from some of the dark and cavernous convention halls game conferences and events usually call home.

It was also really nice to find the center filled with stations loaded with water, teas, and even espresso machines, and fully stocked with snacks like fresh fruit and the best oatmeal cookies I’ve ever tasted. It was a big help to be able to easily grab some refreshments while dashing from one session to the next.

Digital Dragons 2023 made use of the PINE app, which made navigating the conference with your phone a breeze. The app maintained your schedule for you, allowing you to browse the session schedule and add ones of interest to your own schedule. You could also reach out to other attendees, see the openings in their schedules, and request meetings. The app would even reserve a spot for you in the Business Zone to meet. It also included a built-in IM feature as well as a general chat channel, so it was really easy to communicate at the conference without the need to try to keep track of everyone’s phone numbers. The app was a huge help throughout the conference, and I really wish that I had something like that at all of the E3s and Comic-Cons that I’ve attended in which managing a shifting and dynamic schedule was a nightmare.

After taking the time to meet and chat with the some of the wonderful and helpful people on the conference’s promotion and media relations team, I decided to drop in on a few of the sessions before the afternoon interviews I had scheduled. Even though the conference is held in Poland, all of the sessions are conducted in English, and in fact English was the primary language of the entire conference, so I had no trouble enjoying everything that Digital Dragons had to offer.

School is in Session

Digital Dragons 2023 featured sessions on the hour for every hour of the conference. They were divided into a number of tracks focused on different aspects of game development such as design, programming, and art, as well as tracks focused on the business side of gaming. Each session was led by someone with an extensive background in the industry, and you might even recognize some of the names behind some of the game’s you’ve played. While many of the sessions were highly specialized, there were plenty of interest to those without specific domain knowledge.

For the sake of brevity in this diary, I’ll just provide a small synopsis of the sessions I attended on both days of the conference here. Expanded coverage of the sessions, as well as indie game profiles and other features from the show, can be found here, which will be continually updated as new features go live.

I first sat in on a session led by Pawel Sasko of CD PROJEKT RED in which he discussed what went into the design of some of their characters for The Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk 2077. It was really interesting learning how they started with only a basic sketch of each character that eventually was developed into someone that resonated with gamers. For example, Cyberpunk 2077’s fan favorite Judy Álvarez character sheet began as a two-word description – “braindance technician”. Sasko emphasized that if you can’t create a character that comes to life in your imagination with a two to three sentence description, you won’t be able to do it with 100 pages. His Creator’s Manual of character design really gave good insight into how much work goes into developing memorable characters that bring a game’s story to life.

Next up was a panel discussion titled “The Science of Horror”, which was timed to follow the announcement of Fear Fest 2023 and was a bit of a kick-off celebration for the online event coming this September. The panel was moderated by Polish game journalist Mateusz Witczak, and featured four game directors with a background in creating horror games, Kelvin More (Sumo Digital), Mikael Kasurinen (Remedy Digital), Tom Heaton (Supermassive Games), and Wojciech Piejko (Bloober Team). There was a lot of good discussion on the challenges of designing horror games such as the need to keep the player feeling almost powerless, the correct use of jump scares, and avoiding horror tropes. One of the interesting things that came out of the discussion was the idea that it takes just three things to make a memorable character – hat, whip, and gun in the case of Indiana Jones.

Pawel Kroenke of Arkane Lyon led a session called “Narrative Design is Like Skinning Cats”, an interesting look at how you have to approach creating a story completely differently depending on the size of the project – AAA, mid-tier, or indie – which he illustrated through the use of three fake game pitches. I have to say that one of his fake games, a band tour management sim that he described as “Sid Meier’s Pirates meets a musical biopic”, sounded intriguing enough that I hope it actually does become a game one day.

The final session that I attended for the day was “Games of War” presented by Yaraslau Kot, a Ukrainian game developer working for The Farm 51. He showed how the Ukrainian game industry has been mobilized by the war, developing games to help the people of Ukraine manage the psychological toll of the invasion of their country as well as to help aid their cause socially, charitably, and even militarily. It was a fascinating look at how games could aid people in the midst of a terrible crisis, and I learned a lot about the war that doesn’t make it into the news back home.

Between these sessions I was able to drop into and out of the Indie Showcase to meet some game devs and talk about their games, as well as make time for a few interviews. These game demos and interviews, as well as detailed looks at the content of some of the sessions, will be detailed in separate features.

Achievement Unlocked

After the conference activities wrapped for the day, it was time to recognize the best games of the year from Poland at the Digital Dragons Awards Gala. The event was held at the conference center’s main theater, and featured all of the lighting, music, and energy you’d expect to see for a game awards ceremony. Awards were given to Polish games in five different categories, and an award was also given to the best game of the year from a foreign country.

You’ll probably recognize all of the nominees for the Best Polish Game for 2023: Dying Light 2: Stay Human, Evil West, Railbound, Shadow Warrior 3, and Trek to Yomi. It’s no spoiler at this point to let you know that Dying Light 2: Stay Human took home the award for the best game of the year, with Elden Ring earing the best foreign game nod. True to its name, the Digital Dragons award trophies look like dragon eggs that are beginning to hatch with a little dragon tail with a tip that looks suspiciously like a mouse pointer poking out of the top.

Once More Unto the Breach

How do you follow an awards ceremony? With a party, of course! Digital Dragons continued its streak of finding amazing locations for parties with its post-awards celebration which was held at a club built within the remains of a 19th Century fort, the Forty Kleparz Music Club. Within the brick battlements of the fort, attendees celebrated the winners and talked about their favorite games while enjoying some delicious Polish food and beers.

Day Three

Breakfast at Smok’s Place

What better way to fuel up for a conference with “Dragons” in its name than with breakfast in a castle? The final day of the conference began with a breakfast within the walls of Wawel Castle followed by a short walking tour around some of the castle’s major buildings. I can say with absolute certainty that Digital Dragons is the first game event that I’ve covered that included events at two UNESCO World Heritage sites.

Back to School

On the second day I sat in on “Narrative Through Gameplay”, a session presented by Yasen Stoynev, Lead Level Designer at Flying Wild Hog. It was an interesting session on how a game’s story must evolve along with the game’s development because there may be technical constraints on how the story is presented, and that the story must compliment the gameplay. As Stoynev put it, narrative action in books is easy because it takes place in the reader’s head, it’s easy in movies is easy because the physics engine is already implemented, but it’s very difficult in games. If you’re wondering whether or not one of the characters in the story you’re writing should push the other while arguing, you’d better check with the developers about the animation, physics, and clipping work that it would entail. The session certainly gave me some insight into the constraints faced by video game narratives, and I’m sure that I’ll have a better appreciation for some of these limitations the next time I write a game review.

Arena Mode

Digital Dragon’s indie love continued with the Digital Dragons Arena. This event gave indie devs the chance to pitch their games to both publishers and investors. It was a great opportunity for the devs to get valuable exposure for their games without all of the trouble of looking for the right contacts or having to fight to get their foot in the door at game companies just to be seen. It would be interesting to learn which games we’ll be playing in the future came to life thanks to the Arena.

Independence Day

The last day of Digital Dragons 2023 was primarily an indie day for me. I basically camped-out for most of the day at the Indie Zone where about 50 games were on display. It was a great opportunity to meet the devs and have the chance to get a demo of or hands-on time with their games. It was a pleasure talking with the devs because they were all really enthusiastic about their games and eager to answer any questions about them. I’ll be spotlighting the games in future features because there were a lot of innovative and imaginative games on display at the Indie Zone and they deserve more than a passing mention here.

Indies in the Spotlight

Digital Dragons 2023 had the perfect way to end a day focused on indie games – the Indie Showcase Gala. The event was a little more low-key than the previous evening’s Awards Gala, but the more intimate atmosphere felt more fitting for indie games. A ten-person jury voted on their top three games from a list of twenty finalists, and the top three vote-getters were given awards. In addition to the trophy, recognition, and valuable exposure, the winners received a top-of-the-line development PC provided by AMD. The winning games from first to third were Sacrifire, Tarnished Blood, and The Wandering Village. A special recognition award was given to Hank: Drowning on Dry Land. In addition, each conference attendee was able to cast a single vote for their favorite indie game, and the voice of the people chose Backpack Hero as the top game at the show. It was good to see the attendees spread the love to a game that didn’t already take one of the other awards. Finally, Techland decided to honor one of the indie games by giving away the AMD PC they received with their award at the Awards Gala. Members of Techland’s staff that attended the conference spent time in the Indie Zone and each voted for their favorite, which was Through the Nightmares. It was really special to see how excited, happy, and overwhelmed the devs were to find that their hard work was recognized by their peers in the game development industry. Definitely a “feel good” moment for the conference.

One for the Road

After the Indie Showcase Gala, attendees exited the theater to find that Remedy Entertainment had bought everyone a beer. And given that this was Digital Dragons, the bottles featured a private label with a dragon logo. I would have been tempted to bring my bottle back home for a souvenir if I didn’t have to try to keep it from breaking during my 6,000-mile journey back home.

The mood was certainly festive as everyone said their goodbyes over a cold dragon brew – it may have been a bit sad that things were now over, but everyone was focused on how well the conference went, and the fun they had and the new contacts they made during the past few days.

I as well was glad that I was able to attend. The conference was well-planned and managed, and in spite of the number of people in attendance and everything that was happening at once, it all went quite smoothly. I met some great people from the game industry, learned a lot about game development, and got the chance to see some great games.

See You Next Year

Digital Dragons will once again return to the ICE Krakow Congress Centre next May.