Na zaproszenie Tomasza Z. Majkowskiego pojawię się w Krakowie we wrześniu na konfernecji naukowej “History of games” z prelekcją “Bravehearts – how 90s define Polish gamedev, both digital and analogue”.
To mój pierwszy raz jako prelegent na naukowej konferencji 😉
Opis prelekcji:
The 1990s were a time of profound global transformation. The Soviet Union collapsed, Germany reunified, civil war broke out in Yugoslavia, and conflict flared in Chechnya. Meanwhile, the United States launched Operation Desert Storm. It was also a decade of tremendous technological shifts: the era of Windows 95, the birth of mobile phones, the rise of 3D gaming, and, of course, the emergence of the internet. Mass culture was flourishing—Braveheart ruled the big screen, MTV dominated television, and grunge music captured the hearts of a generation.
In Poland, these changes were felt on multiple levels. After decades behind the Iron Curtain, we suddenly gained access to pop culture, art, and games. After years of sanctions and scarcity, cutting-edge technologies began to appear on our market. Following an era of censorship and restriction, dozens of publishers sprang up, releasing books, comics, and games. Laws were changing, social norms were evolving, and the economy was rapidly transforming.
Today, Polish game products like The Witcher series or Neuroshima Hex are known across the globe. But in the 1990s, the local gaming market was barely a shadow of what it would become. While RPG fans abroad were diving into World of Darkness, we were painstakingly copying hard-to-find AD&D rulebooks by hand and learning English from expensive, Xeroxed copies of Cyberpunk. While Eye of the Beholder captured the imagination of gamers worldwide, we were assembling our very first PCs.
Join me on a journey through the twists and turns of 1990s Poland—a story of how, from the rubble of the Polish People’s Republic, the foundations of today’s successes were laid, and how a fledgling grassroots movement grew into a thriving industry.
