GDC’s attempt to control spaces around the venue, plus how to watch The Game Awards
Game Conference Guide Insights - December 2025
In this month’s issue:
GDC is on the hunt for revenue while taking over places where conversations happened organically
The Game Awards is upon us, see how to watch the main event + handful of supporting showcases
Updated December’s deadlines for awards, funding, etc.
Service announcement
As we are slowly winding down and preparing for the upcoming holidays, we are looking at the upcoming 2026 events calendar. Which events to visit? Which are already announced? Which one is going to create the biggest FOMO? Where everyone will flock, and which one will be on everyone’s mind? Questions, questions, questions.
As of now, you can choose from more than 83 events scheduled to happen in 2026. It is a fraction of the 300+ events happening each year, so expect new events added to the database in coming days and weeks.
During the upcoming days a server maintenance is scheduled as well. What will happen?
As per usual, you won’t notice a thing. The maintenance window will be very short and everything will happen on the server side. In a nutshell, 2025 events will be archived and on the main page you will have access to the upcoming 2026 events.
The archive will welcome 342 new events from this year, boosting the total to 1799 events. The Archive is an essential part of the Game Conference Guide, feel free to travel back in time and check which events happened in the previous years reaching back to 2020.
Now, with service announcement out of the way, we can cover two short topics, but before we do, check out this festive message from our sponsor:
PARTNER OF THE MONTH
Happy Holidays from the UberStrategist Team!
As we enter the holiday season, we are reminded of how grateful we are to have been a part of the gaming industry and its community for the last 12 years. Working alongside teams who create meaningful and memorable experiences is a privilege we never take for granted.
If you are planning your event schedule for 2026, now is the perfect time to build your strategy. Our team can support your presence at key shows and strengthen your visibility with PR, influencer outreach, and coordinated media planning. Thoughtful preparation now helps you create more impact when the season begins.
From our team to yours, we wish you a happy and restful holiday season.
GDC’s attempt to take over conversations
The organisers of GDC Festival of Gaming (formerly known as GDC) are saying the tickets are 40% cheaper. Let’s break it down.
For the past 4 years I have been looking closely at prices for every event. Prices for GDC conference passes were steadily rising each year. The average increase in 2025 was 12% per pass. While the step to overhaul the conference pass offering for GDC Festival of Gaming and even making the passes more affordable is a welcome chance, when you look closely, you will notice not very popular decisions.
Compared to previous years, the focus is on offering full access to every ticket holder. Long gone is the tiered approach and everything is consolidated into Festival pass costing $649 (for indies) and $1199 (everyone else). Very nice, but access to GDC Vault is missing (valued at $649) which was included in the conference pass in previous years.
There is an All Access pass called Game Changer with GDC Vault included but the price is $2,499 (same as last year for All Access pass). It also features a daily picnic in Yerba Buena Gardens (we will get to it shortly) and additional services like concierge and networking, which begs the question how on Earth they want to manage it on a scale with demanding clientele if not with a “very smart AI system”. I believe it won’t be the concierge level of service you know from hotels or boutique events.
Speaking about networking. GDC Festival of Gaming organizers are going for places where all the cool kids were hanging out without the pass. You know, Yerba Buena Gardens, W Hotel to name a few. These places are popular each year and if the weather is nice, the park is the place to be. Going for these specifically is very strange, as the business people are all around Moscone. Marriott Marquis takes the majority of the crowd, not to mention the Jessie Square behind it, Four Seasons has a busy lobby and there is a nice cafe inside SOMA.
Going for open space and privatizing them, while claiming they will create much needed NDA space for meetings is a predatory takeover of the conversations you do not have control over as they are happening organically and turning it into additional revenue. I do wish the organizers all the best, pulling an event the size of GDC is a massive endeavour, but this is not going to help them to win the business crowd that goes to San Francisco but not attend GDC.
Imagine, gamescom taking over Marriott, Radisson and Dorint and naming them the official gamescom hotels! Let’s not give them ideas.
Moving on.
Have you noticed the Expo Pass is gone? It was not a popular choice just among indies and bootstrapped companies travelling to one of the most expensive cities in the world. It was the only way to attend the biggest developers conference and mingle with developers, checking out games, and expo hall when you were running on a tight budget. Now with this tier gone, they basically cut away a pretty large group of people who will not attend anymore.
On one hand the conference pass is 40% cheaper than last year, but for this group the ticket is 44% more expensive as they have to buy the Indie Pass now.
GDC Festival of Gaming will find a new audience for sure and I do believe many will travel to San Francisco, but only a fraction of people who were in the city without a ticket will be buying the passes in 2026. There is zero incentive to buy a pass for business people occupying hotel lobbies. And with the current state of the industry, with tough funding, rough job market, non-existent discoverability, and competition beyond the limits, the attendance level overall will dip.
I personally like the festivals, but in the case of GDC it is a misunderstanding of the target group and its needs with changes that are coming way too late.
EVENT SPOTLIGHT
Pocket Gamer Connects London is the largest b2b conference for the UK games industry, now in its 12th year, bigger than ever, with extra meeting space plus activities at the nearby Barbican - the Apps Business Summit and Beyond Games: Transmedia Summit side events!
Use promo code “GAMECONFLDN” and get 10% discount by clicking the button below:
❄️How to watch The Game Awards
The Game Awards marks the end of the year as the industry is winding down and rushing to squeeze and finish everything before Christmas. This year familiar faces among showcases are returning back and they are sprinkled around the main event.
As always, at the Game Conference Guide you can find direct links to the streams, all the times, dates and there is a handy calendar with reminders so you won’t miss a single World premiere.
Below is a list of all the showcases and awards broadcasted round The Game Awards.
December 9 @ 9AM PT / 12PM ET / 6PM CET
December 9 @ 12PM PT / 3PM ET / 9PM CET
📺Latin American Games Showcase The Game Awards Edition
December 9 @ 4PM PT / 7PM ET / 1AM CET (Dec 10)
📺Day of the Devs: The Game Awards Digital Showcase
December 10 @ 10AM PT / 1PM ET / 7PM CET
📺Women-Led Games Showcase - The Game Awards Edition
December 10 @ 4PM PT / 7PM ET / 1AM CET (Dec 11)
December 11 @ 5PM PT / 8PM ET / 2AM CET (Dec 12)
December 13 @ 11AM PT / 2PM ET / 8PM CET
December 18 @ 3:30PM PT / 6:30PM ET / 12:30AM CET (Dec 19)
Get all details, dates, times & direct links to broadcasts here.
🏆Upcoming Deadlines on the horizon
🏆Pégases Awards Ceremony
Deadline: December 31, Awards, entry: 240€🎮BitSummit
Deadline: December 31, On-site showcase, entry: 2750 JPY💵Games Finance Market
Deadline: January 5, On-site networking & funding, entry: £349🎪Steam Next Fest: February 2026
Deadline January 5, Steam Festival, entry: free🎪gamescom LATAM BIG Festival
Deadline January 9, on-site showcase, entry: free📺Indie Fan Fest
Deadline January 9, Showcase + Steam event, entry: $600
Get all deadlines here.
And this is it for this year
I want to thank you all for reading, visiting the website and sharing it with your friends. It means a lot.
I want to wish you all Happy Holidays. Try to unplug from all the feeds for a few days and spend the time with the loved ones. My plan is to read as many books as possible.
We can talk about them at some of the events next year.
[Game Conference Guide is helping you find your next games industry event.]
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Pavol Buday, curator @ GCG