Claire Blackshaw
Claire Blackshaw
Technical Director at Flammable Penguins Games
Shipping games since PS2 era, queer creative based in London, her perspective spans from assembly to stage plays. Her career working on platform PS4, PS5 and PSVR1/2 at PlayStation, Climax, and Jagex. At Sony as Senior Online Consultant for Europe, she worked closely with Strategic Content helping indies on console, and her own background includes releasing one of the early titles for XBLA. Currently Technical Director at Flammable Penguins Games, she continues leading technical work, contributing to Godot and started PlayStation Community port of Godot.
Claire was recently featured in Kelly Vero’s book Breaking Through Bytes: Women Shaping the Digital World for her ongoing contributions to the games industry and VR.
Technical Director
Session
Traditionally, indie studios and small teams developed for a single console first before porting to PC—a tradition that has since flipped to "Steam first." This talk challenges that modern default. By exploring the technical advantages of a single hardware spec, the business benefits of dedicated console audiences, and the artistic merit of crafting a canonical, intended experience, we will examine why developing for console first might be the smartest strategic decision for your studio.