Ben Cousins, Executive Producer of EA DICE’s Battlefield franchise, will deliver a keynote speech titled, “Scenes from the Battlefield: The Present and Future of Core and Casual,” at this year’s Paris Game Developers Conference (Paris GDC).

Cousins will address the business and consumer trends that have led to the creation of the new Battlefield Heroes service and will share his thoughts on the future crossover of core and casual gamers and the supposed death of the PC as a gaming platform.

Paris GDC, the second French edition of the Game Developers Conference, the premier event for developers and publishers in the videogame industry (and part of Think Services, as is Gamasutra), is scheduled for June 23-24 at the Coeur Défense Convention Centre in Paris.

As Executive Producer for Battlefield titles at DICE in Stockholm, Sweden, Cousins most recently led the development of Battlefield Heroes, EA’s first “Play 4 Free” game. Cousins’ past history involves work exclusively on digitally delivered entertainment – before leading Battlefield Heroes he served as Creative Director on PlayStation Home, Design Manager for the EyeToy group and Lead Designer for Beats at Sony Computer Entertainment Europe.

“The game industry is in a state of rapid and exciting change today, as developers grapple with adapting to free to play models and bringing gameplay to universal audiences,” said Jamil Moledina, Executive Director, GDC Events. “Ben has a successful history of coaxing our industry into the 21st Century, and we expect that his experiences fomenting evolution with Battlefield Heroes will prove highly illuminating to our audience.”

Paris GDC 08 offers more than 50 sessions presented by industry experts and designed for developers looking to expand their expertise, network, and learn from their peers. New session highlights include:

- Matt Hooper, "From DOOM to RAGE: Megatextures, Pushing Artistic Boundaries," id Software
- Nicolas Thibieroz, "Ultimate Graphics Performance for DirectX 10 Hardware," AMD
- Tamsin Lucas, “SingStar: The Game Factory,” Sony Computer Entertainment Europe
- David McCarthy, “A Family Affair: Adapting EA Sports to the Wii,” EA Sports
- Ralph H. Baer & David Winter, “How to Create an Industry: The Making of the Brown Box and Pong”.

“Previous consultations held with game companies have helped us put together a session lineup that meets the industry’s expectations,” explains Pierre Carde, Executive Director, Paris GDC. “From megatextures to optimized production techniques to the first creator of videogames, the key topics covered are in line with the developers’ needs and interests and we are proud to offer them at our conference.”

This interview has been translated