--- title: "To ICSE ’16 and Back Again: A Research Tale" description: I recently presented my research on best practices and common mistakes in game dev at the International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE ’16)... image: https://michaelwashburnjr.com/hubfs/Imported_Blog_Media/austinskylinelouneffpoint-2010-03-29-b.jpg --- # To ICSE ’16 and Back Again: A Research Tale Written by  [Michael Washburn Jr ](https://michaelwashburnjr.com/blog/author/michael-washburn-jr) ![Picture of Michael Washburn Jr](https://michaelwashburnjr.com/hubfs/AuthorAvatar.jpg) Published on: June 13, 2016 ![](https://michaelwashburnjr.com/hubfs/Imported_Blog_Media/austinskylinelouneffpoint-2010-03-29-b.jpg) [Share this blog post on Twitter ](https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?text=I+found+this+interesting+blog+post&url=https://michaelwashburnjr.com/blog/to-icse-16-and-back-again-a-research-tale) [Share this blog post on Facebook ](http://www.facebook.com/share.php?u=https://michaelwashburnjr.com/blog/to-icse-16-and-back-again-a-research-tale) [Share this blog post on LinkedIn ](http://www.linkedin.com/shareArticle?mini=true&url=https://michaelwashburnjr.com/blog/to-icse-16-and-back-again-a-research-tale) I recently went to Austin, Texas to present my research on best practices and common mistakes in game development at the International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE ’16). My paper, titled *“What Went Right and What Went Wrong”: An Analysis of 155 Postmortems from Game Development, *presents an empirical study on postmortem reviews from game development. I coauthored this paper with Pavithra Sathiyanarayanan, Meiyappan Nagappan, Thomas Zimmermann, and Christian Bird.   In order to perform this study, we read *a lot *of postmortem reviews written by game developers. These postmortems generally contained a list of areas that went right during the project, along with a list of areas that went wrong. The postmortems were voluntarily published on [Gamasutra.com](http://www.gamasutra.com/) about a year or so after the game was released, and were posted over the last 10 years. Through our analysis we are able to identify which areas of game development that developers excel in. The image below shows the percentage of postmortems that listed each category as something that went right during development. ![Chart showing what went right](https://michaelwashburnjr.com/hs-fs/hubfs/Screen%20Shot%202021-04-19%20at%2010.42.34%20AM.png?width=800&name=Screen%20Shot%202021-04-19%20at%2010.42.34%20AM.png) Conversely, we were also able to find the most common areas of game development to go wrong, as shown below. ![Chart showing what went wrong](https://michaelwashburnjr.com/hs-fs/hubfs/Screen%20Shot%202021-04-19%20at%2010.43.00%20AM.png?width=800&name=Screen%20Shot%202021-04-19%20at%2010.43.00%20AM.png) The full paper is available at microsoft.com [here](http://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/default.aspx?id=262301), and the data we analyzed, along with some additional resources, is available on [Google Drive](https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0BwEjRillyZroRHF0bkZJdHVxMUE&usp=sharing). Feel free to send me a message if you have any questions about my research and I will do my best to answer them in a timely manner. Tags: [Research](https://michaelwashburnjr.com/blog/tag/research) ## Related Posts [![React.JS Code](https://michaelwashburnjr.com/hs-fs/hubfs/pexels-antonio-batinic%CC%81-4164418.jpg?height=200&name=pexels-antonio-batinic%CC%81-4164418.jpg) ](https://michaelwashburnjr.com/blog/how-to-debug-react-rerenders) [React](https://michaelwashburnjr.com/blog/tag/react), [JavaScript](https://michaelwashburnjr.com/blog/tag/javascript) May 11, 2021 10:45:00 AM ### [How to Debug React Rerenders](https://michaelwashburnjr.com/blog/how-to-debug-react-rerenders) Are you having trouble trying to debug react rerenders? Debugging unwanted react rerenders can be one of the most frustrating and tricky problems when building Reacts apps. 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