Screen Australia Injects $6 Million Into Dying Games Industry

[Steven Bogos]

Screen Australia Injects $6 Million Into Dying Games Industry

There are only a reported 581 people working in the entire Australian games industry.

The games industry in America is big. Huge even. Massive, multi-billion dollar corporations produce hundreds of multi-million dollar projects every year. Australia's games industry is comparably tiny, boasting a mere 581 people, which is actually down from 1431 several years ago. Screen Australia, the Australian Federal Government's key funding body for the Australian screen production industry, aims to reverse that trend, announcing plans to inject $6 million dollars into the dying industry.

To put into perspective just how small the Australian game's industry is, a single EA studio: EA Mobile Montreal, which was recently hit with heavy layoffs [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/123232-Layoffs-Strike-EA-Mobile-Studio-Hit-Hardest], has 300 employees - over half the number of employees in the entire Australian games industry.

The $6 million will be given to the following ten developers and publishers, based in various locations across the country:

Defiant Development (QLD)
ODD Games (SA)
Soap Creative (NSW)
Tantalus Media (VIC)
Tin Man Games (VIC)
Torus Games (VIC)
Twiitch (VIC)
Uppercut Games (NSW/ACT)
The Voxel Agents (VIC)
Wicked Witch Software (VIC)


The money will be paid out over 3 years, and is part of a larger $20 million campaign to help save the industry. The biggest problem facing the industry is publishers leaving Australia for territories offering greater incentives and lower business costs.

The Australian games industry, while small, has produced at least a few notable videogames. BioShock [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallout_Tactics:_Brotherhood_of_Steel] was handled by 2K Australia.

Source: Games.on.net [http://www.screenaustralia.gov.au/news_and_events/2013/mr_130618_GamesEnterprise.aspx?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Media+release+Screen+production+sector+shows+strong+growth&utm_content=Media+release+Screen+production+sector+shows+strong+growth+CID_7fbf13503e0d6d1aa48e47b9b2925f86&utm_source=You%20Mail%20Me&utm_term=More%20details]

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[major_chaos]

First, is that $20 million USD or Australian? Second, where the hell is this 20 mil coming from?

 

[L4Y Duke]

The main difference in the number of Australian game developers is probably the closure of Pandemic a few years back.

 

[Steven Bogos]

First, is that $20 million USD or Australian? Second, where the hell is this 20 mil coming from?

AUD, and from the taxpayer AKA you and me

 

[Roxor]

Whoa. Looks like Victoria is the hotbed of local game development.

I should tell my great-uncle in Melbourne about this. It'll be a point of pride for him.

 

[Jamous]

Wow; that's actually pretty sad. You'd imagine (hell, we as good as -know-) that, in a country as big as Australia, there'd be more than half a thousand people wanting to work in games development. Kinda sad seeing there're so few and they're struggling to maintain even that. Hopefully this will do them some good though.

 

[ciasteczkowyp]

Australian game dev would not be dying if it were not for employers forcing crunch and reducing wages + not paying for overtime. I wouldn't support scum.

 

[rapidoud]

Wow; that's actually pretty sad. You'd imagine (hell, we as good as -know-) that, in a country as big as Australia, there'd be more than half a thousand people wanting to work in games development. Kinda sad seeing there're so few and they're struggling to maintain even that. Hopefully this will do them some good though.

It's kind of hard when you have France with great tax benefits to working there, as well as Canada, and then you have the USA that has a huge industry that muscles anyone elsewhere by making it unfeasible TO work anywhere when they draw in all the talent.

Wow; that's actually pretty sad. You'd imagine (hell, we as good as -know-) that, in a country as big as Australia, there'd be more than half a thousand people wanting to work in games development. Kinda sad seeing there're so few and they're struggling to maintain even that. Hopefully this will do them some good though.

We're only 20 million people to the US's 300 million, and they already muscled out Europe as the development centre of the world by moving quite quickly after the first World War to secure their place (especially when they took over as the common currency).

It used to be France vs Germany for culture, but now it's "Hey we're America we're going to do what we can to make out country better than yours and making AAA development unfeasible anywhere else thereby wasting much International talent".

 

[Thaluikhain]

I'm doing a computer course at TAFE, and while the cutbacks to kill TAFE off have ruined my current course...at least I'm not doing the games design one.

Them people in the next room talking about their zombie hordes while I'm pretending to understand Visual Studio...yup, more interesting course, just won't get you anything.

 

[SushiJaguar]

Probably doesn't help that you don't get fun games in Australia for months and months after release, and a lot of them get banned because of your pansy-ass government censorship laws.

 

[Formica Archonis]

Today I learned that Yahtzee is the only self-sufficient member of the Australian game industry.

 

[MrHide-Patten]

Wow; that's actually pretty sad. You'd imagine (hell, we as good as -know-) that, in a country as big as Australia, there'd be more than half a thousand people wanting to work in games development. Kinda sad seeing there're so few and they're struggling to maintain even that. Hopefully this will do them some good though.

Speaking as an Australian game dev who has had to have gone Indie, there are plenty of us. There just aren't any studios.