Task 15. The Industry

The computer games industry first started off as an almost no lose situation. A single programmer could produce a game in a few months on a low budget and sell hundreds or thousands of copies meaning more royalties could be given. Now it’s a much greater risk to create a computer game due to the large budgets that can reach millions of pounds, the development time is also much larger ranging between 1 and 3 years, also the large staff base and complex programming and graphics creation.

The games industry tree starts with the games developer, which is the company that produces the game. Underneath that is the games producer who is the project leader, they will be in charge of sorting out licenses and contracts, making sure both the budget and schedule is kept to, sorting out all forms of testing and localization and to communicate with development staff and upper stakeholders. Then below him are all the different workers that work under each discipline.

These include:

• Level designer
• Game producer
• Game artist
• Game programmer
• Game designer
• Game tester

The problems facing today’s industry include money issues in England. They say that for the industry to remain healthy then government help will be needed. Due to a lack of funds a lot of the creativity and talent has been taken overseas due to better offers over there. Also with the beginning of the next generation more money must be spent on expertise required.

Another problem highlighted by Nintendo is the simplistic view that if graphics and processing power can be increased, gamers will always continue playing. Nintendo however believe that this is not true and the industry really needs to revolutionize the way games are interacted with and turning gaming into a new experience.