MANILA, Philippines – A South Korean government agency has launched an initiative to help stimulate the Philippine game development scene.
The government agency, Gyeonggi Content Agency (GCA), has partnered with Elite Games – a Korean publisher with Philippine operations – not only to introduce new mobile games (Joy Planet, Next Exit, Velator, Fantasy Tales) to the Philippines and the Southeast Asian region but also to help in building a robust game development ecosystem in the country.
The partnership, launched at the Philippine-Korean Video Game Cooperation Conference held at a Pasig hotel on Friday, December 1, will provide a bilateral exchange of business, expertise, and technology between South Korea and the Philippines, as well as the rest of Southeast Asia.
There are several ways that the partnership will attempt to spur growth. One is that the partners involved will be sponsoring some promising Philippine game developers to international expos where they can showcase their games.
Exposure is one of the things that local games crucially needs, emphasized Romulo Reyes, managing director at Elite Games. Reyes said that while there is no lack of talent in the Philippines, the games have to be given a consistent and strong push for exposure.
"We're opening the doors for both South Korean game developers and Philippine teams to work together and come up with great games that the whole world can enjoy," said Johnny Paek, Elite Games' CEO.
Essentially, the partnership may help Philippine games squeak into the Korean videogaming scene. South Korea is known as games-crazy nation, marked by stadium-filling gaming tournaments, and a scene that is buoyed by their strong internet infrastructure. Finding opportunity and space in such a market would yield tremendous rewards, if successful.
Currently, Philippine companies such as Synergy 88 has worked on flagship titles such as Microsoft Studios' Gears of War 4 while Secret 6 has lent a hand to Uncharted 3 and 4, and The Last Of Us. In mobile gaming, the Philippine market has revenues of more than $175 million in 2017, and is expected to grow to $256 million by 2022.
Incubator programs
The GCA and Elite Games partnership seeks to support that growth. Aside from promoting Philippine games in Korea, they announced plans to support the industry on several fronts.
For startup game companies, they will be offering mentorship programs, helping enhance work networks, and promoting bilateral cooperation with the GCA. The mentorship will not only focus on actual game development, but also on marketing the games properly, sales, content writing and how producers and project managers can maximize game development talents – or to be short, the entire business.
Reyes would also like to grow towards a mindset that also considers the larger global market along with the local one and adopts big-picture thinking.
"We need to have this long-term vision – 20, 30, 40, 50 years – and it is only with the help of organizations such as GDAP (Game Development Association of the Philippines), IGDA (International Game Developers Association), PSIA (Philippine Software Industry Association), coming together, talking about where do we want to head 20, 30 years from now?
Interested Philippine game companies are encouraged to apply to their programs, the details of which will be announced at a later date. One thing that they'll be looking for in the screening process: how creative the content is.
For those who are in an even earlier stage in the learning process – namely, the students – the partnership also holds benefits for them.
The partnership also aims to work with educational institutions. With their role in the industry as publishers and game-makers, they hope to be able to provide insights to institutions on current trends or what kind of talents and skills the industry needs.
To help do this, they aim to promote communication among different schools, gaming organizations, and the government as well, to somewhat build a collective towards the betterment of the industry.
Reyes said they've spoken to certain schools at this point, but declined to give out specifics yet.
"Were you able to do the things you wanted to do?" Reyes would like to ask game development graduates, so as to gauge whether game development students are being prepared properly.
Reyes dreams that one day the local game development industry would be an important contributor to the country's GDP – the same way that call centers are at the moment. But it will need good educational infrastructure, a concerted effort both from the private sector and the government – and continuing to change the general belief that videogames are just videogames, a simple pastime. – Rappler.com