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Scotland in Focus begins as our Michael Slevin has an open chat with David Thomson about Denki, Dundee and the Scottish games industry.
Made in Scotland
Videogames are big business, as Rockstar North's Grand Theft Auto IV proves. The best-selling videogame of all time its brilliant mix of non-linear gameplay, characterisation and atmosphere made GTA IV a title that grabbed the attention of both gamers and critics worldwide. Selling over 13 million copies, breaking industry records and generating over $500 million in its first week alone. Quite a feat, and surely one only manageable by one of the big videogame developers in America, right?
Think again! GTA IV was made by Rockstar North, one of Scotland's most successful businesses, generating millions for the country's economy. Currently based in Edinburgh, the company was founded in Dundee, long since known to be the epicentre of the nation's brightest videogame design talent.
Dundee is also the location of the University of Abertay, renowned as a source of talented new designers, and it plays host to studios such as Realtime Worlds and Cohort Studios. With tax breaks now being discussed in Parliament, the future of the Scottish games industry certainly looks rosy, so who better to ask their opinion of it than Denki, one of the city's most popular studios?
Denki's Aim
Set up in 2000, Denki's original aim was to create digital games and toys that anyone of any age could enjoy. A decade on, they've excelled at this goal, creating numerous loveable games for some of the world's best-known brands including Disney, Sky and Nickelodeon. You will likely have played one of their creations at some time or another. David Thomson, Denki's Number One Fan (his official job title) has always had an interest in videogames, making his own on his ZX Spectrum as a child. "I always knew I would work in games. I'm a programmer by trade but I didn't go straight into games from university. I started my own mobile games development studio in 1999 with a friend from university. We ended up working with companies like Disney, Sega and Panasonic, which wasn't too bad." Moving onto another company, Slam, he then spent three years dissecting what makes games fun. "There was a while where I just couldn't face playing games. I'm getting back into the swing of things now, though. Just over a year ago, I joined Denki, which has been fantastic."
Playful Side
Known for their playful approach to business (handing out goody bags containing sherbet, stickers and balloons to anyone lucky enough to visit its offices being a stellar example), the company has an unusual pitching procedure for potential projects. "[Dragons' Denki works] almost exactly like the T.V. show Dragons' Den: you have to pitch your game idea to the ‘Dragons' (Denki's board). If they like the sound of it, they'll invest some of the company's time (which, of course, equals cold, hard cash) to get a prototype together. The onus is entirely on you to prove that your idea is potentially fun and then to prove that it actually is fun." Their business approach may be different, but, as with any other developer, Denki needs to keep an eye on the increasing number of students of games creation courses in order to snatch up any new talent that these courses foster.
"The courses are great and [are] definitely essential. It's up to the companies to engage with the universities to make sure that the graduates have the right skills and knowledge. That's an ongoing process." As good as these course can be, however, just because you have a qualification doesn't guarantee you a job. "For someone wanting to enter the industry, you should think hard about what you actually want to do and bear in mind that [being a] ‘designer' is probably only about 1% of the total available jobs. Not everyone will get to do that."
The increased interest in games creation courses has come along at the same time that Xbox Live Arcade, one of the biggest digital distribution services in the world, has made it easier to develop for. Initially pitched as a 'golden ticket' for new and emerging developers as a cost-effective platform for getting their content to market, does the reality meet this original hope for the service?
Bright futures
"I don't believe in ‘golden tickets'. XBLA is clearly a cost-effective platform for getting content to market but it's not as simple as saying ‘more developers should use it': it's still very much a closed platform with a middleman who acts as kingmaker. We clearly believe that digital distribution is the way forward and the types of games we do are generally a good fit for that model. That said, it's not a panacea. I still see people getting sucked into the ‘if we build something good, they will come', which isn't how it works. It's more like ‘if you build something awesome, they might come. Eventually.'" With all this new talent being generated and the proliferation of digital distribution services making it easier than ever to create content and put it up for sale, what does David see as the future of the industry in Scotland?
"The future looks pretty good and we have a lot of great companies here, probably the strongest batch ever. That kind of thinking encourages complacency though and I think the next key step is for at least some of those companies to have a huge hit game. We need two or three huge hits to act as a magnet for people to come here instead of Surrey or Canada or wherever, but more importantly, those hits need to be owned by Scottish companies so that there's no danger that they'll suddenly be moved elsewhere."
With Dundee being the epicentre of the Scottish games industry, it's only a matter of time until the young talent and innovative ideas being created in the city create these hit titles. With successes such as Grand Theft Auto encouraging developers to spread throughout the nation and talks of tax breaks by the government looking ever more likely to be approved, the future's looking brighter than ever. Who knows, we may even see some large foreign developers setting up shop here. Scotland's creative spark has been ignited, and it doesn't look like it's going to be extinguished any time soon.
Are you Denki enough for Denki? Go to the weblink to find out.
Scotland in Focus will return with more exclusives next week.