There is no doubt that the South Australian game development industry is much smaller than it was years or a even a year ago. With the closure of Krome and before that Ratbag, the South Australian game development scene on the surface is looking a bit bleak. However if you dig not far beneath the surface then what I think you’ll find is a little bit more surprising.
About two years ago I remember sitting in a lecture hall at the Adelaide Convention Center where Ben Kilsby, the head of an Adelaide based serious games company called Holopoint had given out the call “Game Developers of South Australia to unite!” to the people at AVCon, an anime and video game gathering held yearly in Adealide. The thought left a warm fuzzy feeling inside of me that thought maybe he’s onto something.
One and a half years later would mark the end of the Game Development Club at the University of Adelaide. A club that formed shortly after AVCon that year. This club showed me the potentials of what can happen when a community unites. Over the year and a half, 32 small games would be made for Game Jams, regular meets would occur and a small passion community would form.
I’m really proud to say that Ben Kilsby has asked me to help out with this years Indie Games Room(IGR). An event that he himself has poured much energy into over the past few years. The IGR is an area inside of AVCon that showcases the best local game development talent. Despite the fact that the Games Development Club is no longer around I think that the IGR symbolises bigger things to come. So the days of the big studios like Ratbag and Krome may have passed but that doesn’t mean that the best days were behind us. If you look under the surface you’ll see that there is a lot of potential moving forward.