This version is slightly more detailed and longer than the hard-copy published version. Sorry I lost the pictures. They were mainly Team Fortress 2 pictures.
Local gaming development IP to rise
By Hazimin Sulaiman
CODEMASTERS has a presence in Malaysia, working along with local company Vision New Media. Electronics Arts is setting up shop with our southern neighbours, Singapore. These are world computer game heavyweights which would be a boon for the local creative content development industry to have on our shores. There are of course local game developers in Malaysia such as Pheonix and GameBrains. But it seems that in most cases, the games development industry in Malaysia still lacks its own Intellectual Property; most projects handled by these companies are outsourced jobs, with the IP belonging to respective foreign entities.
The interactive-entertainment industry itself is very enticing especially in 2007 video game software sales reached a staggering USD$9.5 billion. Compare that to the top-ten Hollywood blockbusters which generated USD$2.6 billion last year. Unless the local gaming industry gets a boost, it is likely that the local games development industry will remain at a service provider level for a long time.
Not owning unique IP can in the long run spell disaster if somehow a games developer decides to shift to other places which offer lower wages and other incentives. There is hope. As established foreign games entities realiase Malaysia's potential to produce quality work. We have some resources in terms of multimedia and animation talents but it takes more expertise to make a computer or video game. A game requires more people than a movie production. In that respect, relying on an established gaming engine is a good way to jump start the local games industry.
Datuk Hj. Abdul Hamid Mustapha, executive chairman of Online e-Club Management Sdn Bhd which owns NOESIS Interactive Sdn Bhd believes that one of the best ways to break into the lucerative games industry is by creating mods. The clear message is that one should not underestimate the power of game mods.Mods or game modifications is a key reason why games like Counter Strike (running on the Half Life engine) refuse to die.
In 1996, alterations to id Software's Doom resulted in modified versions. These mods extended the life of the game way beyond the point where its excitement would have died down. Since one must have the original game to play mods, sales went beyond the shelf life of normal computer games.Using this template Half-Life has made Valve Software's revenue stream steadily increase. Valve mainly attributes its success to three mods: Day of Defeat, Team Fortress and Counter Strike. In the first year Half-Life sold two million units. In its third year after its launch, it sold 3.8 million units. Over all, the Half Life franchise sold over 11 million units.
NOESIS Interactive intends to offer gaming development courses through franchisee university and colleges. Courses are scheduled to start by June, 2008. Leveraging on its partners Valve Software and NOESIS Interactive USA, NOESIS Interactive believes that we have an ecosystem in place to welcome a whole new generation of game developers from training, community development right through to digital distribution of games for commercialisation opportunities. In simple terms it means that budding game developers can take up the course from participating university and colleges and receive a certification in respective programmes such as 3D content creation with Softimage XSI, character design and integration with Half-Life 2, custom props and animation for source powered games, advanced character animation for gamers with Softimage XSI and advanced source level design bundle source level design essentials.
These certification means that the holder can be instantly put to work on games which specifically use the Half-Life engine. Besides Softimage, other 3D animation tools such as Autodesk Maya and 3ds Max-based courses are also offered. The project based training is open to all students, teaching professionals or those who want to upgrade their skills."NOESIS Interactive is a project conceived, produced and managed by Online e-Club Management Sdn Bhd to address the inadequancies of the Asian Electronic Game Industry. Currently there is only a handful of local games titles that have been released in this region," says Abdul Hamid. This he thinks is largely due to the lack of resources and more crucially the lack of access to any game engines. As for the pool of skilled designers, artists and coders it is believed by NOESIS Interactive that it is small and scattered, with most young talents are yet to be discovered.
NOESIS is also set to leverage on its connections in Brunei, Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Vietnam; since e-Club Management is the regional official distributor for Valve Software. With that, locally produced IP coming out from this has a good chance of being distributed as mods to these countries. The IP rights will also remain with Malaysians. Malaysia can use this opportunity to market its own unique culture as its own IP as well. Placement of facts or cultural objects can picque one's curiosity and influence them to find out more. This has a similar effect to placing products in movies.
Silat, the Malaysian form of martial arts for example, has been eyed by a Dutch-based company DGames Sdb Bhd. According to its advisor Azlan Ghanie, himself a respected martial artist and chief editor of the local martial arts magazine, Seni Beladiri, DGames representatives are keen to create an online computer game where players from all over the world can band together to fight the forces of darkness. "I hope that silat form of fighting will be depicted in the online game to introduce Malaysian silat to world," Azlan says.
DGames is synonamous with the child prodigy Paul du Long, who created his first online game when he was only 11 years old. His father Glenn du Long intends to have his son mentor local talents, as he has done for thousands of children in Europe. "We are scheduling the launch of the proposed game sometime in May or June in Kuala Lumpur," says Azlan.
DGames is keen to have Malaysia as a hub for developing online games. Malaysia it seems has hidden gems which can attract established names from the gaming development industry. But to build up the industry, it takes more than a bunch of companies. The pool of skilled and talent for example, needs to be polished enough to gain the confidence from these would be employers from overseas. We need to learn what we can from tried and tested formulas first, just like the Japanese animators, before branching out on our own.
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