Last week, a study by games industry trade body TIGA, found the Scottish games industry had grown by a massive 27% in 2017. With 1,540 working directly in game development and 2,814 working for companies that indirectly support the industry, this makes a grand total of just over 4300 games professionals working in Scotland.
This growth is fantastic news for Scotland and of course our home city of Dundee, which for us will always be the spiritual home of the Scottish games sector. There are now more established professionals in Scotland than there ever have been at any point in the industry’s history and TIGA’s study suggests this is a trend that’s set to continue.
Our studios have put their talent to work on huge franchises like Halo, Angry Birds and Minecraft in recent years, whilst indie titles like Binaries and Fragmental have shown that Scottish studios also aren’t afraid to think outside of the box. This is all before we’ve even mentioned the Edinburgh-developed behemoth that is Grand Theft Auto.
Scotland offers world class game development courses at Abertay University, which also hosts the Dare Academy games design competition, where student teams compete to produce their own game. This unique combination of education and essential industry experience provides a stream of up and coming developers, and cements Scotland as a creative hub for fostering talent.
Tag CEO Paul Farley says, “Scottish games companies have for many years been at the cutting edge of new technologies, business models and creativity and now we are starting to see the benefit to the wider economy from those years of investment and hard work. The Scottish game development scene provides an unrivalled mix of homegrown and incoming talent, strong educational support and unique industry heritage, so the potential is there for this growth to continue for many years to come!”
We look forward to the continued success of the Scottish games sector.