The Future of Philippine Game Development

Based on researches and interviews conducted by the author, the Philippine game development industry is projected to grow to about US$14 million in revenues by the end of 2011. This is approximately 55.6% higher than the industry revenue back in 2010. Furthermore, the local industry is projected to grow to 1,600 employees from only 1,200 in 2010. The 33.3% growth is attributed to the increasing number of studios being set up by foreign developers and publishers. By the end of 2010, there were about 55 companies in the game development business from about 10 back in 2004, an average increase of 7.5 companies every year. Of the 55 or so game development companies currently doing business in the Philippines, about 11 (corresponding to 20% of the entire industry) are foreign owned. In terms of market served, at least 90% of the total revenues generated in the industry were from customers overseas. However, as early as 2010 there were an increasing number of games that were being developed for the local market, most of which are in the advergame (games for advertising) category. With regard to platforms supported, 2010 saw an increase in advergame projects. This is in contrast to the mobile and console game projects that were prominent in 2007 to 2009. 2011 and 2012 are expected to see an exponential growth in games that are exclusively distributed through Facebook, the most-used social networking platform in the Philippines. At least 20 million Filipinos are currently using Facebook according to Facebooks internal statistics. Based on these industry statistics, it appears that the growth of the local game development industry is poised to continue its double-digit annual growth beyond 2012. However, the last two years has shown an increasing critical weakness in the local industry. As the industry begins to grow beyond 2,000 employees, most of which are game programmers, the pressure is slowly passed to the local colleges and universities who are expected to begin filling up the roster of new positions being created. 2011 is expected to create 400 new positions to add to the current workforce of 1,200. Of these 400, about 360 are for game programming positions. With less than 15,000 Computer Science graduates being generated every year according to statistics at the Commission on Higher Education (CHED), it would seem that there is more than a sufficient number of candidates to fill in these 360 positions. Unfortunately the local game development industry competes for these 15,000 Computer Science graduates with the local software development industry which hires about 11,667 new software programmers every year,1 as well as the local Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) industry (including call centers) which is projected to hire 12,000 new technical support agent every year.2 From these numbers it can be seen clearly that the next few years will pose a challenge to the local game development industrys ability to sustain its growth, as it gets harder and harder to find qualified people to hire. In response to these emerging challenges in human resource, the Game Developers Association of the Philippines (GDAP, the Philippines leading industry group for game development) along with the Manila chapter of the International Game Developers Association (IGDA, an association of game development professionals) is already putting in place a multi-prong approach to addressing the human resource issue. Among the activities already in place or being set up by GDAP include the following:

1 2

Based on an interview with the Executive Director of the Philippine Software Industry Association (PSIA) Based on interviews with local BPO managers.

1. Encouraging more of the youth to pursue a career in the local game development industry, via career talks and career promotion activities, as well as linkages with colleges and universities to improve the career matching and job placement processes 2. Engaging more high school students via game development contests such as Manila Game Jam to impart a deeper appreciation, and hopefully a higher level of interest and commitment, of the game development career 3. Providing technical assistance to the schools as well as to the government agencies that accredit game development training programs, in order to standardize game development education and allow more schools to offer training programs in game development

Through the comprehensive action program above, GDAP is confident that the local industry will be able to pre-empt the emerging challenge of finding the right people to sustain the growth of the industry. And in so doing, allow the local game development industry to realize its true potential that of becoming a leading hub for game development in the Asia-Pacific region.