Panel: Capacity Building & Community in the Region

you today we're gonna talk about now we're gonna talk about what can be done to support game development in the region and what what all that stakeholders in the region can do to just nurture game development talent and support the industry and get more games out of it so as you start yeah so I'm gonna let the panelists introduce themselves starting with Abdullah Abdullah can you tell us about your work and you've done in in Morocco okay hello so I'm a block I am

the founder co-founder and CEO of Shingo games actually I've started from a working game developers community okay and we are actually working on two games two mobile games Jaafar adventures and jumpy space survivor okay and for the question you asked your work in community you've been part of the game develop a game yeah read part of the Moroccan game developers at when it first started and now we are launching a new game community okay and it's due to the visit of Joseph to the true Morocco and we will participate soon in the global Game Jam okay yeah this is actually we are rebuilding the community from the start again yeah because it's yeah you had the call you

had a community but now it's it's kind of sleeping yeah yeah so it's not restarting yeah good luck good luck and Joseph can you tell us about your work and and you what you do and your community your work in supporting game development through the region hi so first I do two things one I work for epic as a Technical Evangelist and my main job is to basically increase adoption of the engine in the region and to do so we have to we realize that the region is still bit early so we need to help it to grow so we're trying to be involved as much as possible in all initiatives in the region and second I also manage with other people the community in Lebanon so we organize a lot of events and we also work on workshops and other stuff that helps it as well grow that's yeah that's it's very interesting that epic has someone on the ground in the region I think you're the only platform that international platform company and game engine company that has someone who's dedicated to the MENA region so I mean

you must be doing a lot of capacity building you know this is what we're talking about how's the experience built for you traveling around the region and meeting all the developers what what's your feeling of the of the of the eleven that the region reached in game development so it's actually depends on the countries country is very different than the other I try to make like a list of what's the perfect ecosystem that of game development in a country and working well each country needs to have and in each country there's like different criteria like if I example Egypt there's already someone trying to teach game development there's already a conference in Jordan there's also like people teaching game development there's a gaming that it's also a conference in other countries there's for example a couple of success stories but then there is no one no interest from the government etc so overall I think like the Middle East if you look at each country on its own it's still a bit

early but combined they're actually really strong so yeah that's a problem we have right we're fragmented as a region we can move around freely we can't have one big community unless it's maybe online which is what the games Angas is kind of doing ok ahead you need no introduction but please tell us about your maybe some people here don't know I hate it when people say you need no introduction you don't really okay my name is Shahid I am going to introduce myself I'm a video game developer I started in the games industry in 1982 yes that's right before there was a games industry and the period known as the jahiliya little Muslim joke there sorry for the people who don't understand translation lease translation the period of ignorance before Islam so community-building is

your question really we'll skip all of the other boring stuff that I've done and let's focus on some community building ok boring in this context he's giving me funny looks ok no I was wondering if sunny was what part of the boarding suffice about 10 or so years ago when I was at PlayStation I was put in charge of exploration of emerging markets for console activity and that was very much a ps2 focused era occasionally ps3 but more so ps2 at that time there was some PSP activity as well one of the areas we looked at was Jordan we looked at Dubai as well India is where we probably had the most success there's some activity in Spain now I know sounds odd hearing that Spain was at one point an emerging market but we were focusing on developers and

develop her onboarding onto Playstation and this is before the period where PlayStation was a lot more open with developers so it was an exploratory thing so Playstations period of Julia I guess and then more recently a Playstation from 2011 to 2015 Norah's regionally oriented I set up and created a team based on the success of the emerging markets initiative called strategic content which was responsible for probably the biggest increase in engagement with independent developers globally that the company had ever seen we worked with developers from Mike Bethel to Vlambeer to Dennett on all the way up to the likes of hello games and ninja theory and transformed the reputation of Playstation amongst

the development community across a number of platforms from Vita to ps4 to psvr yes Vita was pretty much the home of Indies during that generation it's funny you should say that because when I started the activity it was home to no one yeah actually you stole the Xbox's fun truth and because they were starting the indie the indie support and Sony was like suddenly Vita is where all the in thieves want to be so it's interesting because the the day they announced the indie program was the day I was on stage at Gamescom announcing a whole bunch of console exclusives for PS Vita and ps4 so yeah idea xbox was only announced today we'd already got all of these developers signed up yeah so sure had going back to the region a bit Sony has

done it's a good amount of support of the region and as you said you were looking at Jordan as one of the countries you've worked with some word Jordanian developers like Kat and more recently Ababa and you've supported games anga do you feel as a your now ultimatum games but do you feel as a platform Sony and having worked there do you feel that you've done your fair share to support emerging markets or do you think there is more to be done for me personally how you see Sony I mean you're no longer part of it but so so you're asking me to express what my view on Playstations with respect to this market today yes as someone who's been very involved with if I was advising them what I'd say to them yeah well I charge them a lot of money for that advice but I would say PlayStation has traditionally been

strong in those areas where the likes of Microsoft and Nintendo lesser Nintendo more so Microsoft have not been strong PlayStation has traditionally been a very global organization and vary regionally active its activity in Saudi for example it's very well known it has very very good reputation amongst gamers there yes and sure if I'm not mistaken sure sure yoshida-san Yoshida Yoshida visited Saudi and so the Saudi indie games there and in the gamers day for place right yes there has been that engagement but I think what you're asking is there going to be a stepping up a factory yeah what's next for that these I to ask it more generally do you think that platform holders the platform companies the big companies do they have an obligation or do they need to look at emerging markets emerging regions no they're a business they have absolutely no obligation to anyone yeah but we'll come back to it later because this is

the longest introduction of all time so I will I will give our guests from Saudi the privilege to introduce himself before me thank you I'm Tarek I've been recently appointed as game manager manager for the game development department and manga productions we're two years old and we specialized in producing animation and video games and comics of illustrating programs one of our larger goal is to create an industry an ecosystem in Saudi Arabia and by extension the GCC and the MENA region obviously we get a lot of support for people like PlayStation so sure I'd already mentioned that the reputation is very well-known in the region and they've been very supportive but the problem is we need content creators we need studios we need independent developers so the purpose of this panel is to find a

way to help grow that community so while we have a large number of enthusiasts and passionate developers they lack certain skills and tools that will enable them to rise to professional level and to produce products that appeal to wide enough market to generate profits for sustainability now why am I sitting here why everyone's sitting here traditionally GCC's has been a brow about oil production and real estate and stock but not burton asthma and that oil prices have been dropping so now governments in the region have been looking to diversify the income and their economies so the creative economy now is a very viable alternative for getting hard currency into the region so while we are the largest consumers as

Saudi Arab speaking as a Saudi for film and for video games we don't produce anything so the race in three years there's been a lot of focus towards building an ecosystem building an industry and now I am my privilege and I'm honored to be part of that current wave so that's my introduction yeah it's actually I find it really interesting what's happening in Saudi Arabia because you are manga productions is part of misc Foundation which is the NGO owned by the Crown Prince right so in a way you have a game studio that's funded by the government in a way right so we we are okay while misc is an NGO misc is partly owning several companies under them that not honest they're not necessarily NGOs some of them are profit centers some of them had to recoup their losses market reduction is some is one of those companies that have to produce a profit to continue to operate now we don't have the luxury of testing and going as we like yes but at

least you have the early you know runway right yeah No so I'm I'm nervous founder and CEO of myself worth being doing mobile games for the past 17 years and that's by my business side capacity building size site since 2011 here in Jordan we were lucky to have a vision from His Majesty that there's something will happen in the mobile gaming and we were giving a green light to invest in young generation grassroot generation and building gaming labs which today we have seven all around Jordan with more than 10,000 member operating 3500 every month active in our labs and the developers are coming and and that vision today we see it through the quality of product that being published

day after day when the gaming lab was I just want to clear you know because dinar reminded me of that that period so the gaming lab it is a Jordan initiative but was a place that is open for everyone whoever is in Jordan can access and use and and and help this community because we saw from day one that we want to build a a kind of a gateway for the region and we want to participate or to to be part of this equation in the region and then our was one of the people who basically an Iraqi who lives in Jordan and he contributed he's not only benefited from the gaming that he contributed to that too to the gaming lab and this is I think the best capacity building is bridging and this is why we see ourself in Jordan as yesterday we were having the Silk Road

discussion that we want to be back again like Petra bridging you know east-west to our region talk more about our culture and and work together we already work together we can't we know and different but this this capacity building you know I don't care about borders you know whoever talks about borders today's nonsense because today we we we bought we live on a cloud and this cloud is open no one is controlling this cloud and I don't care if there is a physical border because I can't talk with him online and contribute both of us we don't need it and we have to think about this starting today to make sure that we are building the capacity sure had we we know each other for like now since 2011 we work together and we are not from the same geographical area but we have one passion is building capacity

for for the young generation the future generation so that's my my introduction so thank you thank you nor I start you know the big question with you because you've done a lot of work in in supporting game development in Jordan and the region are you happy with the level that we've reached in terms of game development output and this is a question to everyone but also you know are you happy with the level of game development in the region and what do you think can be done to increase it I think I am it is an organic thing that we see today it is really good and we are not talking about long time history this is something that started like 2011 worldwide and with a developing region this is a super position to see a conference in Jordan where you have around hundred of Arab from the region

and outside the region attending this is a great thing you see if you attended the option and gesture day and seeing those 1416 building games and celebrating their games this is big so we we don't have the exposure that we see in in developed country but this will be day by day will come we have to trust ourselves and I say I think this is the start if we trust ourself this would work so I really out from Saudi Kuwait I have the privilege to go to several Arab countries see different type of developer designer artists yes they do have the potential and and they will soon be recognized and the moment they have this opportunity we know our friends for him is smart so fuzzy is the Jordanian born in Jordan raised in Jordan and he was working with the Jordanian startup and we if you don't know folks inspired he was in Qing and

now he's in you know with the guys building battlefield and and the guy is you know is well recognized and that's that's his Jordanian success and a lot success so yes and he started from Jordan and he created he he wrote the first text book on game design in Arabic anymore takes about the level of the game development in in the region and and what can be done actually I think that we should focus on educational think like you are doing here in with the gaming lab and also I think the Dutch we should build the community and be able to connect with the governments as if we can get funds from governments it will be easier for people to to educate themselves to the video game

market yeah yeah and for the your question about if I am satisfied about the level of or not actually there there there are some studios who are doing well in the MENA region and there we hope that we will be able to do the same but still there are a lot of people who who are giving up you know they start the video in the video game development and they they give a lot of effort and after a while they give up and this is psychology of giving up we should give Joseph okay once more things so the thing is a lot of people are making game there continue to improving in quality and basically the next step would be once we find those people are making good games we should give them the push and marketing publishing all of that so the plan would be just to developers right now at this stage they just need

to focus on making good games that's the best thing they can do to have the region grow from their side and as much as possible as we will try to do something to help it go to the market yeah so what what is Epic Games offering game developers in the region now so you're visiting the different countries what what level of what are you offering them so at this point well the first year I was spending it just to understand what's happening actually in the region so I'm working on a plan so everything I'm saying now can't might change but basically the plan will start we will execute the plan starting the upcoming year basically I think one would be to find all the existing games right now and try to see how if there's they got stuck somewhere there's an obstacle we can remove somehow if someone's making a given unreal if we can promote it so at some point we plan to have like a nautical highlighting all the games made an unreal in a region if

someone wants to work with a publisher we are well connected we can actually either introduce them if the game is at that quality point if not provide feedback we can also maybe he can ask our opinion on certain publishing you know work with we have the mega grant already a program that funds project and it's open for anyone worldwide we do local events as well we try to get some training there and also at conferences like I can give an example which is we have one from Lebanon who applied to nd go in another land and he actually got a space in the UM be an engine boost over there to actually showcase his game he met a lot of publishers and he was able to go there so we always try to create space and conferences as well boosters for developers to go there and put their game so anything so this is good you talked you talked about pushing developers and providing them with with the publishing and the distribution and the the post game development what

happens after again draw and this goes back to the point that I was talking about of realizing the potential of the developer start you have a lot of game development going on and so there will be a lots of amazing developers and and and interesting games coming out or being developed but what's missing what do you feel is missing the missing ingredient to get all these games out and successful I I've toured the globe quite a few times looking at independent game festivals and I'm happy to say that the games being developed by independents in at least in the GCC MENA region also it's quite comparable to international developers who have community support studied in the field so we have no talent here an analogy I like to make is that our is that foot our esteemed overpaid over funded

football teams in the region tend to play like this 11 players each one taking the ball each one going to the goal there's no teamwork there's no synchronous no tactic so while I'm happy they're trying to diversify income the problem is these establishments beat-beat academic or government or whatever are working in silos there's no overlaying strategy working together that can be extended to in this game development is a very hard hobby and doing it alone being an animator a programmer design the rights or be it is quite exhausting and time-consuming that being said developers while they produce amazing demos first level second level they burn out very quickly and they do not have the business know-how to get some kind of profit back in to

keep them going while I like Google's and a saying of failing fast that's what's happening across the region developers getting amazing things out but they're failing fast and they're starting to realize oh I can't do this alone I need team I need support I need proper education proper training so I believe we're at that phase where governments are starting to provide that training universities are starting to provide educational programs for professional and I love Jordans example the youngsters here are doing it amazing job of producing on budget on time and delivering very high quality products in general the region is missing that ongoing training that professional mentorship so I would like a larger involvement of Jordans experience to being adopted across the Arab world Noor is doing an amazing job so you

think it's it's a good model to replicate in other countries an excellent advanced long-term model it should be study it should be supported like you said we're above the clouds there are no borders the mentality of each one scoring and the football alone we should get over that especially in the GCC countries so yeah that's my assessment of them yeah you're in Saudi Arabia I guess you have now a lot of investments in entertainment and game publishing houses mentioning that another challenge we have in the Arab world while investors are looking to enter the gaming market while the independent developers are looking for funding and looking for contracts let's say the financial tools the regulations do not accommodate these freelancing independent model of working it's either employment or not giving contracts to freelancers that's a big no-no still

here yet the government has seen prasada arabia is starting to reduce new regulations to give a better legal opposition for these freelancers a better see our financial backing etc at the same time speaking as monger production you probably know in the gaming industry and in the animation the City Journal turnaround is quite high people coming to the project after project depending on the face they're in that doesn't work the same way in blessing the GCC you get employed and you get employed for life I only the concept artist at the beginning of the project I don't need him for the lifetime of the company so governments are starting to these new laws that can accommodate this channel turn around so they're starting to realize that and they started to change the landscape for that I'm thankful for that ahead your take I am my eyes are a little bit dry

so I mean I said sorry you take about this issue I thought you asked are you awake clearly not clearly not so so my take on the situation with respect to education versus freelancing versus having a hub and also because you know you have the international context right you've seen you've worked with developers and from different regions seen different models of supporting game development I I can't comment on the local situation these fine gentlemen have very very good experience of the local situation but there is one thing that seems to be a common trend across countries that previously didn't have an established games development community whatever that means by the way we can cover that another time definitions

right what if the game exactly it's very important to me this kind of thing when people talk about a games development community is there one no there isn't you know all of these associations loose associations spring up go away are established as quickly as companies and sometimes even more quickly but as regards the phenomenon of a country suddenly developing a game development community if you like that's being done from nothing it's happened in Finland yeah it in fact it's very likely to happen here you'll have one breakout success and it will come from nowhere tipping point huh it's not it not even a tipping point you know a tipping point is is a very different phenomenon and Malcolm Gladwell it's got so much wrong by the way

it's another pop turn it's a Black Swan you'll get one company that completely breaks out and will completely define the rest of the region that company will grow then it'll fracture than the people who understood the mentality the methodology the working practices of that company will break away form their own companies and so on that kind of thing happened you know this will happen of course it's inevitable look the people here have access to exactly the same information that any person on the rest of the planet has are they less capable no do they have access to a vein of culture centuries millennia old that nobody else has in their blood yes what does that mean 400 million people with that same blood regardless of political differences religious differences the same blood the same culture informs them now look what happened with Japan there was a time

when Japanese video games weren't a thing because it was American video games and British video games they came first right because of local phenomena you had Silicon Valley and you had Sir Clive Sinclair and that these two things created the communities that still exists to this day and and now world success is bigger than the world of movies bigger than the world of music yeah yeah so that will happen here it happened in other countries and then when you do you will be able to define a language in video games that the Japanese did when they moved in and that is still present today you will notice when you play a Japanese gifts actually you'll you'll notice it's when you play some Western games you'll see that there is culture creep that's adopted by Western companies and you'll see the opposite this culture creep that comes from American games with an American essence if you like that goes into Japanese games and of course the British

had been great at absorbing the whole world's culture and repurposing it for their own I said their own my own I mean you know they took my parents in right here I'm their product now too it's Britain's very good at that there's no reason why children couldn't be distrained there's no reason why any other country in this region couldn't be the same so I think soon we will be talking about Arabic games on the global industry not necessarily arabic language arabic informed by an arab hair in the same way as a japanese game or the language is only a part of it because we of course we can localize which is not the same as we saw that lovely presentation the other day which may I mean get Arabic games from the region yeah with their own you know eccentric different quality is different games made by creative Arabs yeah yeah so everyone seems quite positive almost here do you

guys think there's anything missing from the ecosystem that we can that you know any stakeholders really publishers engine companies platform holders game developers government anything we can do to accelerate this process until we reach you know we're talking of course you know eventually it will happen but talking about short-term and medium-term anything we can do right now to accelerate this and you know if I'm a chip in here manga production we are trying we started internship programs internationally with collaborating Studios so we are cherry picking the best talents in Saudi Arabia by the dozens and sending them off to Sony sending them off to Square Enix SNK etc they're getting on job training they're getting exposed to the business side of

things we are hoping that when they come back they will be either establishing their own studios or getting employed we're also working and talking with different government entities that we will incorporate them into accelerating programs incubation programs so we're trying like you said a black swan that eventually breaks off and then the people who understands that mushrooming their own studios we're trying to push towards that thing you just want to highlight one thing that don't forget the culture burden that we have that is connected to a financial kind of burden so if you look into the history of gaming here and you look into the past 10-15 years it wasn't easy for for a young generation whether to take a decision to be in the gaming industry the culture the financial status and it

you know because it's Sarah's taking industry and better than taking the stress go and work something else and bring bread back home so don't forget that this is not an easy job in a in a developing country in a in a in a geographical area that is really facing a lot of funeral changes political and non-political so and now we new generation is changing everything so we became parents ourself and we were game developers so we are encouraging our kids not only to be game developers you know I was talking today my my you know maybe you saw my little daughter she wants to be a cook and she was spent it's okay I would follow her our parents were not following us in the past they were encouraging us but they were like yeah stop playing games stop playing game no think of something that will build your future today we are following our case and that will change basically this kind of wake wake up call maybe in other country they had it before us because then you know that the

financial status is you know I was talking about the safety net today there is a different safety net you know we did not have safety or still we don't have in that upward and there our startups are arranged iteration in Europe it's much better the government is there there's a lot you know I always say one thing you know I an application called meet meet up or if you open meet up in the UK at least you would find like 10 meetups every day open meet up today in Jordan how many meet meet up related to gaming there's the usual meet up ah there's the Unreal Engine Meetup yeah I want to say one because there is a pocket gamer event so so so so compare it you know I'm I have you know I I have a small office since 2017 a very small village in the UK called Limington Spa old people etc if you open limited spa meetup page you will find at least five

to six everyday gathering people discussing about about games technology whatever that's it will come we will have more and more but you know III think we have to know our you know realize and make you know our issues so we can build on it for the future yes you you talked about how difficult it was to make games 15 years ago and with the evolution of the industry you know with free-to-play and you know self-publishing things like unity free game engines all of this made lower the barrier for game development and really helped the emerging markets to start creating games I'm wondering if there is any next step in this evolution that will make game development easier or more accessible to more people do you guys think do you guys what do you guys think is then is next here or do you

think we will reach the point where everybody can make games I would take it from what we have today and yes we have good friendship with Pocket Gamer they helped us in the previous year just having Pocket Gamer Connect Jordan it's not because Jordan Jordan Jordan we are trying to make think easy in Jordan things comes easier than any part of the world thank God yeah but this is this is a good start yes we had the summit for the past eight years but this is this is the first time I came this morning to be very I and I saw Chris and I said we will have empty rooms you know and I went to one of the rooms there in the morning and it will was fully packed and they were like standing and waiting that's a big achievement from someone in the region for the past 17 years seeing that this is a big achievement this is a big achievement seeing all the speakers around and seeing them with young and you know startup with companies this is

what we want and we have international a commitment we need to commit to ourself and I think that that is for me the next step we need to be committed ourselves before anything else I have to second that earlier I was joking with my friend here Chris say hello to Chris he's lovely he's from King by the way I was joking I'd probably have it's very quiet it's a Sunday looks like maybe five to ten people are gonna come to the talk what I'll do is I'll gather them right at the front and we'll make him more intimate and I'll deal with the iPad the room was packed I was absolutely blown away that just shows the level of interest I want to go back to your point about how easy things have become all that's done is it's made the latter accessible to more

people which means that there are more people on the ladders right and all that means that everybody else has to climb higher when the bar is lowered everybody is able to achieve a similar standard so actually it might be the easiest time in the history of the world to make a video game and it's the hardest time in the history of the world to stand out so there is still that challenge that will always remain no matter how easy you make it if you make it you press a button and out pops again that just means six seven billion people can make a video again now so you'll so it better be amazing what are you going to do you know look look at the demos these guys get if you look look at the stuff they get through their applications for the mega grant and the stuff that they expose and it's like one person you know making something that maybe five years ago would have been triple-a you looked at that said you does a triple-a game and you've got people part-time making

the stuff there's no reason why any developer in this region couldn't do the same but if you want to go to the next level if you want to create something truly groundbreaking then you're not gonna have to do the same thing everybody in the history of art has had to do work at it swept shaheed day after day after day night after night after night a notice point is especially salient you're doing that in an environment where it's culturally not as appropriate perhaps as is in other parts of the world I mean I had an issue in the UK because of course look at the color of my skin so my parents gonna say beta you have to be a doctor or something right but it had to be something conservative but the other kids in the scene in the early 80s in the UK they didn't face that problem yeah the parents might have said well being you don't want to be doing video games no no you don't know

how long they're gonna be around and that of course the those kids have brought their parents homes now so things have changed but they weren't stopped but this is what I wanted to ask you also because you know you as you said you were there in the jahiliyya right you witnessed an industry being born and we all you know most of us or all of us played a British game you know like lemmings or you know the the PC and the publishing scene started there in the 80s in the UK and Europe so what what did you see happening what is something that do you see do you see what you see here is it similar to what was happening back there is there something we can learn from that experience is a different world you have to remember there was no internet when I started there were no CDs there were no mobile phones there was nothing but you had entrepreneurs right you had the bedroom developers and you had people who saw this talent and said this is something we can exploit and make money out of you you had hubs and those hubs were publishers or meetup groups that

kind of thing you have people who gathered around magazines fanzines what what nu is doing over here is particularly relevant he's created a hub a Learning Centre and as you were saying earlier tarik that's a model that needs to be reproduced in the rest of the region but that's just part of it when I was talking earlier about a Black Swan it won't necessarily be connected to one of these groups yeah so thank you thank you guys anything anyone wants like to add something abdullah you had ubisoft in Morocco right yeah can you tell us a bit about the effect we have a little time left and maybe we can ask some right yeah actually in Morocco we had Ubisoft and it was doing well for a certain period of time but after the financial crisis okay they at the beginning they started a kind of school inside Ubisoft

and they started to form people on video game industry and when the crisis came they they completely cut out stop this program and everyone was fired up okay fired yes what happened to this talent did you guys start a new company I am actually going toward us and the thing that's happening is for example he talked about sending people to other countries to form themselves okay and come back and form the community actually the decisions happening when someone for example go to goes to another country he stays there and he learned about video game and never come back for example this is what I've learned from American people for example okay and all the challenge that we're after Ubisoft close in Morocco all the challenge called flew to the other

countries okay some of them started their own studios like s in Arif and the guys from rim games okay they were able to raise X pounds for their games okay actually the the problem that I would like to discuss is the not the problem but actually what we need is a success story you know this is what we are lacking in maybe we will have our own Ubisoft yeah something like that when we will have a success story then I think that there will be a boom in India is that when we work or when we launch our companies we don't get enough money in the air we don't get a get enough revenue to continue making games and continue making games yeah it will happen it will happen

do we have do we have time for questions or okay questions are left outside we can we can discuss it more but thank you everyone for listening [Applause] you