All Tomorrow’s Parties
The Australian Senate recently held their long overdue hearing into the Australian games industry. There were a lot of topics covered, ranging from taxation issues and offsets, funding, diversity, support and the like. Call me a cynic, but even though Scott Ludlum has his heart in the right place, and an obvious sense of humour when it comes to pointing out that his fellow senators are often Luddites, I feel as though we’re talking about this way too late and after the damage has already been done. The indie scene is thriving in Australia, but AAA development is dead, with no major studios left after last year’s closure of 2K Australia. There’s a talent drain in Australia when the industry globally as well as locally is becoming more and more profitable.
Australians spent nearly $3 billion on gaming software and hardware in 2015, a 15% growth from the previous year. That’s a lot of money, but Australia isn’t making even half of that. Traditional retail – essentially the only avenue that still has significant money coming in – made up only $1.243 billion whereas digital sales made up the remaining $1.589 billion. Even accounting for Australian developed games that earned their developers some cash, the vast majority of that money doesn’t benefit the Australian industry in any major way, and also points to what I see as a problem we are soon going to face. Digital distribution, and digital work as a whole is the future, and thanks to our hamstrung digital infrastructure we’re going to be on the back foot for the foreseeable future when it comes to trying to establish businesses that can compete with countries that already have bandwidth that already eclipses our own. In simple terms, why would someone contract or work with a company that doesn’t have the digital flexibility and speed to upload and download large files quickly and efficiently, or even telepresence effectively.
Sorry for all the doom and gloom. I don’t mean to be a downer, but looking at everything that is coming this year – the rise of consumer VR, the innovation in the indie scene and a renewed willingness for some big studios to take risks – I wonder what could have been if some of our great local studios weren’t shut down and what might be if we don’t quickly pull up our virtual socks and set the country on a course that sees us digitally competitive with the rest of the world. Gaming isn’t the be all and end all of the digital future, but like with most advances when it comes to PC technology, it will be the vanguard.