Even if Rockstar’s Grand Theft Auto IV reflected every cubic inch of the real New York City, you’d still be hard-pressed to find any other game studios whose names you’d recognize. According to a recent study conducted by the Center for an Urban Future, even though the local games industry has grown rapidly to approximately 85 companies employing 1,200 people, the sector “lags well behind Seattle, Los Angeles, Montreal, Austin and Boston.”
The study, entitled “Getting in the Game,” cites two main reasons why this might be. First, the area lacks a major gaming studio. Including the 100 employees of Rockstar New York, Take-Two’s offices employ 250 — the largest “the city that never sleeps” has to offer. Almost half of NYC’s game companies employ few than five individuals, and only seven have more than 50. This is all without mentioning that many of the companies counted (IGN, Ziff Davis, GameDaily, the ESRB, etc.) don’t develop games to begin with.
Without an EA, Microsoft, Nintendo or Ubisoft, the Center claims that NYC might not be able to develop the same sort of “gaming ecosystem” that creates jobs, local competitors and interest among the region’s students.
But second, existing game companies are finding that NYC doesn’t have the technical talent required to grow the sector. Whether it’s the high cost of living, the lack of large firms available, insufficient training in video game design at local universities, or even just the knowledge that the games industry is typically located “on the West Coast,” those programmers who might have worked in gaming instead leave for other cities or find other work:
Most native New Yorkers who become skilled programmers are hesitant to pin their career hopes on New York’s small game industry and move away; those who do live here are often snapped up by investment banks or ad agencies that pay much higher salaries.
While the majority of the document reads like a very well-researched persuasive essay attempting to entice investment in a city with (what 58% of the International Game Developers Association agrees to be) serious potential, it’s quite evident that there’s a rather dangerous game of chicken or the egg going on here. If there’s no major game company to work for, students won’t be interested, and it won’t be worth it to the university to offer programs, etc. But at the same time, if there’s no affordable, skilled talent, the game studios will do far better elsewhere. If anything, the paper does worlds to convince me that NYC is just a bad climate for games industry growth.
The paper does pin some hope on, and tout some of the success of casual games developed in NYC — Diner Dash, The Shivah and RocketBowl Plus are a few titles that adorn the front cover — but if I were looking for a silver lining in all this dark, frozen, idiomatic H20, I wonder if I might find it back where we began… in New York City’s digital incarnation. How many budding game developers will be inspired to stay in their hometown after viewing it through the eyes of a Rockstar?
Unlike many major studies of this type, “Getting in the Game” is free for download, right here.
Tags: GTA IV, GTA4, Kaos Studios, New York City, research, Rockstar
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May 12th, 2008 at 9:08 pm
New industries don’t grow in high tax environments, either NY or California. Any industry not already at critical mass there will never be. There is little chance that NY despite its massive cultural advantages will exceed Austin or Dallas with Texas’ pro-business environment. Absent major tax policy changes, it is doomed to run a distant 4th or 5th among gaming creation cities. Should EA succeed in acquiring New York’s one leading gaming light of Take Two the Big Apple’s decline would accelerate.