Screen Australia, a government agency, announced in September a $2 million investment to support the Australian games sector.
The move is part of a $12 million commitment to game development that was announced in January. While government investment in video games may seem insignificant, the industry plays a crucial role in nurturing talent and serving as a pathway to other IT and innovation sectors.
“This significant investment highlights our ongoing commitment to fostering growth and innovation within Australia’s games industry,” Deirdre Brennan, CEO of Screen Australia, said in a press release. “By supporting these projects and industry events, we’re nurturing local developers and small to medium studios, reinforcing our position as a global leader in independent game-making.”
As Australia faces an IT skills shortage, strengthening the game industry may ultimately help to close the talent gap.
From games to NASA
One notable example of the broader impact of video games skills emerged in 2017. That year, Opaque Space, an Australian game developer, transitioned from creating games to being recruited by NASA to develop virtual reality training modules. Given Australia’s strong ambition to lead in space technology, this agreement with the world’s largest space agency held particular significance for the local industry.
Although Opaque Space is no longer active, the fusion of video game development principles with space tech remains part of Australia’s innovation legacy.
Game development: A source of talent
Game development is also an attractive first job or early career opportunity for those with software design and IT skills. As Ross Symons, CEO of one of Australia’s leading game developers, Big Ant, said in an interview with TechRepublic: It’s also a demanding field that acts to train talent quickly.
“There is a wide-held belief in IT focused organisations, and the broader community, that games programming and development is not a serious endeavour,” Symons said. “Nothing could be further from the truth.”
He added, “Games are always on, must be responsive, and critically cannot have wait or down-times — all of these elements actually make regular enterprise programming and development a comparative walk in the park.”
Consequently, many game developers do start to look for work in enterprise software as part of their career journey, with Big Ant being a good example of this, Symons said.
“Former Big Ant Studios employees have brought their skills to companies like Microsoft, Google, Tesla, Amazon, Adobe, Meta and many more, often in very senior roles,” he said. “Indeed, there are so many that have ended up in Silicon Valley that each year at GDC in San Francisco, there is an annual ‘Big Ant dinner by the Bay,’ where the staff that cut their teeth and learned their craft at Big Ant get back together.
“It is something we are very proud of.”
A source of ‘brain drain’
That so many former Big Ant staff have relocated to the U.S. highlights the challenges Australia faces — both in the gaming industry and the broader IT sector. A lack of investment and opportunities often pushes those seeking career advancements to relocate overseas.
The industry’s collapse has been a significant factor, but the situation is now beginning to improve.
Research shows that the number of full-time workers in game development in Australia rose by nearly 60% in recent years. This means there are opportunities to keep people onshore.
“For decades, Australian developers have headed to foreign shores, and it’s caused headaches for the studios here as they have so often invested greatly in them, but that has now somewhat abated,” Symons said. “The key for us now, in a post-COVID world that is in a state of flux, is to try and use the stability we have in Australia to attract those that left us, back home.”
The other challenge will be to make sure that pathways for game developers to move into enterprise roles exist. As the nation grapples with its IT skills shortage, looking to Australia’s gaming industry for talent could be a good idea.
Game development fosters proficiency in programming languages like C++, Python, or JavaScript, which are also widely used in enterprise applications. Moreover, game developers are often adept at working in collaborative, agile environments — a skill set that transfers well to software development teams in corporate settings.
They’ll need help in some areas. The first step in this career shift is expanding knowledge of enterprise software technologies such as databases, cloud computing, and enterprise resource planning systems. Gaining experience in frameworks like .NET, Spring Boot, or working with cloud platforms like AWS and Azure can enhance their appeal to enterprise employers. Certification in enterprise software tools can also make the transition smoother.
But as Symons noted, the games industry is highly demanding. Successful developers need to be quick to learn and adapt, as well as be flexible. Over time, the gaming industry could grow to become one of the most effective feeders to solve the enterprise IT skills shortages. It just depends on whether the growth in investment into building the gaming industry can be sustained — because, in Australia, that has continued to be patchy and politicised.