The UK and Irish Game Industries - The Video Game Industry: Formation, Present State, and Future - page 109

message. It is argued that other countries have “subsidized” industries and
that there is not a “level playing pitch” internationally (Games Investor
Consulting 2008). Development costs are said to be higher in the UK (espe-
cially with a fl uctuating U.S. dollar), skill shortages are said to be driving
up wage costs and some university courses are described as “low quality”.
Although the consultancy reports are careful to present their data with
the requisite methodological caveats, press releases, manifestos and policy
documents based on them are less careful. Part of the current policy dis-
course calling for an industry tax credit includes the selective and creative
use of statistics. As noted earlier, Skillset divides employment in the British
industry into the computer games sector and the interactive media sector. If
one only takes fi gures for the computer games sector, or notes that certain
companies are shedding jobs, one could make the argument that employ-
ment in the UK is falling (TIGA 2011). However, if one adds in a conser-
vative estimate for “mobile content” from the interactive media sector, or
tries to take into account the growth of “online”, “social” and “mobile”
games this is a dii cult argument to sustain. One also needs to take into
account the year from which the data is presented. We need to ask, where
are we in the console life cycle, because many companies shed employees at
the mid to end point of the life cycle.
Further, although comparatively the UK may have slipped in overall
rankings, this does not mean that total employment in the UK is neces-
sarily falling—it merely points to the growth of games employment in
other countries. The Oxford Economics consultancy report commissioned
by TIGA states that the UK had slipped to fi fth place (in revenue terms)
behind Canada, South Korea, Japan and the U.S., when one includes online
games, and that the number of UK independent development companies in
2008 was 166, down from 295 in 2000, although the numbers employed in
development had increased to 9,900 (2008, 4). 14 Thus compared to previ-
ous reports already mentioned in this chapter, total employment had actu-
ally increased, and the decline in independent companies may have been
due to mergers and acquisitions by multinational companies and growth
in company size. In relation to annual revenue the selection of a base year
is important. Certain games, like the latest iteration of Grand Theft Auto ,
can have a signifi cant impact on total sales or revenues in a particular year
in the UK. Finally, revenues from mobile and online games may, or may
not, be included in reports, but by including them countries like South
Korea are automatically promoted up the rankings.
More signifi cant, I would argue, than total employment numbers is the
shift from independent to publisher-owned studios, and the shift from
indigenous to foreign-owned publishers, a trend Cornford, Naylor and
Driver identifi ed in 2000. This trend indicates a shift in terms of who
determines what gets produced in the UK and where the value is retained,
above and beyond the payments to workers and supporting services. Many
of the UK's top independent studios are deriving over two-thirds of their