Look beyond your horizon and work with African video game developers

Christophe De bont

01/12/2021

We often talk about the world of video games. Yet, we see that world almost exclusively through a Western lense. From AAA heavy hitters through indie darling cult classics: most of the video games we cherish are created in the West, tell a Western story, and embrace Western cultural influences. That begs the question: aren’t we missing out on something?

According to SpielFabrique, organisers of the African Games Co-Production Market (AGCM), we most definitely are. Sign up here to become part of the co-production market and work on a game together with an African indie studio.

Much like its European counterpart, the goal of AGCM is to foster successful collaborations between indie studios from different countries. Or in this case: different continents. Last week, a jury of both European and African industry professionals selected 9 projects out of 46 applications from indie studios based all over Africa.

Going forward, these studios will join a six month mentoring program where veteran experts and mentors will meet with the studios to improve their concepts and prototypes.

The final goal is to match these developers to interested, established European indie developers. With the support of a European co-producer, African developers can access complimentary expertise and funds, that will help them to develop and release succesful African based video games.

If you want to be part of an effort to make the video games industry a little more global, gaining access to experiences, stories, and perspectives you wouldn’t have known about otherwise in the process, you can sign up here to become part of the co-production market. At least one Flemish studio will be selected to meet with the African studios in Berlin in the spring of next year.

Here’s a quick look at the selected African studios.

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