Game development today is a $10 billion industry in US. India has more than a finger in this lucrative pie. It has emerged as a key one-stop destination for game development. According to research firm AC Nielsen, the Indian gaming market is expected to be worth $ 50 million by 2005, with console and PC gaming break up of $ 35 million and $15 million respectively. Most Indian developers have the global wireless gaming market - worth a staggering $550million - in their sights. All of the big Indian development companies have distribution and marketing partners abroad and 75 to 80% of their turnover comes in from the international market.

A typical game title today takes around 24 months to make and will have a production budget of $ 4 -10 million. The game industry is under increasing pressure to reduce development time and the cost of production. Reason enough for major publishers and studios to look at outsourcing development.

This is where the Indian game developers with their world-class quality and game development experience step in. India has excellent programmers and the rapid growth of the market is adding to the allure.

The Indian market has 4 to 6 large game development companies with 50 seats and more, while there are another 100 odd small game developers with 5 to 10 seats, which are dedicated to developing for the wireless.Leading Indian game companies like Indiagames, Dhruva Interactive, Paradox and Mobile2Win develop for a range of platforms such as PC, console, wireless and online.

Key Segments

Outsourcing to India in this sector can be divided into three broad segments:

1. Computer games that are delivered on disks or CD- ROMs and played on a PC.
2. Video games that use dedicated consoles to play the game.
3. Wireless games market that is dominated primarily by games played on mobile phones.

Indian companies are aggressively developing games in all these three segments. India has carved a niche for itself even in the console market dominated by giants like Sony's Playstation 2, Nintendo's Game Cube and Microsoft's Xbox.