BBC Blog Network

User Profile

knowles2

Listed below are comments made by knowles2 between Wednesday, 7th May 2008 and Saturday, 17th October 2009.

«Newer
Older»

British games: Small is beautiful? 8:54pm on 17 Oct 2009 What I do not get is why every Industry, successful or not always demand tax breaks.
As far as I am concern tax breaks should be given to industries which are new to the country or something with potential to create a multi billion pounds industry in the future or industry which is struggling but which has plenty of prospects of expanding but have little to no international parterners or private finance help.
As far as I know the game company is not struggling with either. An so in my book does not qualify for tax breaks.

As to the main point of the article, small is beautiful, unfortunately I think it a short term solution for small game developers, the main reason why iphone games are small is because of storage limits on the iphone as a file size limit, and also physical limit to the storage on the phone. Also the phone memory and processor also limit the size an scope of the games. As time goes on both of these limits will be eliminated and size of the game will expand and so will the size of the developer teams needed to developed these and to complete in the market will sky rocket.

I do think over the next 10 years the cost of developing game titles will level off, I think we already reach the cost limits with consumers and investors will simply not cross. The question now is more how we can decrease cost and development time for big titles and small titles and think the answer to that is much more development in the areas of tools used to build these games. A lot of games are still built from scratch, often building there own game engines and other design tools, the industry needs to move a lot further to reusing stuff from previous games and stop building everything from scratch like they do now.
Klaus opting out 7:44pm on 10 Oct 2009 MarcusAureliusII Then I guest the Irish second election where they were pretty publically bribe and bullied into the yes vote. With threats of redrawing support for there economy, an block any more support, of ceasing further investment in the country from the EU.

If that not force then I do not know what is. an according to your view this goes against the founding principles of the treaty in the first place.
Klaus opting out 11:08am on 10 Oct 2009 achaian If that what I believe the Lisbon treaty did then I would sign on and support it in a heart beat. The fact we been basically told by the writers themselves that it would made so complex and incomplete so that they could get it past the people is what make me doubt it.

The fact it does not clamp down the corruption with in the EU. Does not define the president powers or other posts its creates, does not give us the people a say on who the president should be. The fact that they wrote the treaty in such away that they can change bits of it, with out it needing it to be rectified by the countries parliament again, this is how they can promise Ireland all the changes they promise with out it getting signed of from each country again.

All mean to me that it a poorly written, poorly thought out treaty which is design to enhance there own egos rather than actually correcting some of the basic flaws in the EU, such a the EU accounts not being sign off yearly,the ridiculous moving of parliament every month or so.
These just some of the biggest an simplest flaws with in the EU which they should of solved before even consider type treaty which is a blatant grab for more powers by the EU with out solving any of its current issues.

Also if they want to make the EU simpler then getting every country signed up to the same set of rules and regulations would of made a bigger difference rather than the messed that is the lisbon treaty with different rules for different countries, which are very much open for interpretations. Yes it would of probably mean far less power being given to the EU, a far simpler treaty with less ambitious aims but it would actually done it job of which to simplified the running of the EU.
Klaus opting out 9:25pm on 09 Oct 2009 The bloke clearly does not have any intentions of signing it before we have our say in Britain. It pretty sad state of affairs that Britain have to rely on other countries to defend our sovereignty.

Hopefully he can hold of the EU Mafia until the next election. Shame he choose to reveal his hand to Swiss, if would of waited until after the constuition Court ruling there little hope that the Czechs would signed it before our elections.
Could mechanical trees save the world? 12:10pm on 27 Aug 2009 good descent realistic solutions, unlike the current crazies that currently camp in London.
Red Button Arcade 6:35pm on 25 Mar 2009 Good, licence money spent well. Everyone keep on saying that the BBC should support other media companies this is a good examples of how, creating and developing a other platform to deliver games to people.
BBC launches Virtual College of Journalism 11:24am on 06 Mar 2009 Orvillethird, I would thought that be the next logical step, certainly it would makes sense for internal training of stuff to gain a legit and useful qualification that is recognise out side of the bbc. Certainly I think it would foolish for such courses which are all ready being run not to incorporate aspects of this in to their course curriculum in the coming years.
Calling all game developers 11:41am on 05 Dec 2008 At the moment we do produce some of the best games in the industry, the Fable series, GTAIV, and Media Molecules excellent Little big Planet as well as many other titles.

It seems the lack of a world wide publisher is a problem, perhaps a government back uk publisher should be developed.
Instead of tax breaks may be a direct development loans would be a better idea where the government give 100 million over a ten year period for studios to developed their own intellectual properties, the aim of the money would be to developed the initial concept which could be taken to investors. These loans would have to be paid back to the government but with very low interest rates. This would act as incentive to make sure any games developed are profitable.

I also think making money available to further developed university courses is key, targeted investment in 10 to 15 universities and turn these into centres of excellence would be a good start.

I think competitions like the above by the BBC are a good idea and need to happen more often. So may be a other joint scheme between industry and government, a yearly competition that anyone to enter to developed a game concept and even implement it. This could then be developed into a PSN/xbox release.The game concept should be built by a small development studio chosen as random each year, with say 250,000 pounds prize or developed by the contestant themselves if they have the skill to do so.

I think tax breaks should be a last resort but government should aim to keep us in the top three in the world. I am not sure if the above would necessary do that but I do not think they would cause the industry any harm.
The Apple tease 12:59pm on 16 May 2008 Interesting debate, but I agree with BrownSource the future in in the cloud computing, which will undoubtedly be taking center stage in the years to come.
Microsoft and Google are way ahead of any one else in this field, both have already got much of the infrastructure their and are both in a race with the software, with google slightly leading at the moment. Apple I have not herd anything from them about cloud computing yet. Amazon who are currently offering cloud computer may also be in position to expand its offering to mobile in some form.

As to symbian it the most widely used. The key their survival will be in whether they can keep up with current technologies with all the big boys diving in, and from looking around Symbian seem to have the widest selection of Apps around.
Google android seem to be most interest, being built from scratch , it could potential offer the best experience out their for connecting to the cloud and the web. And if they manage to keep to it open source the apps that will be available will be huge. And I still reckon the Android is just the beginning of Google operating systems venture with desktop computing coming around next, obviously tightly integrated with the android operating system.
The End 12:21pm on 07 May 2008 What I am wondering is why the super delegates is letting this go on, they could end it today if they wanted, Obama in just 200 vote of winning. I am guesting it's the publicity, that given everyone is talking about Hilary and Obama in the news and ignoring the Republican candidate.

I think this will not go on anywhere near August, it will end on 4th of june where we will see all of the remaining super delegates declare for Obama and end the contest. No matter what the Clinton wants.
I reckon most super delegates made their minds a lot time ago and just letting the race on on so to freeze the republicans out of the head lines and to let Obama continue his energizing of the young voters to for the democratic candidate.

«Newer
Older»

^ Back to top

BBC MMVI

The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites

BBC.co.uk

BBC Blog Network

Find and talk to the BBC's bloggers.

User Profile

knowles2