To some eyes, news from the video game industry might not immediately apply to Canadian TV and film folk. But with Ontario poised to become the next major gaming hub in the world, opportunities for the entertainment industry on the whole are only just beginning.

PricewaterhouseCoopers’s Global Entertainment & Media Outlook for 2009-2013 states that the Canuck vidgame market grew 24% in 2008 and forecasts that it’ll be one of the fastest growing media segments through 2013. It’s an even harder industry to ignore when one considers the increasing amount of investment dollars that Ontario has recently been pouring into this sector.

This past summer the provincial government announced that it would invest a whopping $263 million into gameco giant Ubisoft over the next decade. The cash infusion, along with the company’s own $500 million investment, will go towards a full development studio in Toronto, which is expected to create 800 jobs in the province over the next 10 years. It’s the first time a major game company will be setting up shop in Ontario, slated to open its doors by the end of the year.

At Interactive Ontario’s third annual GameON: Finance conference at the end of October, Minister of Economic Development and Trade Sandra Pupatello announced that the province would be investing an additional $605,000 in IO to support a trio of programs to help vidgame entrepreneurs, provide marketing and promo support, and connect developers with Canuck and international investors.

With Pupatello stating that the government is looking to ‘make Ontario a world leader in game development,’ it’s time for the rest of the entertainment industry to take note and get in the game.

Media convergence

‘Convergence [between film and gaming] is the current and next catalyst for growth,’ says Ubisoft Montreal and Toronto CEO Yannis Mallat, an area he and his team have been following closely for a number of years.

For evidence of this claim, just look at its in-house animation studio, Ubisoft Digital Arts. Established in 2007 – followed in 2008 by the acquisition of Montreal-based studio Hybride Technologies – the division is already known for its VFX work on major Hollywood blockbusters such as Sin City, 300, the Spy Kids series and Journey to the Center of the Earth 3-D.

At press time, Ubi and Hybride had just released on YouTube the first of three live-action/CGI short movie episodes of Assassin’s Creed: Lineage, filmed in Montreal. The eps are based on the company’s bestselling Assassin’s Creed franchise, and Mallat says the movie treatment of the already established property made perfect sense – as the fastest selling IP for the company in 2007, it appeals to its devout fanboy following, but also to broader audiences with its rich storyline and graphics fit for the big screen.

Of course, games-cum-movies are not an unfamiliar hybridization. Resident Evil, Super Mario Bros., Street Fighter have all been there, along with the upcoming Prince of Persia: Sands of Time, Bioshock and Shadow of the Colossus, to name only a few. But, with studios seemingly more risk-averse to new IPs during the economic crunch, content with built-in brand awareness makes a lot of sense – look at Hasbro’s partnership with Universal for movies based on their toy brands (Transformers, anyone?), and even Mattel is working on film adaptations of Barbie and View-Master.

Ubi was scouting out areas to set up its Toronto shop at press time, which will join studios in Montreal, Quebec City and Vancouver, altogether employing more than 2,300 creative minds across the country. Mallat will oversee the new Toronto operations, with help from the recently appointed MD Jade Raymond, who gained industry cred as a producer on the Assassin’s Creed franchise.

The location’s proximity to the Montreal studio will also help facilitate the exchange of technology, tools and people. Additionally, the Greater Toronto Area boasts a high concentration of graduates from post-secondary studies in fields specific and related to game creation, from computer science, animation, design and engineering – and yet, no major vidgame employer in the region to recruit them.

As a result, much of Ontario’s talent has migrated to areas with flourishing game economies, like Silicon Valley, Montreal, Vancouver, so these new incentives are also part of a greater effort to lure ex-pats back to the Great White North.

Kala Ramachandran, sales and marketing director for Alien Concepts, a 2-D and 3-D digital art and design studio in Toronto, agrees that gaming investment will help animate (sorry) the industry as a whole. ‘I think them anchoring the industry in Toronto will bring a lot of those people back,’ predicts Ramachandran, ‘and hopefully lift up the whole animation community here – and also help them get more rooted here. All in all, I think it could benefit everyone down the road if all those people who left over the last few years to find full-time jobs elsewhere come back.

‘It needs help from the ground up. I see the schools picking up in terms of enrollment. There’ll be more opportunities within the city, so hopefully more students coming out of high school – particularly girls – will consider this a career option.’

Games equals jobs

According to the Ontario Media Development Corporation, the provincial agency that supports creative industries through media tax credits and various funds, Ontario’s creative and entertainment sector is the third largest in North America by employment, behind California and New York, with more than 276,000 jobs.

‘We often joke that if Canada was number three at anything in the world, it would be much more heralded,’ quips Colin Macrea, director of communications at Electronic Arts. ‘Video games are an entertainment and technology medium that a certain segment of the population still hasn’t embraced. There are a lot of synergies between film, animation, TV, video games – they’re all entertainment media. And at EA, we’re an entertainment company.’

With studios in Vancouver and Montreal, EA also seems to be keeping its eye trained on the market potential of Ontario – this past summer, it acquired Kitchener, ON-based social gaming company J2Play. Macrea adds that the government’s increased investment certainly holds some appeal, though he remains tight-lipped on whether there were any formal plans in place to make a bigger push into the province.

The OMDC’s Interactive Digital Media Fund has been in place for the last four years and provides financial assistance for companies with product ready to go to market. Like Ubisoft, it’s also keeping its eye on the ever-closing gap between TV, film and video games.

‘Convergent content is really taking off in Ontario,’ says Kristine Murphy, OMDC’s director of industry development group. ‘In film and TV – TV in particular – producers are really latching on to and taking advantage of the opportunities of interactive media in this province.’

Murphy points to Toronto’s marblemedia as an example of one such company that has moved beyond multi-platform experimentation into serious investment and development. For shows such as Taste Buds, marblemedia has developed a full slate of components, such as interactive cooking demos, games, and other digital manifestations.

The fact that the government is willing to put its weight behind the industry is having a positive effect. Ubisoft is constantly receiving interest from cities around the world, hoping to attract key video game players to develop that segment of the economy. With a strong presence already in Canada, major publishers generally don’t want to concentrate their activities in one country, but government participation made the difference.

‘I think it’s the willingness of the Ontario government that made the decision to be aggressive and make sure that this industry would develop in Toronto as well,’ surmises Ubisoft spokesperson Cédric Orvoine. ‘So that basically means creating the environment that would make sense for a publisher to establish themselves there.’

But the opportunities aren’t just there for the Ubis and EAs of the world, the government is also helping the little guys out, with some notable accomplishments to boot.

‘The success those companies have been having, and that success being recognized on a world stage, that has made Ontario a really attractive jurisdiction now for that industry,’ says Murphy.

She lists Toronto-based indie game developer Capybara Games as such a company, which has been gaining worldwide accolades for its Critter Crunch title. The puzzle game download has also been floating around on mobile and winning critical industry acclaim, and just last month was just released on the PlayStation Network (for the PlayStation 3) to rave reviews for melding gorgeous art and fun and quirky gameplay.

Capybara president Nathan Vella is pleased with the amount of attention that video games are getting in the province, and is among the number of smaller companies grateful for the government support.

‘There are a lot of indies in the States that get little to no support, and here, it definitely makes you a little more willing to take a bigger risk,’ says Vella. ‘The amount of creative and game interest is massive, but the number of opportunities to work in video games is small, especially in Toronto.’

Interestingly, he’s not too threatened at the prospect of a biggie like Ubisoft entering the market.

‘One studio will make a dent in the talent pool, but it’s not going to get rid of it all, that’s for sure,’ he adds. ‘I think that’s a good thing and hopefully people will start thinking of Toronto as a place where good games are made.

‘Hopefully, one of the better things coming out of Ubisoft coming here is that it’ll remind people that this is an amazing city for creativity – art, music, film, comic books, everything. And all that stuff applies 100% to making great games.’