LATEST NEWS
TIGA wins games tax credits with GIC's help (March 2012): The Chancellor announced tax credits for the games industry (21 03 12), which follows years of work by TIGA, GIC and Osborne Clarke to persuade successive governments about the need for a tax credit for this key knowledge economy industry. GIC conducted its 3rd census of the UK's games industry, surveyed British games staff overseas about brain drain, crafted many of the arguments and wrote much of the TIGA report that changed the Government's mind about tax credits for games development companies. GIC wholeheartedly congratulates George Osborne and the Coalition Government on its decision, and TIGA on its sustained lobbying in the face of opposition from some pundits and quarters of the industry. GIC also pays tribute to Ian Livingstone's tireless work behind the scenes at the heart of Government.
GIC opens TIGA's casual games event (January 2012): Rick Gibson opened the conference at Osborne Clarke with an overview of three casual games markets, with data from its mini-report exclusively for TIGA members.
GIC keynotes Osborne Clarke summit (December 2011): GIC's Rick Gibson gave the keynote address at the invite-only event attended by the UK's most senior games executives in London. Rick then chaired a session on hardcore social. The event operates under Chatham House rules.
GIC at Intellect gamification event (September 2011): GIC's Rick Gibson spoke at the Intellect event on how to get the most from gamification and how previous gamification projects have succeeded alongside speakers from Playgen, Spigit and Pailz.
Insight article Microtransactions consolation prize (August 2011): Nick Gibson investigates the enormous potential of microtransactions on console and asks why the opportunity is largely untapped.
Edinburgh TV Festival Conference (August 2011): Rick Gibson presented and chaired a panel on gaming at the Edinburgh International Television Festival on Saturday 27th August. Panellists were Robert Nashak from BBC Worldwide, Paulina Bozek from Inensu and Charles Cecil from Revolution.
Insight article: Learning to Love Gamification (July 2011): After nearly 3 years working on a large scale gamification project, Rick Gibson analyses the potential and pitfalls of gamification.
Insight article: Hardcore social (June 2011): Nick Gibson appraises how Kabam drastically cut its user base and grew twentyfold by focusing on the highly lucrative area of hardcore social gaming.
Insight article: Understanding Smurfgate (May 2011): Rick Gibson assesses how a scandal around virtual goods in a mobile game roused the legislators and changed the way Apple handles in-app purchasing.
Insight article: Why the Gamification market will never be accurately scaled (May 2011): GIC's Rick Gibson analyses whether it is possible to accurately size the gamification market and why some analysts' gamification projections should be scrutinised.
GIC keynotes London's inaugural Gamification conference (May 2011): GIC's Rick Gibson launched London's first gamification conference as part of Digital Shoreditch. Rick joined a strong line up of speakers including Sebastian Deterding from Coding Conduct, Former Playfish Marketing Director Raf Keustermans, Kam Star from Playgen and Tom Reding from the BBC.
GIC launches on Twitter (April 2011): GIC has launched its Twitter feed @gamesinvestor. Follow our thoughts on the business of games.
Abertay's first round of prototype grants awarded with GIC help (April 2011): The first six projects funded by Abertay University's Prototype fund have been announced, along with GIC's involvement. We gave a rigorous commercial assessment of candidates that made it through a first screening stage.
Insight article: Analysing the analysts (Feb-Mar 2011): Nick Gibson explains why the old addage 'there are lies, damn lies and statistics' remains true for analysts using the wrong research methodology.
GIC in the New York Times and TechRadar (January 2011) : Nick Gibson assesses the impact of Sony's new handheld NGP here and assesses claims that Nintendo is taking its next generation too slowly here.
GIC speaks at Monetising Social Games conference (January 2011): Rick Gibson spoke at the Clarion event about the DNA, best practice, commercial performance and valuations of social network game developers.
GIC confirmed to speak at GameHorizon 2011 (December 10): Rick Gibson is confirmed to speak for the fourth year in a row at this leading industry conference in Newcastle.
Insight Article (December 2010) Science Friction: Rick Gibson assesses the commercial science of managing the friction that can make or break your social game.
GIC chairs panel at Osborne Clarke's Interactive Entertainment Summit (November 2010): Rick Gibson spoke about how games publishers are changing to address online markets and chaired the summit's concluding panel of industry luminaries at this high level conference in London.
Insight Article (November 2010) Facebook's Forgotten Fountain of Youth: Nick Gibson looks at why the youth audience that founded Facebook is being under-served by games and go elsewhere to play.
Insight Article (October 2010) How games development clusters survive: Rick Gibson analyses the impact of Realtime Worlds' closure on Dundee and what's in the DNA of the more successful games development clusters.
Doctor Who hits 1.6m downloads (October 10): Doctor Who the Adventure Games continues its dramatic rise to hit 1.6m downloads even before the final episode is released later in 2010. The series GIC has been shepherding since its inception has shot past its targets and been recommissioned by the BBC.
Insight Article (September 2010) The pitfalls of 3D casual gaming: Nick Gibson warns would-be 3D pioneers to avoid casual gaming, where 3D has failed again and again, but where simple, fun and intuitive means a winner.
Insight Article (August 2010) Chinese hordes: Nick Gibson finds China has become the 3rd largest games development territory and assesses the latest round of acquisitions of Western games companies by giant Chinese online games companies.
Insight Article (July 2010) Is mobile gaming's future social? Nick Gibson explores the drivers and barriers to mobile gaming becoming social and accessing significant new revenue streams.
Insight Article (June 2010) Freeing the iPhone: Rick Gibson assesses the future of iPhone games and contrasts his bleak findings about premium retail games with the brighter prospects for freemium products like ngmoco's We Rule.
Doctor Who shifts 500,000 downloads in 12 days (June 2010): In another first for the BBC, the first episode of Doctor Who the Adventure Games won a half million downloads in just 12 days. Executives at BBC are delighted and GIC is quietly pleased our strategy is working. Read more about it in Gamasutra, MCV, Gamesindustry.biz and Broadcast. The game has now been downloaded over 1.3 million times.
GIC speaks at GameHorizon (May 10): Rick Gibson spoke for the third year in a row at this leading industry conference in Newcastle. This year Rick profiled the fastest growing market the games industry has ever seen: social network games.
Insight Article (May 2010) The Generation Game: Another year, another batch of Cassandras calling the current generation of consoles the last ever. Nick Gibson picks up and passes this old canard around, before putting it into touch.
GIC Doctor Who project announced (April 10): Doctor Who: the Adventure Games generates huge media interest. Since mid-2008, GIC has been working with Simon Nelson, Controller of Vision Multiplatform and Portfolio, the Cardiff interactive team, Sumo and Charles Cecil to define and give strategic guidance to this innovative project. Broadcast gives just a taste of the coverage (more below). Read a case study on what we did on the project here.
Insight Article: (April 10): Do we still need publishers in an online world? As the games industry inexorably moves online, we examine the myth of 'going direct' and assess the new skills games companies need to get their products to market.
Historic decision by the Chancellor (Mar 10): Games Tax relief announced by British government. After 5 years of GIC working with TIGA and leading British games companies to persuade policy-makers that the UK studio sector needs a tax credit to sustain growth, the Chancellor relented and announced a tax credit for cultural games to be instituted in 2011. Building on the Games Up? campaign in 2008 and GIC's report Investing in the Future for TIGA in 2009, we provided critical data to Ian Livingstone and TIGA, who persuaded Stephen Timms to drive the measure into Labour's last Budget. Read more here.
Insight article (Mar 10): Games will subsume everything. Our latest article for Develop proposes that games are fast becoming the most important entertainment medium of the 21st century.
GIC opens Games Gone Wild 2 conference (Mar 10): GIC's Rick Gibson spoke at Games Gone Wild 2 about the tipping point when network games will overtake retail and why traditional publishers have been slow to take leadership positions in new online markets.
Latest report (Feb 10): Big Media Investment in Games. Our latest report looks at how, where and why traditional media companies have invested $3bn in games over the last 5 years. You can purchase the report from Screen Digest.
Insight article (Feb 10): An offer you can't refuse. Rick Gibson examines the furore around criminal scams and the firms taken in by them, and finds a perfectly viable commercial model for social gaming.
GIC at the Westminster Media Forum (Jan 10): GIC's Rick Gibson spoke for the second time at the Westminster Media Forum, setting the scene for the conference on Government policy and games, and joining a panel of industry figures and policymakers to discuss the future of the British games development industry. Read Rick's transcript here.
Insight article (Dec 09): Taking a gamble? Our latest article for Develop shines a light on the investment by a huge gambling company in an online games publisher.
Insight article (Nov 09): Extraordinary games business: Ankama. GIC's latest article for Develop profiles one of Europe's most formidable casual MMOG companies, Ankama.
Insight article (Oct 09): What the industry said: the definitive survey on tax credits. A review of our findings in the latest industry survey on tax breaks (from our monthly column in Develop).
New report (Aug 09): Time to play. GIC analyses the impact of a tax credit for cultural games on the UK games development industry. You can read the synopsis here or the entire report for free here.
Games Gone Wild 1 conference presentation: Rick presented latest market stats and chaired a panel discussion at a Kemp Little conference of online games businesses for investors called Games Gone Wild. Read more
GameHorizon conference presentation: Rick also presented the latest games commercial models and chaired a panel of industry experts for the GameHorizon conference in Newcastle in July 2008. Read more
GIC IN THE NEWS
GIC interviewed by T3's TechDesign TV: Rick Gibson discussed the impact of social network gaming on the wider industry here.
GIC discusses investing in games in EDGE: Article on how investors treat the games industry extensively features Nick Gibson's thoughts here.
GIC's stealth project Doctor Who covered in the press: You can read more about this pioneering BBC games initiative in the Telegraph, the Guardian, the Sun, Broadcast, PC Gamer, BBC, Gamesindustry.biz, MCV, and Develop.
GIC asks why there is no Twilight game: Nick Gibson discusses the value of an unexploited traditional media IP brand here.
GIC's latest report covered in the press: You can read about our latest report on Big Media's Investment in Games in Gamasutra, in Gamesindustry.biz and in MCV.
GIC on the iPad: The Guardian's Jack Schofield quizzed Nick Gibson on the launch of Apple's latest style icon. Read Nick's comments here
Investing in the Future: Our report Investing in the Future for TIGA set out the case and mechanism for administering cultural tax credits and strongly argued that games can be cultural products. Read Develop's coverage.
Time to play gets national media coverage: Our recent report Time to play was covered in the Independent, the Times and the Guardian.
