By Alexander Villafania
INQUIRER.net
MANILA, Philippines — Major game development firm Gameloft is looking to open an office in the Philippines that is focused on developing games for the handheld and mobile platforms.
In an interview with hackenslash, Vincent Ricot, who is serving as the Philippines studio manager, said the Philippines office will initially serve as a support location for mostly 3D animation development for Gameloft’s programming branches.
He said the company aims to hire around 50 animators until the end of the year.
“We have a lot of projects to do, especially with the number of console games being ported to the mobile phone and handheld platforms,” he said.
Ricot said the local office will go beyond animation work and start game development from conception to programming.
He said company’s direction is to develop games for the current generation of consoles, particularly the Nintendo Wii.
“There’s a lot of development opportunities for the company now and the office here can benefit from it,” Ricot said.
Ricot said the Philippines was chosen due to its large pool of 2D artists who could be trained to do 3D animation.
The local operations will support Gameloft’s programming work in Vietnam, China and India.
The French game developer is one of the biggest firms developing for the mobile market segment.
It has over 90 games in its portfolio, some of which are ports of popular franchises, such as the Tom Clancy series of Rainbow Six and Ghost Recon, Asphalt racing games, Prince of Persia, as well as game versions of popular TV shows Grey’s Anatomy, Heroes and Desperate Housewives.
