Brazilian delegation has returned back from running a successful campaign at GDC 2019 where they forged lasting bonds with the global gaming community. Brazil Games is a partnership between the Brazilian Games Companies Association, ABRAGAMES, and Apex-Brasil (Brazilian Trade and Investment Promotion Agency.
Brazil Games delegation attended GDC in San Francisco between March 18-22 and represented 47 studios and 50 video games across a variety of platforms and genres from Brazil. Their main goal was to foster international relationships and further cement Brazil’s role as the leader of Latin American video game and technology developers.
At the end of GDC 2019, the delegation announced that the mission was successful in every sense and they were able to form strong business relationships worldwide and received critical acclaim for their games and products. Brazil Games is working hard to promote Brazil’s video game ecosystem as the premium video game hub for international companies to do business in Latin America.
According to PwC, the global video game market will grow at around 7% a year (2017 to 2012) whereas the Brazilian market is expected to grow 16% per year which shows a total growth of 80% in the period, reaching US$ 1.4 billion by 2021 (PWC, 2017b). Brazil currently houses more than 60 million gamers making it the third biggest country in the world when it comes to video gamers.
There are around 375 local video game developers in Brazil and in 2018 alone, more than 1,700 video games were developed by these local developers. This generated more than US$ 1.3 billion annual market revenue according to McKinsey and Company’s report. All the credit to this massive growth goes to contacts and relationships formed in San Francisco.
More than 1000 meetings took place which converted into projected business deals worth over US$ 14 million. Brazil Games clearly showed at this year’s GDC that it facilitates deal-making between Brazilian video game companies and their global constituents. Eliana Russi, Brazil Games’ executive manager says:
We took the talent, ingenuity, and spirit of Brazil’s developers with us to San Francisco and the world responded in kind. We are very grateful to both our international partners and the local players that drive the growth we’re seeing in the Brazilian market. We are proud of our presence at GDC 2019 and are already looking forward to what we will have to show next year.
Brazil Games aimed to utilize GDC to showcase the role Brazil is playing on the world stage. Brazil is keen to share the positive outlook of its rising market but also hosts a plethora of talented developers ready to provide the world with new perspectives and partnerships. Brazil Games plans to continue this initiative from June 26 – 30 at Brazil’s Independent Games (BIG) Festival seventh edition.
The event will take place in São Paulo and it is the biggest indie gaming expo in Latin America. The success seen by Brazil Games and all the developers at GDC 2019 will be carried to this event and it has already driven a surge in global business relationships. BIG Festival will also host an awards section which will honor video game developers both locally and worldwide for their contributions.
The success story of Brazil Games does not end here as it also managed to secure some awards and nominations during the GDC 2019. According to the official press release: ‘Relic Hunters Legend (Rogue Snail) and DeMagnete VR (BitCake Studio), won awards as GDC’s Best in Play Finalists. A third game, Areia (GILP Studio), earned a spot in Best in Play’s Honorable Mention category. Trial of Titans (Oktagon Games) and Talaka (Flux Games) both represented Brazil in the GDC Pitch competition, with Talaka winning the grand prize. A consolation for Oktagon Games is that two projects it co-developed, Mila Moment and Covens, both landed on CNET’s list of The 10 coolest mobile games we saw at GDC 2019’.
