studios
STUDIO SPOTLIGHT
Contact 31 St Petersburgh Place London W2 4LA
This month: Ideaworks Formed back in 1998 as Ideaworks3D, London-based Ideaworks has built a reputation for developing and porting innovative games for big-name franchises onto smartphones and handheld platforms. An early example of the work for which the studio would later become highly regarded was the porting of the PSone version of Tomb Raider to the Compaq iPaq and later Nokia N-Gage. The latter handheld proved to be a productive platform for Ideaworks, the studio had four launch titles for the console and developed a further ten titles for it over the course of its two generations to 2008. It wasn’t until 2005 that a dedicated games team was established at the studio, staffed by industry professionals with backgrounds in both PC and console development and with the mission statement of bringing triple-A C++ titles to mobile platforms. A large amount of mobile content, both original to the studio and franchised IP, has since been developed by the team. Mobile versions of Need for Speed Most Wanted, Metal Gear Solid, Resident Evil, Trivial Pursuit and the acclaimed Call of Duty: World at War: Zombies cemented the studio’s reputation for delivering highend versions of console products on
Epic
WWW.DEVELOP-ONLINE.NET
+1-919-870-1516
www.epicgames.com
mobile platforms. This wealth of highquality content has also seen the studio rack up an impressive array of awards, including a Mobile Entertainment Award for Best Game Developer and a Develop Industry Excellence Award for Best Mobile Studio, both in 2008. In 2009 Ideaworks restructured into two separate organisations, Ideaworks Game Studio and Ideaworks Labs. The former continued to develop games for smartphones and the iPhone, but with a new remit looking to take in development for other handheld and console platforms. The latter looks towards multi-platform technology development, and released the Airplay SDK to that end, a development environment supporting iOS, Android, Symbian, bada, Windows Mobile, webOS and Maemo.
IndieCity
P: +44(0)8456 434 969 F: +44(0)8456 434 970 W: www.ideaworks3d.com
With the recent release of Fable III Coin Golf for the Windows Phone 7, Ideaworks has maintained the impressive momentum that it has built up over the past thirteen years. Considering the continuing pace and level of quality the company works to, the coming years have a distinctly interesting potential for the Ideaworks firms. www.ideaworks3d.com
01926 880081
www.IndieCity.com
MAY 2011 | 67