Ten years ago, hardly anybody in the Netherlands was involved in designing computer games. Now a small but growing new industry wants to make its presence felt. Tomorrow night will see the presentation of the first Dutch Game Awards.

“There’s some brilliant stuff being produced in the Netherlands,” says Viktor Wijnen from game development centre Dutch Game Garden. “Until now we didn’t have a national platform to show what we can do. The awards will mean greater recognition for Dutch game makers.”

Annual monitor

About 250 organisations and 2,500 individuals are involved in the Dutch gaming industry. These include suppliers, educational centres, researchers, specialised media, event organisers and game developers. A new, annual monitor for the industry is expected to report exact figures from December.

The turnover generated by the fledgling industry is unknown but the type of games being produced is certainly diverse. As well as a few big commercial productions, games are also commissioned for advertising and educational purposes.

One of the nominations for the first Dutch Game Awards is the humorous fantasy game Overlord, an elaborate production by Triumph Studios in Delft. The protagonist is an evil ruler who commands an army of reckless little monsters. It is a parody of fantasies along the lines of Lord of the Ring.

Gaming pioneers

The founders of Triumph, Lennart Sas and Arno van Wingerden, are two of the Netherlands’ gaming pioneers. “We started out doing demos at the beginning of the 90s, just a couple of guys trying to create great effects on a computer screen with little money and few resources,” says Sas. “But after an internship with an American gaming company, we knew that making games was what we wanted to do.”

Their first effort, a strategy game called Age of Wonders, was followed by Overlord which has already sold more than a million copies. The sequel is planned for next year. The bad guy will be a decadent Roman emperor.

But first Sas and Wingerden will have to see if Overlord wins in any of the three categories of the Dutch Game Awards for which it has been nominated: best PC/console game, best original game design and best visual design.

“The game did really well here,” says Sas. “There was none of the cynical ‘it’s Dutch so it won’t be up to much’ attitude. And the awards are a good way of letting people know that Overlord is a Dutch game. Many people aren’t aware of that.”

Tough world

One of the largest Dutch gaming companies, the renowned Rotterdam studio Coded Illusions, will not be represented at the awards. After four years in development, its futuristic action-adventure game Haven has still not seen the light of day.

The company went bankrupt three weeks ago and had to fire half of its 40 staff when its main US investor was hit by the credit crisis. Founder Richard Stitselaar: “If we had found a publisher in time, this would not have happened. But it wasn’t possible because the game is in a grey area: not good enough for the major producers but too good – and too expensive – to be brought out as a B-title.”

Stitselaar has learnt much over the last four years. “Working in this industry is often made out to be an easy option. You make a game and the money starts rolling in. But it’s not like that. There is an enormous amount of investment involved and it’s a tough world.”

Stitselaar says that 80 percent of the people who worked for Coded Illusions have already found jobs as game developers elsewhere so they company at least served as a breeding ground to develop talent.