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In our latest partner spotlight in the run up to this year’s Develop Awards, Unity’s EMEA VP Antony Douglas champions some of the biggest success we’ve seen in games development over the past year.
Unity Technologies is a Gold Partner at the Develop Awards 2014, which takes place on Wednesday, July 9th. More info below.
Partner Spotlight: Unity
Year founded: 2004
Website:www.unity3d.com
For any readers who might not know you, tell us a little more about your company and its goals.
Unity is a cross-platform games development engine and tool set that seeks to democratize games development and smash the barriers of time, reduce the costs of developing and helping developers make money from games. The Unity community has over 630,000 monthly active users and over 2.9 million registered developers worldwide.
What differentiates you from similar outfits? What’s unique about you?
Unity’s capabilities make it possible for developers to bring popular games, entertainment and apps to the largest number of desktop, web, mobile, and console platforms. No other games development engine, offers the “author once, deploy anywhere” capabilities of Unity. Our developers can effortlessly port their games to platforms including Windows, Mac, Linux, iOS, Android, Windows Phone 8, Blackberry and the Unity Web Player.
The partnerships we have in place with the major console manufacturers have opened up new opportunities for all developers that had typically been much more difficult in the past. We have partnered with Sony Computer Entertainment to create tools for PS4, PS Vita, PSM, and SCE’s upcoming cloud gaming service PlayStation Now.
Our collaboration with Microsoft saw the release of development tools for Windows Store and Windows Phone 8 and we have made great progress made on development tools for Xbox One, that will be free to approved Microsoft Games Studios and ID@Xbox developers. Unity also supports deployment to the Nintendo Wii U.
What excites and/or encourages you about the games industry and games development today?
The appetite for games & tech remains insatiable, this pushes the development of our tools in the same positive way it inspires our developer community to defy the boundaries of what was made possible last week, let alone last year. We’re unashamed game fans, we get a huge buzz from seeing what gets made with Unity, if we’re not coding, we’re playing.
Looking at the Develop Awards finalists, what does it say to you about the industry and development today?
The first thing that strikes you is the sheer quality, across platforms, on offer to gamers these days. Clearly mobile has been the beneficiary from the fallout of console / PC studio closures in the past few years with lots of teams sparking from the embers of AAA development but it’s also nice to see titles like Monument Valley from ustwo, ostensibly a creative design agency, making one of the most brilliantly memorable and affecting games of recent years. Clearly the bets and budgets on next gen titles have to be huge, but it’s a relative fear too for the small teams banking their redundancy payments on making the next big PC / mobile title. Our role in this ecosystem is take the pain out of development.
Do you have a message for the finalists?
Having an idea is the easy bit, making it is the tough part. Everyone nominated should be hugely proud of what they’ve done, we talk to millions of wannabe developers aspiring to bring their ideas to life – the passion and finesse behind these games is what drives this ambitious community.
Anything else you’d like to add about your company and the Develop Awards?
In terms of development my advice would be make your life simple; making the game is one thing, but monetisation & design mechanics, data analysis, retention, customer acquisition are all headaches you will also have to deal with. Oh, and then porting it… Unity works for so many of our community because our tools ease the burden on production and allow developers more time to focus on making killer games.
About The Develop Awards
The 2014 Develop Awards will take place on Wednesday, July 9th at the Hilton Metropole Hotel in Brighton, and recognises the best innovators and development talent in the UK and Europe.
If you want to attend, you can book single seats and standard or gold tables by contacting Kathryn.Humphrey@intentmedia.co.uk or calling 01992 535646.
There are multiple new awards this year, with a total of 24 prizes up for grabs, while PlayStation 4 lead architect Mark Cerny is 2014’s Development Legend.
There is a host of big names backing this year’s Develop Awards, including Crytek and Deep Silver as Platinum Partners, a slew of Gold Partners in King, UKIE, Amiqus, Keywords International, Codemasters, Perforce, Cubic Motion and Unity, Event Partners Wales Interactive, InnoGames and Tandem Events and Table Gift Partner OPM. Epic Games is Drinks Reception Partner.
For more information on the sponsorship and partnership opportunities still available, contact Alex.Boucher@intentmedia.co.uk or call 01992 535647.
You can find out more about the Develop Awards at the official Develop Awards website.
