![]() ![]() Now there are quite a few game companies around Ireland ranging from small to midsized, and Irish games are doing really well internationally." "I remember around 2013 or so there didn’t seem to be much of an industry here, but it has grown and grown in the years since then. Luckily they opened it up in time for Guild’s first release." Back before 2013 games like mine basically couldn’t get onto Steam despite it being the best place for PC gamers to buy digital games. "Steam has been very good for us and certainly is the easiest path for a smaller studio to be able to self publish digitally. "On Steam alone, there were 2,800 games released in 2015 and 10,000 released in 2020."Įver since Steam launched in September 2003, it has been a springboard to success for smaller developers like Gambrinous. This means each year it’s much harder to stand out and reach an audience - it’s certainly much harder in 2021 than it was in 2015" "Even when we launched in 2015 game platforms were becoming quite crowded - lots more games were being released each passing year. The original 'Guild of Dungeoneering' was released in 2015, and this week sees the release of the Ultimate Edition, with all of the games DLC added in.Ħ years is a long time in any industry, let alone gaming, but Larkin says there have been major changes in the time since the game first came out. "More recently the board game 'Carcassonne' also features tiles you need to connect to each other", adding "those were definitely a kicking off point for the tile-laying side of the game." Industry Baby You placed square tiles that connected up to each other like the rooms in 'Guild of Dungeoneering'. 'Guild of Dungeoneering' is influenced by tabletop & board games, with Larkin adding "the original idea for the game came from playing a Games Workshop game called 'DungeonQuest' with my siblings in the 90s. I remember around 2010 when 'Minecraft' absolutely blew up its creator ended up paying a massive amount of income tax that first year because there was no company," he revealed. "I formed a limited company (Gambrinous) in case it was successful. The game was released in 2015 and Larkin learned a lesson from the success of 'Minecraft'. A screenshot from 'Guild of Dungeoneering' That 'real game' wound up being 'Guild of Dungeoneering'. One of these felt promising and I decided to spend another 3 months on it and make it a ‘real game’". "I made a few games on the side, mostly rough prototypes from game jams. "Later in life, I studied Computer Science in university and worked in tech but not games." Game magazines at the time came with pages of BASIC code you could type in to make your own games. "I’ve been interested in making games since our family got a ZX Spectrum in the 80s. Larkin says he caught the gaming bug in the ZX Spectrum era. The game has been one of Ireland's gaming success stories since its launch in 2015, with the game available on PC, iOS and Android devices. Gambrinous is known for their 2015 game 'Guild Of Dungeoneering', a turn-based dungeon crawler.Īsked to give a one-sentence pitch of his game, Larkin said the game is "a dungeon crawler where you don’t control the hero - instead, you build the dungeon around them!" We talked to Colm Larkin, Founder and Director at Gambrinous, about life as an indie developer, what goes into making a game and getting published on Steam. What is lesser known about the Irish gaming industry is that it boasts a robust indie gaming scene. ![]() The Havok game engine that powers 'Doom Eternal' and 'Animal Crossing' is an Irish creation, 'No Man's Sky' director Sean Murray hails from Waterford, and 90s gaming icon Earthworm Jim is the brainchild of Lisburn man David Perry. For such a small country, Ireland has contributed an awful lot to the video game industry. ![]()
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