Niel Dagondon's Anino Games -- Philippine-based Game Makers

PH game maker lives out boyhood fantasy

Tuesday, 07 December 2010 00:48

By Cecil Morella
Agence France-Presse
First Posted 11:54:00 12/06/2010

 

MANILA, Philippines - Inside a brightly painted red and green building in the Philippines' financial hub work is more like play for a young team making funky electronic games.

Niel Dagondon may be the boss, but the 30-year-old is living out his boyhood dream running a company that creates games for iPods and iPads, smartphones and websites such as Facebook, as well as game consoles and personal computers.

"I've always wanted to make computer games for a living," Dagondon told AFP in his office that looks more like a children's play centre.

Yet in his playpen, Anino Games, designs and tests game concepts using some of the most expensive three-dimensional graphics software in the business and is packed with brilliant young minds.

Anino, the Filipino word for "shadow", has been crafting games since 2003 for many of the world's biggest entertainment firms such as Walt Disney, Namco, Atari, and Electronic Arts.

The company is growing up fast and has 45 developers with an average age of only 25 -- a team weaned on all-night computer combat games such as "Counterstrike", "Warcraft" and "Ragnarok".

Anino's roots can be traced back to 2001, when Dagondon was a 21-year-old college student trying to turn a game project from his computer science studies into a commercial product.

Dagondon eventually burned through about P5 million ($115,000) of his own money over the next 2 years as he and 7 developers brought the first-ever Philippine-made commercial game to hit the market.

He said the product, a role-playing game set in 16th century Philippines when Spanish colonisers first arrived, was not a major success but it crucially gave his small team experience and contacts to sell internationally.

via aninogames.com