Australian games industry head count

How big is the local games industry? It's certainly been a long time since the local games industry last had a proper headcount. The Australian Bureau of Statistics provided some incredibly detailed stats back in 2007 on the Australia games industry sector, providing a breakdown of the different skillsets employed in the games industry, the ratio of males to females, as well as the amount of developers in each state. It also included other informative details like the amount of profit that the games industry brought in and more, so if you're curious about all that, be sure to check it out here.

Here are the local industry employee stats from that report released in 2007.

As of 30 June, 2007: 45 businesses

Employment at 30 June:

  • Managerial/administrative/clerical = 212
  • Designers = 136
  • Artists and animators = 491
  • Programmers = 417
  • Audio technicians = 26
  • Technical support = 33
  • Quality assurance = 105
  • Other = 11

Total = 1,431

Of course, 2007 was a long, long time ago, and while we've had some additional growth after that report, we've certainly had some incredibly big studio closures since as well. The biggest closure of them all has to be Krome Studios which, at 400 employees, would mean a sizeable chunk of those numbers.

Finding out current numbers

Justin Brow at 60Sox is approaching Australian games developers (commercial as well as independent) and any other company that derives revenue from providing a games related service (middleware, game art / programming / audio outsourcing etc) for the numbers of people employed in their studio or team. If you fit in any of those categories, please don't hesitate to contact Justin and tell him your stats at:

justin (at) 60Sox.org

If you know of any other businesses working in the local games industry, please do forward them this link or Justin's details so they can contact him with those details. Justin is working on projects to help the local games industry, so that should be an added incentive to say hi to him. In any case, we'd all like to have a good idea on where the local industry stands now in terms of numbers after suffering some rather frequent successions of studio closures over the years as well as a rapidly expanding independent scene.

Submitted by Matt Korda (not verified) on Wed, 19/01/11 - 7:41 PMPermalink

Wow! I knew the industry wasn't that big in Australia but I wasn't expecting that. It will be interesting to see if there is much difference when it is updated.

...If someone wants to give me a job you could add one to that number (just sayin')

Submitted by souri on Wed, 19/01/11 - 8:06 PMPermalink

Back in 2004, the industry was half that in 2007 - just 700 people. Here are some details on the games industry then which has some interesting comments on work-for-hire and case studies on how much profits games like Powerslide and Dark Reign pulled in for the game's publishers compared to what the local developers got.

Submitted by Justin Brow (not verified) on Tue, 25/01/11 - 2:29 PMPermalink

Thanks to everyone who has gotten back to me so far re our Aussie Games Industry Head Count. Obviously it's easier to identify the more establish studios, but if you're Indie and making commercially-oriented entertainment games (on any platform) then I'd really appreciate you getting back to me and adding your self to the list. The benefit of of this head count is directly proportionate to its accuracy. Pls have a look below and let me know if you (or someone you know) is not on the list.

Thanks heaps and heaps and heaps,

-jb-

Submitted by Justin Brow (not verified) on Tue, 25/01/11 - 2:30 PMPermalink

3 Sprockets*
Brawsome
Conor OKane
Creature Interactive*
Crystalised
Demruth
Dime Studios
Drop Spider Games
Farbs
Rubber House*
KlickTock
Ludo Digital
Lycette Bros
Pixelpickle Games
Play-Bit Entertainment*
Sam Whillance
Sector3 Games
Shadow Field Team
SubZero Media
Synthetic Nest
The Voxel Agents
Third Wave Games*
Tin Man Games
Touch My Pixel
True Axis
Unbelievable Games

(*denotes no numbers yet)

Submitted by Justin Brow (not verified) on Tue, 25/01/11 - 2:31 PMPermalink

Big Bucket
Binary Culture*
Binary Space
Black Lab Games
Creative Anarchy*
Different Methods
Dog Melon
DrewFX
Frosty Badger
Gnomic Studios*
Kruger Heavy Industries
Love Addicted Robot
PodSix Video Games
Rockethands
Sandbox
Silver Lightning Software*
Spinfast *
Staring Man*
Super Furious Software
White Knight Games*

(*denotes no numbers yet)

Submitted by Justin Brow (not verified) on Tue, 25/01/11 - 2:32 PMPermalink

5th World*
Aberrant Entertainment
Bane Games
Cratesmith*
Curious Bear Productions*
Defiant Development
Hitbox Team
Iron Helmet
Last Level Games*
Mooktown Games*
Play This! Studios
Squid Tank
Virtual Mechanix*
Wildfire Studios*

(*denotes no numbers yet)

Submitted by Justin Brow (not verified) on Tue, 25/01/11 - 2:33 PMPermalink

2Moro Mobile*
Binary Space
Champagne for the Ladies
Enabled
I love biscuits*
Mark Killey
No Prisoners
Overbyte
Run with Robots*
Silhouette Studios
Soda Cube
Two Lives Left*
WheelSpin Studios

(*denotes no numbers yet)

Submitted by Justin Brow (not verified) on Tue, 25/01/11 - 2:34 PMPermalink

Brownbot
Bubble Gum Interactive
Convict Interactive
DinoRoar*
Impact Audio Studios
Mirandow*
Nigredo Studios*
Nnooo

Submitted by Justin Brow (not verified) on Fri, 28/01/11 - 1:16 PMPermalink

I've got them down (both Bris and Syd) in my other list of more established studios (ie not Indies) ...

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue, 01/02/11 - 6:18 PMPermalink

There's a lot of companies being displayed here, but are they all making a living from the games industry? I think not.

Submitted by Justin Brow (not verified) on Wed, 02/02/11 - 2:44 PMPermalink

The approach taken by people these days to earn a living from games production is very different to what it was even a year ago - that's why (at this point) I'm getting data on part-time employees vs fulltime.