Like any capital city’s population, Londoners like to view themselves as being the heartbeat of any and all industry or entertainment trends. That is because so many people who move to the city are career driven individuals who want to make an impact in their chosen field.
Mobile gaming is no different. London is packed full of ground-breaking games developers and publishers all wanting to make their mark.
Here we look at exactly how London has become the epicentre of mobile gaming in the UK, and how it intends to build on the progress made in recent years.
Classic Games Londoners Always Loved Are Now on Mobile
One of the massive benefits of many mobile gaming sites and apps is that, as well as offering brand spanking new games people have never clapped eyes on before, they also offer the classic games that have been passed down through multiple generations of Londoners.
Indeed, few cities have quite such a long and varied history of gaming like the English capital does. The first gentleman’s club to offer casino games in London opened all the way back in 1828. Then, in 1962, the first fully licensed casino opened its doors to the public. It was called the Clermont Club and welcomed the great and good of the film and music industries throughout the week, as they gamed late into the night.
Of course, such a passion for gaming has been carried on by today’s Londoners, with there being plenty of land-based casinos for people to keep enjoying as if they were back in 1828. However, because a Londoner’s life these days is so hectic, the preferred mode of gaming is now on mobile. This allows a method to while away the journey on the tube, a double-decker bus, or on the chilly platform of an overground line, as well as from home.
Mobile games these days are almost as good as their PC or console counterparts, making them a cheap and accessible alternative
Mobile Games Developers Flock to Feed Off London’s Rich Talent Pool
With so many high-class universities and colleges based in the city, London is the perfect place for a tech start-up to source the talent it needs in double quick time. For this reason and many more, the capital has amassed plenty of market-leading mobile games developers, whose offices are dotted around the city’s many boroughs.
Some of these include the likes of Intelivita, Fan Studio, and Criterion, with the latter being the studio behind mobile racing games such as Need for Speed: Most Wanted and Burnout Paradise.
Great Minds Converge on the Big Smoke
With so many gamers and developers living, working, and playing in one place, it always made sense that someone would set up events that could bring them all together.
Answering that call was the Pocket Gamer Connects Conference that is due to take place at a date yet to be confirmed, hopefully in 2021. For an event more tailored to consumers than to industry insiders, the London Gaming Market is a great place to go to pick up contemporary and retro games and mobile devices on the cheap. Take your pick.
So Many Top Games Being Set in London Town
Another thing that always sets a city apart as being at the forefront of the gaming community’s consciousness is when it becomes the setting of a game or popular gaming franchise.
London certainly fits the bill in that regard. The city was used be developers as the main setting for games like Watch Dogs Legion, Assassin’s Creed: Syndicate, and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3.
As more mobile games put London front and centre of their titles, and developers who have set up their creative studios in the city continue to produce excellent titles, expect the mobile gaming buzz in the capital to grow and grow.