Brazil, a nation of small studios with a big future
Brazil is one of the biggest emerging games markets in the world, and a vital territory for anyone wishing to be successful in Latin America.
The region's games scene has grown rapidly over the past 15 years – something GamesIndustry.biz's Marie Dealessandri dives deeper into with our Brazilian games industry in numbers feature. But the local industry actually dates back to the 1980s, with a handful of Brazilian developers making video games.
By the 1990s, games had become a little more popular but it was difficult for consumers to gain access to them due to a government block on technology imports.
"The government back then thought it was a good idea to develop our own technology," explains Rodrigo Terra, president of trade body Abragames, "which is a good concept but blocked everything coming in. You could not import computers or consoles.
"What happened? Clones. The Famiclones, right? With clones here, video games started to be something in the country."
There was one notable exception; Sega made a deal with Brazilian games firm Tectoy to manufacture its consoles, including Master System and Genesis, making it easier to release them in Brazil. This also helped fuel interest in video games, and inspired some Brazilians to make their own, but developers still struggled to secure the equipment they needed to create games due to the block on imports.
As CD-ROMs took off as a format, more windows of opportunity were opened, but Terra says the industry did not begin in earnest until Steam launch in the early 2000s. Digital distribution gave developers a new way to reach their audience, and the rise of accessible engines such as Unity gave more people the power to start their own studios.
The Brazilian games market really started to ramp up around 2010 as the smartphone became more popular. The government of the time once again wanted Brazil to focus on making its own tech and introduced policies that allowed mobile manufacturers to produce their devices in the country.
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