14 DAY TRIAL // Cultural issues have always surrounded development houses - the Japanese are good at this, Americans are good at that, while Europeans see things this way... Few bother touching the subject, but Nick Button-Brown, Director of business development for EA Partners, felt it was in order, during his interview with GamesIndustry.biz.
The following question arose: Do American game developers focus more on on moneymaking, leaving creativity on the second place, while Europeans focus more on the creative content? Button-Brown replied: "There's more creativity in Europe than there is in America. The Americans are much more refined in their processes, it's all about the money. There are less chances taken and there is more money being thrown at developers in the US."
He added that "Taking less chances means there's less failures, but I can't see the US having ever come up with Grand Theft Auto. There are a lot of really good European developers and they all bring slightly different things and there are big cultural differences as well, that they are willing to exploit."
Naturally, culture is the biggest influence when speaking of video games development. Look at it this way: Americans will always come up with nicely polished titles (graphically), but deliver more action and less sentiment; the Japanese will do anything to roll out the most fantastic storyline ever, but they always have pretty much the same thing in the end (especially with RPGs and fighting games); Europeans on the other hand, tend to use every culture's ideas blending them into an original one:
"So many developers are multinational, says Button-Brown. "Go to Crytek and they have 27 national languages there. And that's interesting because they are bringing in so many different areas and ideas to the studio, particularly with the influx of Eastern Europe - you're getting such a wide range of experiences to pick from.
"We like that multiculturalism. What we're getting now are more worldwide titles. We used to have the German industry that produced German titles, the UK would deliver tongue-in-cheek games, but now it's become much more globalised and what we are seeing is European titles that can sell worldwide," the man continued.
What's your opinion? Do you think there are so many discrepancies between American and European development studios? And if so, which one do you think focuses more on what you want from a game? Hit the comments column below and give us your impressions.