A listing of UK game development companies (for you college kids looking for work!)

[PapaZeb]

I've had this kicking about for the last few weeks - a relatively up to date listing with addresses (I've got marketing contact information, but no internal contacts for intern stuff)
This should hopefully help out any computer science graduates that are interested in programming or developing for a living, or at least getting into the games industry and having a chance to see the process by which games are made.
Ideally, I'd recommend writing to these companies, or checking their website out for any further information and asking for information regarding intern positions in some aspect of game development. It's definitely a good way to get yer hands dirty.
I wish y'all luck if you want to pursue it.



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Argonaut Games
Argonaut House, 369 Burnt Oak Broadway
Edgware, Middlesex HA8 5XZ
0208-951-6000
www.argonaut.com

Argonaut's been around for about 20 years with 5 locations in the UK. 2 in London, 1 in cambridge, Bicester, and Sheffield. They employ around 300 folks and have been behind the original Starfox, and two of the PS1 Harry Potter games.

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Artem Digital
Unit 4 Perivale Industrial Park
Horseden Lane South, Perivale
Middlesex UB6 7RL
www.artem-digital.com

Artem Digital are motion capture specialists, used for the special effects in the film 'Troy', Codemaster's 'Dragon Empires' game, and The Getaway 2.

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Astraware Limited
IC2, Keele Business Park
Newcastle-under-Lyme
Staffordshire ST5 5NH
www.astraware.com

Astraware is a leading developer and publisher of games for handheld PDAs including Palm OS and Pocket PC based devices. They've worked on Bejeweled, Text Twist, Spyhunter, and a PDA version of Joust. They're one of the more sought after PDA developers from US businesses to provide entertainment to a primarily North American market.

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Babel Media Ltd
Unit 11 - 12 Hove Business Centre
Fonthill Road
Hove East Sussex BN3 6HA
www.babelmedia.com

They provide Quality Assurance, Localisation, Creative, and Production services to a variety of companies including Nintendo, Microsoft, Sony, Atari, Eidos, Sega, Vodafone, Motorola, Orange, THQ, and many more. They just opened a San Diego office as well (which is one of neater cities on earth if you happened to get shifted around )

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Blitz Games
Bedford Court, Bedford St.
Leamington Spa
Warks CV32 5DY
www.blitzgames.com

Blitz Games have created a variety of games for the PS2, XBox, GameCube, and PC such as Mummy Returns, Bad Boys II, Zapper, Taz: Wanted, Cubix: Showdown, and Fusion Frenzy. As of last May they were working on 5 unnamed titles for release over the next year and a half.

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Blue Beck Ltd
Adelphi Mill, Bollington
Cheshire SK10 5JB
www.bluebeck.com

Blue Beck creates a variety of games in J2ME for mobile phones running Java and the like, including games on the Red Dwarf and Pop Idol licenses. Games they've created include Sims Pinball, Command and Conquer Copter Strike, and MotoGP2.

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Circle Studio Ltd
York House, Stephenson's Way
Wyvern Business Park
Derby DE21 6LY
www.circle-studio.com

The founders of this relatively new company were responsible for Lara Croft and the Tomb Raider series (back when it was good!) and are working on their first few titles bringing all their good knowledge from Eidos to bear.

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Digital Jesters
Unit 4, Weltech Centre
Ridgeway, WGC
Herts AL7 2AA
www.digitaljesters.com

Digial Jesters are a publishing company - so they deal with Quality Assurance (playtesting!) and bugfinding for the programmers. They've got a good games lineup judging from their site.

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Distinctive Developments
Sheffield Science Park
Arundel Street
Sheffield S1 2NS
www.distdevs.co.uk

Distinctive Developments are a games production company - they make games for mobile phones.

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Eutechnyx Limited
Metro Center East Business Park
Gateshead
Tyne & Wear NE11 9HU
www.eutechnyx.com

Eutechnyx is a racing and driving game developer based in Newcastle - they were responsible for the surprising hit Big Mutha Truckers, as well as Micro Machines, Test Drive Le Mans, and 007 Racing.

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Evolution Studios Ltd
2 Kings Court, Manor Park
Runcorn, Cheshire WA7 1HR
www.evos.net

The programmers behind World Rally Championship for the PS2, Evolution Studios is acclaimed as one of the best driving game developers with offices in Cheshire and Warwickshire.

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GameWare Development Ltd
25 City Road
Cambridge CB1 1DP
www.gamewaredevelopment.com

This company is split in two - one half, Creature Labs, was responsible for the incredibly popular Creatures series of games where you got to toy with Norns and breed interesting creatures as well as the James Pond series of games for the Mega Drive. Also responsible for PC conversions of Dig-Dug and Silent Hill 2. The other half, SceneMachines, were responsible for the software that drove BAMZOOKi, a show on CBBC and BBC1 that had contestants build ZOOKs using the BAMZOOKi engine and pit them against each other gladiator style.

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Iomo Ltd
Wessex House, Upper Market Street
Eastleigh, Hampshire SO50 9FD
www.iomo.com

IOMO is a developer of mobile games, nominated for a BAFTA recently as well as responsible for Tomb Raider, Tiger Woods PGA Tour Golf, Monopoly, and TxtDating for mobile gaming systems.

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Lionhead Studios
1, Occam Court, Occam Road
Research Park Guilford
Surrey GU2 7YQ
www.lionhead.com

Oh this one's a biggy. Headed up by Peter Molyneux (Populous, Syndicate, Dungeon Keeper) and located in possibly the most awesomest looking production house, Lionhead Studios was formed after Molyneux's break with Bullfrog Studios to create Black & White. Recently they've released Fable and they are known for taking in interns occasionally (Most notably, iirc, the AI developer for Black & White was just some punk kid that wouldn't stop sending in requests to be taken in as an intern)

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Mere Mortals Ltd
The Old Casino
1-4 Forth Lane, Newcastle Upon Tyne
Tyne & Wear NE1 5HX
www.mere-mortals.com

Mere Mortals is a subcontractor for many development houses, including Sony, Electronic Arts, Blitz, NAMCO, and Eutechnyx. They provide Contract Programming, Localisation and Conversion, Modelling, Local Design, Animation, Development, and Dev Support capabilities to larger companies.

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Rebellion Developments Ltd
The Studio, Brewer Street
Oxford OX1 1QN
www.rebellion.co.uk

Rebellion is a games developer responsible for the original Aliens vs Predator, Gunlok, and Judge Dredd: Dredd vs Death. They own 2000AD and have current plans to develop more of their 2000AD characters into video games after the success of 2003's JDvD

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VIS Entertainment
Eagle Building
19 Rose Street
Edinburgh
EH2 2PR
www.visentertainment.com

VIS Entertainment is a games developer responsible for one of my no-brainer favourites, State of Emergency. They've got bases in Dundee and Edinburgh so a bit closer than most of these other southern developers.

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Rockstar North
Calton Square
1 Greenside Row
Edinburgh EH1 3AP
www.rockstarnorth.com

Rockstar's one of the biggies in UK games development. Grand Theft Auto, anyone?


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Extras from forum user Padlock (cheers!)

Big Blue Box
Lionhead Studios
Unit 3 Stirling House
Stirling Road
Surrey Research Park
Guildford
GU2 7RS
http://www.bigbluebox.com/

A subsidiary of lionhead, recently open. it was actually them who did the main development on fable, though both companies did work together.


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Elixir Studios
The Forum
74-80 Camden Street
London
NW1 0EG
http://www.elixir-studios.co.uk/

demis hassabis's company (molyneux's protege) made republic: the revolution (And more importantly, Evil Genius --PapaZeb)

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Rare
used to be part owned by nintendo, now owned by microsoft.
previously made goldeneye and donkey kong, now on the likes of grabbed by the ghoulies and banjo-kazooie.(And more importantly the best game on the N64 and upcoming for XBox, Conker's Bad Fur Day as well as Marble Madness, Battletoads, --PapaZeb)

http://www.rareware.com/ - games site
http://www.rare-recruitment.com/ - employment site.
Especially for you students out there, they have positions open for students seeking a years placement.

[anglarna]

Noted.

Thanks. I'd like to do game music composition when I grows up.

[dalamarthedark]

The games making industry is a long hard thankless non-life.

True story.

[GoddamnElectric]

True - only those at the very top make decent money. Being in the business is really only for people who dont care so much about the pay, but want to enjoy their job no matter what it pays. Me, im going into IT law. Talk bollocks for a living

I couldn't do that again - my computing degree was the most souless, irritating, life draining waste of time I have ever bothered with.

* Vonnie thinks about finding her degree and setting it on fire....

[Funkmaster D]

Ahh, thanks for pointing this threat out Mister Dalamar.

One missing company from that list is Vis Entertainment - you'll find our website at http://www.visentertainment.com and much good may it do you. We could well be hiring at the moment, I'm not really sure. Another fairly major one missing is Rockstar Games, makers of GTA and so forth. http://www.rockstarnorth.com for a peek. These are the guys you really want to be working for, I know a few guys there, they really treat their staff well (but they'll work you hard too).

Anyway, I've worked in games for a few years now, and like Dalamar says, its not the best of jobs if you like having a life outside of work. Its coming up to Christmas now, and I'll be lucky to get a day or night off work until we knock off for the holidays. Crunch time, 24+ hour shifts, 7 day weeks, I've done the lot. That said, I've also seen my name in the credits for a million-selling game, sat and played it with my mates and had a good old time, met loads of good like-minded folks, and really stretched myself as a programmer. It pays for my bass guitars and keeps me in beer money (when I have time to play them or drink, of course).

Its some of the hardest programming you'll do, if you're a coder. There's hardly any women (sorry guys). Just be prepared to work yer bollocks/minge off, get paid less than folk working for banks or web companies, and you'll have a good idea of what its like.

Oh, artists also get paid even less!

If you've got any questions about my company in particular, working in games in general, or funky bass-playing, get in touch

[PapaZeb]

Cheers D for the info - I knew of Rockstar but this promotional material for some reason didn't include that. Hmmph!

[PapaZeb]

*cough bumpforthenonweekendbrowsers/getnew cough*

[PapaZeb]

Updated - cheers Padlock for a couple, including RareWare (Who accept students looking for a years placement!)

[Alick]

reflections interactive in newcastle is where i did my year out, games include destruction derby, stuntman, driver 1, driver 2 and driv3r

if no one can find the address i'll have it at home somewhere, so i'll hunt it down for tomorrow

[Zero]

Any thought on whether these companies would prefer written or emailed CVs?

[PapaZeb]

From chattin with a few of them last year, it's an either-or situation. I've got phone numbers if ya need 'em as well.

From what I've seen, most places prefer snailmail to email. More traditional, respectful, etc.

[Alick]

in my experience people i know in industry have mostly dealt with emailed cvs, if you're on livejournal the gamedevelopers community is pretty good for anything to do with industry, incl. how to get a job/placement http://www.livejournal.com/userinfo....gamedevelopers

[Zero]

I shall see if any are looking for a reasonable-physicist/mediocre-programmer.

[Alick]

haha my dissertation this year is on physics programming major fallback is my lack of art skills, which sucks since im not even being marked on art >:-(