Meet the visionaries behind BAFTA-nominated Gaming titles driving a £6bn Industry

But what sorts of games are being made in the UK and who is making them?

This week, RT shines a light on some of the most influential people in an industry that can often feel overlooked, focusing on the six nominees for best British game at this year's BAFTA Games Awards.

Xu Xiaojun – Game Director and Studio Head on LEGO Horizon Adventures

What are your earliest gaming memories?

My earliest memory is in Shanghai, where I grew up. I remember going to a barbers' shop. There was a black-and-white TV set up at the back – probably as a side hustle for the owners. So, while you were waiting to get your haircut, you could pay for maybe ten minutes of gaming. They had Contra and all the classics.

How did you become a game developer yourself?

I got into gaming via the computer science route, because we didn't have any proper gaming degrees or education back in China them. I managed to find an internship at a game website, then got my first job as a level designer at Ubisoft [the video game publisher that created Assassin's Creed].

Where are you now?

Studio Gobo – we are a team based in Brighton. We developed it together with Guerrilla Games, who are based in Amsterdam, but the bulk of the development team is here in the UK. There's about 125 people working on this game.

What advice would you give to others interested in gaming as a career?

Pursue what you are good at and don't feel you have to take up a different subject. Artists are always wanted, designers are always wanted. Music composition, sound design, engineering…

How would you describe your game?

In three works: LEGO robot dinosaurs. That is, essentially, what it is. Horizon [the Sony-owned action game franchise] is all about futuristic giant machines in a majestic landscape, and LEGO Horizon Adventures is a friendlier version of that.

How does it feel to be BAFTA-nominated?

It's an incredible honour. This is the first game that we've really made – to be nominated with our first attempt is just amazing recognition.

LEGO Horizon Adventures is available on PC, PS5 and Switch.

Dom Matthews – Studio Head on Senua's Saga: Hellblade 2

What are your early gaming memories?

I was really young. My brother got a Spectrum Sinclair 48k and I remember playing Barbarian on that, and I just absolutely fell in love with games. It was the thing that I was known for at school. I was the gaming guy.

How did you turn that passion into a career as a game developer?

I had a very different route. I studied economics at university. After that, I found my way into PR and marketing. And them, one day, I saw a job advert from Capcom, who made Resident Evil, which I absolutely loved. I went for the job. Rest is history.

What advice would you give others interested in gaming as a career?

Follow your passion. There are so many tools and ways of learning that are free. Do your research, watch videos from the Game Developers Conference, download Unreal Engine [a 3D creation tool], play around with it and make things in your spare time.

Where are you based?

Our studio, Ninja Theory, is based in Cambridge, and we're a team of about 100 people. One of the things that makes it particularly British is that we've got a pub at the bottom of our building.

How would you describe your game?

It's a story-led, character-led journey into Viking heartland in Iceland, with a character who experiences psychosis.

How does it feel to be BAFTA-nominated?

Incredible. These are the most important awards in the games industry. Suddenly your friends and family, who have never really paid attention to what you do before, start to take notice.

Senua's Saga: Hellblade 2 is available on PC and Xbox Series X/S.

Jon Ingold and Joseph Humphrey – Writer and Director of A Highland Song

What are your early gaming memories?

JON – I started playing text adventure games in the 1980s, which were stories that you typed into and got a story back from.

JOSEPH – I had a Mac, which had a niche set of games like Escape Velocity and Monkey Island.

How did you become game developers?

JON – I started off making games on my own for quite a few years, then I got a job in a studio and learnt how bigger games were made. That's where I met Joe, and then we founded our company, Inkle Studios.

Where are you based?

JON – The company is based in Cambridge but the game is very much a love letter to the Highlands and to Scottish history and mythology. We also have music from two of Scotland's greatest folk bands, Talisk and Fourth Moon.

JOSEPH – I'm pseudo-Scottish. I was born and grew up in Scotland but my parents are English. I spent a lot of time in the Highlands as a kid, and that was the main inspiration for the game.

What advice would you give others interested in gaming as a career?

JOSEPH – If you really want to get a job in the game industry, you need to have a really strong portfolio. A game company is more likely to hire you based on the work that you've done, maybe in your spare time, than what degree you've done at university.

How would you describe your game?

JON – There's that classic conversation we always have, where we tell people we make games. And they say , "Oh is it about murdering or stealing cars?" And we're like, "No it's about hiking in the Scottish Highlands." It couldn't be more different.

How does it feel to be BAFTA-nominated?

JOSEPH – BAFTA is one of the very few institutions that brings credibility to the games industry. Because even now, I think games have a little bit of a struggle compared with films, books and TV. So the work that BAFTA does, and the opportunities they give to indies like us, is incredible.

A Highland Song is available on PC, Mac and Switch.

Laura Dodds – Associate Art Director on Still Wakes the Deep

What are your early gaming memories?

I always had a big love of film and television, but there's this excitement when you put a game into someone's hands and you just don't know what they're going to do. It was that joy of the unexpected that drove me into games.

How did you get into the games industry?

I studied at the National Film and Television School and then I did a Games Design masters – that gave me some of the skills and some industry contacts. It all just sort of grew from there.

What advice would you give to others interested in gaming as a career?

I had no idea how to get into games. It just seemed like this kind of magical realm. There are lots of different ways into the industry, but if you can find a course that suits you, that was certainly my route in.

How would you describe your game?

It's kind of like a 1970s kitchen-sink drama, set on an oil rig, where things start to go horrible wrong. It takes you on this journey from being quite grounded in reality at the beginning and then there are more transcendental, strange, cosmic horror elements as the game goes on.

Still Wakes the Deep is available on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S.

Henry Hoffmann – Game Director of Paper Trail

What are your early gaming memories?

I've been playing games since I was five. I used to sneak out of bed in the middle of the night and play the Nintendo Entertainment System. I'd stay up all night, then I'd have to go to school the next day and pretend that I'd gone to sleep.

How did you become a game developer?

From the ages of about nine until 16, I made hundreds of games in my spare time, using game-making tools that you could download for free or, at the time, get on the cover of magazines. I experimented for all those years and then I went to university to study video games, art and design. I started my first studio when I was at university.

Where are you based?

We're based in Norwich. Me and my brother, Fred, founded our studio, Newfangled Games, together. We grew up in rural Suffolk in this little town called Halesworth.

What advice would you give others interested in gaming as a career?

Take part in "game jams", these little competitions that are either held online or in person, where groups of individuals get together and make games in a very short space of time. Nearly every game that I've made started life as a game jam.

How would you describe your game?

It's an origami-inspired, top-down adventure game. The levels are these two-dimensional pieces of paper, and there's a level on the front and a level on the back. You can physically fold those levels over in order to merge the two worlds.

How does it feel to be BAFTA-nominated?

Absolutely insane. We're a team of five, but we started as a team of two, so we feel very much out of our depth. But BAFTA has been supportive from the very start.

Paper Trail is available on PC, Mac, PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, Switch and mobile.

Will Todd – Co-Creator of Thank Goodness You're Here!

What are your early gaming memories?

I've been into games for as long as I can remember, really. My super early memories are in a Wacky Warehouse kind of place, with PlayStation 1 stations set up with games like Crash Bandicoot and Spyro the Dragon.

How did you become a developer?

I studied gaming at college and university with more of a programming focus. After graduating, I realised that my school friend, James Carbutt [on the right in the picture, with Todd, left], had a complementary skill set. He was a really good illustrator and animator. So we sat down together one weekend. That weekend has lasted six years.

Where are you based?

We're in London now, but we were originally from the north of England. Barnseley in South Yorkshire was our inspiration – Barnsworth in the game is a very thinly veiled homage to it.

How would you describe your game?

It's a sort of surreal and imagined version of our hometown. You arrive as a salesman and you've got some time to kill. The Townsfolk inexplicably have a series of increasingly farcical odd jobs for you to do, and it all spirals out of control from there. We call it a comedy slap-former, so a slapstick platformer.

How does it feel to be BAFTA-nominated?

The fact that it resonated with anyone outside of Barnsley is incredible. It's really amazing to be recognised by our peers and for our debut to be received so well.

Thank Goodness You're Here! Is available on PC, Mac, PS5, PS4 and Switch

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