Canada: Weâ??ll take your investment

Entertainment Software Association of Canada (ESOC) has sounded its battle cry in a new campaign to entice UK developers.

“We’ll take the best and the brightest,” said ESOC executive director Danielle Parr (pictured). “We’ll take your investment”.

In an interview with the BBC, Parr said “a lot of people are looking at Canada and are saying ‘how are they doing this’, ‘they are taking all our jobs’. But as I say all’s fair in love and work.”

Her comments come amid rising concerns that Canada is ramping up efforts to pull UK developers into North America.

TIGA CEO Richard Wilson says that Canada poses a “major threat to the UK”, while last year Sports Interactive boss Miles Jacobson told Develop that the UK’s dev migration North America was “massive”.

UK Culture minister Ed Vaizey has downplayed the threat, claiming that Britain’s longstanding culture of game development puts it on a “relatively level playing field” with Canada’s highly state-supported sector.

At the recent GameHorizon event, a number of British developers were outraged at being handed ‘mock Canadian Passports’ – a pamphlet which featured material that encouraged Brits to prosper with Canadian business partnerships.

Parr said that ESOC is “simply trying to promote the videogame industry in general, promote what Canada has to offer.”

She added: “We as a nation have made it a priority, and have invested a lot in this industry, and we’re hoping that will pay off with our continued growth, and our continued dominance in the videogame space”.