London studio scores Birmingham Library contract

Birmingham Council has selected London outfit Preloaded to build a game for the City’s ambitious £189 million library.

Preloaded – which has worked for clients such as BBC, the Arts Council, Tate and Parliament – was selected from a pool of about twenty other applicants.

The group will now create a mobile and tablet application aimed to be an accompanying experience to the library, allowing users to search through the facility’s collections remotely.

At first a prototype will be made, afterwhich a review process will determine if the project will be fully funded and greenlit.

“There are lots of connections between libraries and electronic gaming: they are both all about discovery, fun and learning,” said Birmingham councillor Mike Whitby.

“This gaming experience is just one of the ways that the Library of Birmingham hopes to be able to attract new visitors and reflects the library’s intention to be a library for the twenty first century. We feel confident that Preloaded will create a concept that the public will love.”

Birmingham’s new library is scheduled to open 2013.