The Federal Ministry of Economics (BMWK) has recognized the potential behind the topic of computer and video games.

Germany is the fifth largest sales market in the world for games.

But only 4 percent of sales in Germany goes to German developer studios and publishers.

That is why the Federal Ministry of Economics has set itself the goal of promoting the developer culture with 50 million euros annually.

Gregory Bruner

Editor in Business.

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Not only that young projects and spin-offs should be given a chance.

The ministry also wants to encourage multinational game companies to open branches with several hundred developers in Germany that produce games with global resonance.

German games industry should grow

So far, Germany's gaming landscape has been dominated by medium-sized companies.

Employee numbers of up to 100 developers are the norm.

Larger studios in America, France and China have several hundred developers.

A key reason for the higher numbers: Production costs are lower elsewhere.

Canada, for example, operates a tax refund system if a studio makes a loss in a year.

This is good for start-ups, because the development of a game takes three to four years on average.

Years in which no money is made.

In Germany, companies do not receive any repayments during this time, they simply do not have to pay any taxes.

Isolated lighthouses

According to the BMWK, the funding should offer an equivalent to the repayments.

He is joined by the federal states, many of which have their own funding programs, each with their own amounts, applications and criteria.

One of the greatest German successes of state funding is probably the Hamburg studio Daedalic Entertainment, whose games such as "Edna breaks out" or the "Deponia" series have fans all over the world.

In an interview with the FAZ, founder and boss Carsten Fichtelmann remembers the early days of the studio: "In the beginning, we were helped by the support of the city of Hamburg, which recognized the potential of games earlier than others." Portfolio prices and is currently working on the title "Gollum" under the "Lord of the Rings" license.

However, according to perception, there are still no other German lighthouse studios that shine out into the world.

“Everyone would like to have the one studio that produces internationally acclaimed games with big budgets.

But that doesn't really work out," says Petra Fröhlich, editor-in-chief of the FAZ's Gameswirtschaft magazine

Example Poland

Poland has the lighthouse.

The development studio CD Projekt Red became internationally known with the games of the Witcher series.

The company also operates the digital games retailer “Good Old Games”.

At the booth of the Polish games industry at Gamescom, one learns that the studio's success certainly attracts personnel from other countries to Poland.

A census in 2019 came to about 1000 foreign developers.

In the meantime, this number has doubled, but this is also due to the influx of refugees from Ukraine.

The country also has many start-ups.

Around 450 studios are currently active in the country.

The conditions for starting a business are easy, they say.

In addition, there is now a central office for the development of creative industries, which is attached to the technology section of the Prime Minister's Office.

Many medium-sized companies in Switzerland

In Switzerland, the promotion of the games industry is assigned to the cultural sector.

Oliver Miescher from the Pro Helvetia Foundation also describes the Swiss gaming landscape as more medium-sized.

However, that is not bad.

Switzerland's strengths lie more in creativity and a very good infrastructure.

Founding a company is easy, the training in Switzerland is excellent and the networks for developers are very accessible.

"The game culture in Switzerland is only ten or twelve years old," says Miescher.

"But it's growing rapidly." Ten years ago, the country had around 10 studios, now there are around 150. As in Poland, the funding here is centralized.

They are also characterized by flexibility.

Developers can approach the foundation at different stages and ask for funding, be it for a start or in further growth phases.

Meager grants

Germany contrasts these examples with a very federal system.

The individual countries with their funding pots have budgets of 900,000 to 2.8 million euros.

The biggest sponsor is Berlin-Brandenburg.

Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria, Lower Saxony and North Rhine-Westphalia are also presenting support programs designed to lure developers to the respective corners of Germany.

Different locations emphasize different advantages.

Brandenburg is trying to advertise itself with residency programs away from the big cities.

In Baden-Württemberg, the quality of the universities is emphasized.


However, the financial incentives of the federal states and the federal government remain small.

The largest grant from the federal government is 2.5 million euros.

Those of the countries are disproportionately lower.

If you look at the production costs of large game titles amounting to several hundred million euros, the funding programs seem like a drop in the ocean.