Sompom on Cambodia's nascent place in the Asian mobile game ecosystem

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Indie start-up is looking to make waves, Jon Jordan

There's a lot going on in Asia when it comes to mobile games.

There's the obvious attraction of billions of users, tens of millions of whom are quickly becoming middle-class consumers.

The other part of the play, however, is the development ecosystem, which is often being kickstarted by Western developers relocating for a better work-life-balance.

One such is Rudy Rosamont, who moved from France to Cambodia to set up Sompom, an indie mobile game developer which is working on its own games ranging from brain-training to fantasy.

Pocket Gamer: Can you give us some background about Sompom?

Rudy Rosamont: The heart of the company is a designer and a programmer. We thought that with the launch of the smartphone app stores there were new opportunities for small game developers to reach out directly to players and make a living.

Reality is not that simple but we believe the opportunity still exists.

Why Cambodia?

We were already established in Cambodia at the time we met and then started discussing the idea to make games. Jeremy - the programmer - was an IT manager in an outsourcing company and I had been an art director in France.

We gathered our resources and start working on an idea. We cancelled several project before our first game release Numbees.

What sort of games do you make?

Right now we group our different projects between three collections:

• 'Why so serious?' for edutainment games
• 'Singularity' for arcade/puzzle games
• 'Fantasy' for arcade/adventure games

In terms of the 'Why so serious?' collection (it's an unofficial name until the second game in the collection is released), the idea with Numbees and the world of Math was to make a game that provides classic arcade mechanics to practice math operations such as addition, subtraction and so on.



The first title in the Singularity collection is Brainsquare.

Our first Fantasy title is now in production. We will provide more information soon - the background uses Cambodian scenery and legends - and we are really proud of it.

Why did you decide to make a brain game?

In fact, it's the result of our brainstorming sessions. We had a lot of concepts, but being a young companies with limited resources, the budget was the most important thing for us.

Given those constraints, we started firing out ideas and after selecting the ideas we'd take onto prototyping, it appeared most of them were brain games based on logical and innovative mechanics or used puzzle-based mechanics .

The first game in that collection is Brainsquare and we have two other brain games to develop.

We believe Brainsquare will provide something new and entertaining. We also hope these games will be successful enough so we can invest resources into ideas and games that require higher budgets.

What markets are you focused on?

For Numbees and the world of Math, it's a global release for iOS, with the game localised into 11 languages.

For Brainsquare we will target both Android and iOS. The game will launch in English, French and Chinese, with Japanese to come.



In terms of iOS, localisation is pretty straightforward, but with Android, we have to deal with the different app stores - Google Play, Amazon or carrier billing for China - which requires a bit more work.

What's it like being a developer in Cambodia?

There are several companies making games in Cambodia, but not as their main activity. There are also some outsourcing companies working with Japanese game makers, and small teams of students and solo developers.

It's a great experience, though. Everything is starting and we are part of this growing movement.

We hope that we will have the opportunity, together with the help of other studios, to promote local talent and create new opportunity for building games.

Do you have much help from the government as a small business?

The company is self-funding with our savings. We are looking for various funding opportunities for our projects but it takes time. Things are moving faster than before, though. Cambodia is very well located in Asia. We are near Singapore, and China, Korea and Japan all have a strong presence in Cambodia.

About staff, it's not always easy to find experienced developers so we hire graduates from the IT university in Phnom Penh who have a strong interest in technology, smartphones or in games.

We are always looking for passionate and dedicated people, whether in terms of art or programming. .

What are your goals for the next 6-12 months?

We hope to have two new titles in the 'Why so serious?' collection released before the end of 2013. We also have another Numbees game - Numbees Quest - in development.

And our main goal and biggest project for the coming year is to release our first adventure title in the Fantasy collection.

Thanks to Rudy for his time.

source:

http://www.pocketgamer.biz/r/PG.Biz/Sompom+news/news.asp?c=55186