Taiwan's VR technology shines the world! Futuretown, III-backed VR team, launched on the world's largest VR gaming platform in June!
Date: 2016/06/08
Taiwan's VR technology wins praises around the world! With the support of Industrial Development Bureau (IDB) of the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA), Futuretown, a VR development team backed by the Digital Education Institute (DEI), was invited in March by Valve, the parent company of the world's largest VR gaming platform SteamVR, to attend the world's prominent annual gaming convention, the Game Developers Conference (GDC*) in San Francisco. The team received a lot of positive compliments at GDC. It has also recently launched three games, "Jeeboman", "A-10 VR", and "Cloudlands: VR Minigolf", on SteamVR. The games enjoyed good reviews among attendees, and Jeeboman was named "one of the best VR gaming experiences... ever" by the world's largest technology review website- Engadget.
In fact, Valve had invited only 10 VR teams from around the world to the world's largest gaming convention, GDC Expo, this year. Valve had also supplied each team with its own demonstration space. Futuretown, led by CEO Johan Yang, was the only VR team from Taiwan. CEO Johan Yang pointed out that Futuretown has grown to 25 employees, and apart from technical personnel from Taiwan, the multinational team also consisted of members from Brazil, Japan, and Canada. Having people from different cultures and backgrounds working together was credited as one of Futuretown's sources of inspiration for games and other ideas.
It is worth noting that Futuretown was invited to join other gaming communities in Taiwan's private sector at the International Game Developers Association (IGDA) on July 1 and July 2, and to be a part of the campaign to launch Taiwan's largest professional gaming forum, Taipei Game Developers Forum (TGDF**). In addition, Futuretown will speak at the same venue as Alex Schwartz, founder of Owlchemy Labs, who developed Unity VR Award nominee Job Simulator, Kiyoshi Shin, director of Tokyo VR Startup, and other noted VR developers and VR venture capital firms from around the world. Futuretown will share its experience in VR development and try to attract more investment into VR development in Taiwan.
The DEI, supervised by IDB MOEA, has been promoting VR applications in Taiwan through meetings, workshops, hackathons, and application integration of hardware/software suppliers as means to encourage digital content providers to transform and upgrade their businesses. According to III DEI Deputy Director General I-Chang Tsai, Taiwan's digital innovation process has reached a turning point. Progress is constantly being made in VR, AR and other innovative hardware/software. III indeed will keep encouraging local digital content providers to advance toward integration of advanced technologies and playing a supportive role at conventions not only in Taiwan but also in other countries in order to explore blue ocean strategies in the international digital content market.
* Game Developers Conference
Originally called the Computer Game Developers Conference (CGDC), the first conference was organized in 1988. The CGDC changed its name to "Game Developers Conference" (GDC) in 1999. The GDC is also used for the annual meeting of the International Game Developers Association (IGDA). In 2005, the GDC moved to the new Moscone Center in San Francisco's southern district. The GDC changes venues from time to time, but mostly takes place in San Francisco in spring. The GDC is now a popular annual gathering of professionals in the video game industry from around the world. In addition to offering seminars, forums, and tutorials, the GDC showcases independent games, presents awards for video game developers, and hosts professional video game expos, networking events and a variety of other activities.
** Taipei Game Developers Forum
The Taipei Game Developers Forum (TGDF) is Taiwan's largest forum of professional video game developers. It is founded and managed by DEI and video game communities in Taiwan's private sector. TGDF attracts hundreds of video game developers from around the world every year. It provides a venue for participants to discuss programs, arts, planning, product operations, social media management and other video game related topics.
Caption: The III-backed VR team, Futuretown, was invited to GDC, the world's largest game developers’ conference. The photo shows a screenshot from Futuretown's game, "Cloudlands: VR Minigolf".
【Media Contact】
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