??/??/2004
Mark Overmars, developer of shareware engine GameMaker and professor at the University of Utrecht, publishes "Game Design in Education", where he pleads for both the inclusion of game design in education, as well as the use of GameMaker for this purpose. Following this publication, he gives a presentation called "Game Design in (IT) Education" in several locations, including the NIOC and a branche meeting for teachers. He repeatedly recommends GameMaker, which results in a lesson plan for teachers to give lessons using his engine.
??/??/2005
Davilex Games, the biggest Dutch developer and publisher at the time, folds. Tens of people lose their job.
??/??/2005
Mark Overmars starts the Utrecht Platform for Game Education and Research (UPGEAR). This branche organisation sits above and influences every noteworthy game design course in the Netherlands. In an interview, Mark talks about his plans to start a "Game Incubator":
"Hopefully companies will flow forth that we can allow to grow further in a still to construct Game Incubator (a concentration of startups, ed.)"
In the same year, Mark creates the Center for Advanced Gaming and Simulation (AGS) in conjunction with the University of Utrecht, TNO and HKU. Its goal is to further research into the field of serious games. Its first major achievement is securing €20.000.000,- in subsidies for the GAme research for Training and Entertainment project (GATE). GATE's stated goals are to form the biggest and best research center in Europe in the field of gaming, simulation and training purposes. GATE "researches serious gaming and develops serious games for education, health and safety".
??/??/2005
Crazyfoot Gamestudio ceases game development after releasing Eurocorps to lack of critical and financial success.
15/03/2006
In a press statement for the Dutch Gamedays 2006 event, Mark Overmars comments:
"This business sector in the Netherlands is, with atleast 375 million euro's in revenue, responsible for almost half of the total revenue in the games industry"
The number appears to have been reached by including the revenues of major electronica concerns such as Thales, as well as revenue already generated from the government. From here on, this number will be referred to as the 375m Claim.
02/06/2006
Centraal Planbureau (CPB) criticizes GATE as one of 14 out of 24 knowledge and innovation projects that encompass safety, health, sport, etc. These 14 companies, CPB projects, are unlikely to succeed despite receiving a total of €140.000.000,- in public funding from Fund of Economic Structurereinforcement Fund of Economic Structure Reinforcement (FES). GATE's original requested subsidies were €40.000.000,-, but were halved after concerns were raised by CPB about its odds of success.
??/01/2007
Mark Overmars becomes scientific director of the GATE program, a position he will hold until ??/01/2011. Under his direction, the program officially starts.
??/01/2007
Mark Overmars becomes co-director at YoYo Games. He will hold this position until ??/02/2015. YoYo Games becomes involved with development of GameMaker, and creates a user generated content website where users can submit and rate GameMaker creations.
??/??/2008
ECP.NL publishes "Gaming: more than a game" with the help of both the Ministry of Economics, as well as (among others listed) University of Utrecht, HKU, and Mark Overmars listed as advisors.
??/??/2008
Coded Illusions folds, 28 people lose their job.
??/??/2009
Triumph Studios drops a significant amount of employees in 2009 after lackluster sales of Overlord 2.
??/??/2009
Spellborn Works folds.
??/??/2009
Streamline Studios files for bankruptcy.
11/06/2009
Het Parool runs an article called "Dutch game industry grew tenfold". It claims the Dutch game industry has grown tenfold in the past seven years, and that the number of developers has grown from under 200 to 2000, according to NLGD.
(From here on out this will be referred to as the Tenfold Claim.)
Research bureau PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC) claims global game industry revenue between 2008-2013 will grow +-40%, to $73.500.000.000,-. It also claims Spil Games to be the biggest online gaming company in the world, alongside "important producers" such as Game Entertainment Europe and MMO Life.
??/??/2010
Playlogic files for bankruptcy after abysmal sales in 2009.
??/??/2010
Games Monitor 2010, a rapport backed by parties involved in Serious Games such as Montpellier Venture, Dutch Games Association, Dutch Game Garden, Control Magazine and Mark Overmars himself, echo positive sentiments about the revenue and growth in Serious Games. The rapport concludes with the threat of a lack of project managers and developers within Serious Games, and advises a growth in supply in both higher and mid level education. Data to support this presumption of growth is not given.
??/01/2011
Mark Overmars' time as scientific director of GATE ends. GATE failed to scientifically prove the effectiveness of serious games, thus failing in its mission statement.
??/07/2011
Gameskool is founded by, among others, Wouter Baars, who previously developed the education courses for game design in GameMaker.
??/08/2011
Mark Overmars becomes co-owner and advisor to Qlvr, a company that creates serious games for health and application. He holds this position to this day.
30/05/2012
id-magazine.nl publishes an article with Mark Overmars, confirming the use of GameMaker at the Utrecht of Utrecht in teaching game design by himself. He also confirms that YoYo Games, still co-owned by himself, publishes and markets GameMaker creations in collaboration with users.
??/09/2012
Games Monitor 2012 calls for "preparing our children for the rise of Serious (Games)." Emphasis is placed on the need to promote workshops, networking and sharing of knowledge. Data to support these presumptions is once again lacking.
??/10/2012
Mark Overmars becomes director and CTO of Tingly Games, a position he holds to this day.
07/09/2012
De Volkskrant runs articles called "'Job engine' mostly trains unemployed gamethinkers" and "Small-scaled gaming branch can't process enormous flood of 'gaming artists'". Research is cited by the Verwey-Jonkers Institute: It reveals that in 2012 mid level courses alone will produce over a thousand alumni in an industry with 2.500 to 3.000 working developers. Most startup companies only work with both a small amount of employees and profits. Combined with the global economic crisis, they predict an increased unemployment that won’t be remedied by government subsidies. The Verwey-Jonkers Institute concludes:
"Based on signals by our respondants respondents, the danger of a ‘pork cycle' seems realistic. By this we mean an economic mechanism from the agricultural sector, where supply and demand don’t come together well."
??/02/2015
Mark Overmars' position as co-director at YoYo games ends.
02/06/2015
Rogier Kahlmann publishes an article called "How popular are Serious Games actually?" He notes the fact that the effects of Serious Games haven’t been scientifically proven yet. Despite lack of evidence, journalists and policymakers are repeatedly told about the growth of the Dutch games industry, dubbing Utrecht the "Dutch Silicon Valley", with the Dutch Game Garden (DGG), a subsidized ‘incubator’ at its heart. DGG claims serious gaming in The Netherlands to have a €375.000.000,- revenue; "Nearly half of the total revenue in the games industry." This number is inflated by including general eletronica enterprises like Thales, which aren’t involved in the games industry, and government revenue.
Rogier comments that demands for upscaling and increased/continued subsidies from 2010 and 2012 have yet to be backed up. Yet, under the guise of renaming "Serious Games" as "Applied Games" (renaming being a common trend in the Dutch game industry), several millions of subsidies have once again been secured.
08/07/2015
Rogier Kahlmann publishes an article called "The beginning of a Dutch game bubble in an exchange of email). He publishes several leaked e-mails between Dutch game industry members and Yvonne Kikuchi; information manager for what is currently known as RVO, a division of the Ministry of Economic Affairs.
These e-mails, sent between 31/09/2009 and 14/09/2009 show that between the Dutch Games Association, NLGD, Newzoo, NFIA PWC, and EVD, the Tenfold Claim was echoed without providing original sources or data. Yvonne Kikuchi notes that she can find no numbers to back up the Tenfold Claim, as well as accurate prognoses for revenue and growth in 2009. Frank van Oirschot claims not to have these numbers.
Jurrie Hobers comments that several parties seem to have "cobbled together incomplete facts, opinions and explanations in a document", and that "At this point in time, every game company just ‘fills something in’ (IT? Software development? Etc…)." Seth van der Meer explains the unscientific research these numbers are based on: word of mouth, informal conversation and impartial enquiry. Nonetheless, the data by NLGD, GfK and PWC are recommended, despite the fact that "these numbers don’t add up or link together."
17/07/2015
Rogier Kahlmann publishes "The effects of nonsense", where he notes that the Tenfold Claim is in stark contrast to reality: 2005-2009 saw the end of seven major Dutch studios. Despite of that, the Tenfold Claim is widely echoed without sourced data up until 2014 in popular culture, industry circles, and even in PR for game industry schools. He repeats that several parties pushing the Tenfold Claim admitted to not knowing the source for this claim, as shown in the leaked e-mails involving Yvonne Kikuchi. Despite this lack of evidence, the claim was used in founding and funding several game design courses and incubators.
The result, Rogier argues, is an industry with +-170 studios, most of which are small indie studios that do not actively hire employees, or rent office space. Even the +-30 companies that are self sufficient rarely employ new developers, and most new hires are programmers. Little to no openings come up for designers and artists.
30/09/2015
Coinciding with the Control Conference and the Dutch Game Awards, Control Monitor 2015 releases its first results. Controvery controversy and conflict follows on social media, as its findings both mirror the 2012 findings by the Jonkers-Verwey institute, as well as validate negative predictions and observations about the Dutch game industry that had been widely denied in industry circles. For example, between 2011 and 2015, the rapport states that jobs have only increased from 3000 to 3130. The rapport also predicts that roughly 1350 students will graduate from game design courses in the Netherlands in 2015 alone.
01/10/2015
Dutch Game Garden comments on Control Monitor 2015, framing the statistics in a positive light. They claim the industry has grown from 330 companies in 2011, to 455 companies in 2015, a growth of 38%. They ignore the fact that most of these are startups by students that otherwise would be unemployed.
07/10/2015
Rogier Kahlmann publishes "Architect of a Crisis", criticising the role Mark Overmars played in several problems plaguing the Dutch games industry. The article ends on:
"Mark, above all else, is responsible for the creation and hype surrounding one profession: the all-round 2D game designer. A profession nobody ever asked for and nobody ever will. He presented game design as a low entry bar trade that everybody can practice; small scaled, feasible and autonomous. All of this with the underlying goal of promoting his own commercially available software that interlocks with that dream.
Many other schools through all of the Netherlands have followed the example of Utrecht and now also offer 4-year courses. Game design courses that are as inviting as they are useless. The result: masses of youth being trained for unemployment.
Mark now makes games, and as one of the few in the Netherlands, gets paid for it."
As of now, Mark Overmars has provided no comment.
~fin~
Mark Overmars, developer of shareware engine GameMaker and professor at the University of Utrecht, publishes "Game Design in Education", where he pleads for both the inclusion of game design in education, as well as the use of GameMaker for this purpose. Following this publication, he gives a presentation called "Game Design in (IT) Education" in several locations, including the NIOC and a branche meeting for teachers. He repeatedly recommends GameMaker, which results in a lesson plan for teachers to give lessons using his engine.
??/??/2005
Davilex Games, the biggest Dutch developer and publisher at the time, folds. Tens of people lose their job.
??/??/2005
Mark Overmars starts the Utrecht Platform for Game Education and Research (UPGEAR). This branche organisation sits above and influences every noteworthy game design course in the Netherlands. In an interview, Mark talks about his plans to start a "Game Incubator":
"Hopefully companies will flow forth that we can allow to grow further in a still to construct Game Incubator (a concentration of startups, ed.)"
In the same year, Mark creates the Center for Advanced Gaming and Simulation (AGS) in conjunction with the University of Utrecht, TNO and HKU. Its goal is to further research into the field of serious games. Its first major achievement is securing €20.000.000,- in subsidies for the GAme research for Training and Entertainment project (GATE). GATE's stated goals are to form the biggest and best research center in Europe in the field of gaming, simulation and training purposes. GATE "researches serious gaming and develops serious games for education, health and safety".
??/??/2005
Crazyfoot Gamestudio ceases game development after releasing Eurocorps to lack of critical and financial success.
15/03/2006
In a press statement for the Dutch Gamedays 2006 event, Mark Overmars comments:
"This business sector in the Netherlands is, with atleast 375 million euro's in revenue, responsible for almost half of the total revenue in the games industry"
The number appears to have been reached by including the revenues of major electronica concerns such as Thales, as well as revenue already generated from the government. From here on, this number will be referred to as the 375m Claim.
02/06/2006
Centraal Planbureau (CPB) criticizes GATE as one of 14 out of 24 knowledge and innovation projects that encompass safety, health, sport, etc. These 14 companies, CPB projects, are unlikely to succeed despite receiving a total of €140.000.000,- in public funding from Fund of Economic Structurereinforcement Fund of Economic Structure Reinforcement (FES). GATE's original requested subsidies were €40.000.000,-, but were halved after concerns were raised by CPB about its odds of success.
??/01/2007
Mark Overmars becomes scientific director of the GATE program, a position he will hold until ??/01/2011. Under his direction, the program officially starts.
??/01/2007
Mark Overmars becomes co-director at YoYo Games. He will hold this position until ??/02/2015. YoYo Games becomes involved with development of GameMaker, and creates a user generated content website where users can submit and rate GameMaker creations.
??/??/2008
ECP.NL publishes "Gaming: more than a game" with the help of both the Ministry of Economics, as well as (among others listed) University of Utrecht, HKU, and Mark Overmars listed as advisors.
??/??/2008
Coded Illusions folds, 28 people lose their job.
??/??/2009
Triumph Studios drops a significant amount of employees in 2009 after lackluster sales of Overlord 2.
??/??/2009
Spellborn Works folds.
??/??/2009
Streamline Studios files for bankruptcy.
11/06/2009
Het Parool runs an article called "Dutch game industry grew tenfold". It claims the Dutch game industry has grown tenfold in the past seven years, and that the number of developers has grown from under 200 to 2000, according to NLGD.
(From here on out this will be referred to as the Tenfold Claim.)
Research bureau PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC) claims global game industry revenue between 2008-2013 will grow +-40%, to $73.500.000.000,-. It also claims Spil Games to be the biggest online gaming company in the world, alongside "important producers" such as Game Entertainment Europe and MMO Life.
??/??/2010
Playlogic files for bankruptcy after abysmal sales in 2009.
??/??/2010
Games Monitor 2010, a rapport backed by parties involved in Serious Games such as Montpellier Venture, Dutch Games Association, Dutch Game Garden, Control Magazine and Mark Overmars himself, echo positive sentiments about the revenue and growth in Serious Games. The rapport concludes with the threat of a lack of project managers and developers within Serious Games, and advises a growth in supply in both higher and mid level education. Data to support this presumption of growth is not given.
??/01/2011
Mark Overmars' time as scientific director of GATE ends. GATE failed to scientifically prove the effectiveness of serious games, thus failing in its mission statement.
??/07/2011
Gameskool is founded by, among others, Wouter Baars, who previously developed the education courses for game design in GameMaker.
??/08/2011
Mark Overmars becomes co-owner and advisor to Qlvr, a company that creates serious games for health and application. He holds this position to this day.
30/05/2012
id-magazine.nl publishes an article with Mark Overmars, confirming the use of GameMaker at the Utrecht of Utrecht in teaching game design by himself. He also confirms that YoYo Games, still co-owned by himself, publishes and markets GameMaker creations in collaboration with users.
??/09/2012
Games Monitor 2012 calls for "preparing our children for the rise of Serious (Games)." Emphasis is placed on the need to promote workshops, networking and sharing of knowledge. Data to support these presumptions is once again lacking.
??/10/2012
Mark Overmars becomes director and CTO of Tingly Games, a position he holds to this day.
07/09/2012
De Volkskrant runs articles called "'Job engine' mostly trains unemployed gamethinkers" and "Small-scaled gaming branch can't process enormous flood of 'gaming artists'". Research is cited by the Verwey-Jonkers Institute: It reveals that in 2012 mid level courses alone will produce over a thousand alumni in an industry with 2.500 to 3.000 working developers. Most startup companies only work with both a small amount of employees and profits. Combined with the global economic crisis, they predict an increased unemployment that won’t be remedied by government subsidies. The Verwey-Jonkers Institute concludes:
"Based on signals by our respondants respondents, the danger of a ‘pork cycle' seems realistic. By this we mean an economic mechanism from the agricultural sector, where supply and demand don’t come together well."
??/02/2015
Mark Overmars' position as co-director at YoYo games ends.
02/06/2015
Rogier Kahlmann publishes an article called "How popular are Serious Games actually?" He notes the fact that the effects of Serious Games haven’t been scientifically proven yet. Despite lack of evidence, journalists and policymakers are repeatedly told about the growth of the Dutch games industry, dubbing Utrecht the "Dutch Silicon Valley", with the Dutch Game Garden (DGG), a subsidized ‘incubator’ at its heart. DGG claims serious gaming in The Netherlands to have a €375.000.000,- revenue; "Nearly half of the total revenue in the games industry." This number is inflated by including general eletronica enterprises like Thales, which aren’t involved in the games industry, and government revenue.
Rogier comments that demands for upscaling and increased/continued subsidies from 2010 and 2012 have yet to be backed up. Yet, under the guise of renaming "Serious Games" as "Applied Games" (renaming being a common trend in the Dutch game industry), several millions of subsidies have once again been secured.
08/07/2015
Rogier Kahlmann publishes an article called "The beginning of a Dutch game bubble in an exchange of email). He publishes several leaked e-mails between Dutch game industry members and Yvonne Kikuchi; information manager for what is currently known as RVO, a division of the Ministry of Economic Affairs.
These e-mails, sent between 31/09/2009 and 14/09/2009 show that between the Dutch Games Association, NLGD, Newzoo, NFIA PWC, and EVD, the Tenfold Claim was echoed without providing original sources or data. Yvonne Kikuchi notes that she can find no numbers to back up the Tenfold Claim, as well as accurate prognoses for revenue and growth in 2009. Frank van Oirschot claims not to have these numbers.
Jurrie Hobers comments that several parties seem to have "cobbled together incomplete facts, opinions and explanations in a document", and that "At this point in time, every game company just ‘fills something in’ (IT? Software development? Etc…)." Seth van der Meer explains the unscientific research these numbers are based on: word of mouth, informal conversation and impartial enquiry. Nonetheless, the data by NLGD, GfK and PWC are recommended, despite the fact that "these numbers don’t add up or link together."
17/07/2015
Rogier Kahlmann publishes "The effects of nonsense", where he notes that the Tenfold Claim is in stark contrast to reality: 2005-2009 saw the end of seven major Dutch studios. Despite of that, the Tenfold Claim is widely echoed without sourced data up until 2014 in popular culture, industry circles, and even in PR for game industry schools. He repeats that several parties pushing the Tenfold Claim admitted to not knowing the source for this claim, as shown in the leaked e-mails involving Yvonne Kikuchi. Despite this lack of evidence, the claim was used in founding and funding several game design courses and incubators.
The result, Rogier argues, is an industry with +-170 studios, most of which are small indie studios that do not actively hire employees, or rent office space. Even the +-30 companies that are self sufficient rarely employ new developers, and most new hires are programmers. Little to no openings come up for designers and artists.
30/09/2015
Coinciding with the Control Conference and the Dutch Game Awards, Control Monitor 2015 releases its first results. Controvery controversy and conflict follows on social media, as its findings both mirror the 2012 findings by the Jonkers-Verwey institute, as well as validate negative predictions and observations about the Dutch game industry that had been widely denied in industry circles. For example, between 2011 and 2015, the rapport states that jobs have only increased from 3000 to 3130. The rapport also predicts that roughly 1350 students will graduate from game design courses in the Netherlands in 2015 alone.
01/10/2015
Dutch Game Garden comments on Control Monitor 2015, framing the statistics in a positive light. They claim the industry has grown from 330 companies in 2011, to 455 companies in 2015, a growth of 38%. They ignore the fact that most of these are startups by students that otherwise would be unemployed.
07/10/2015
Rogier Kahlmann publishes "Architect of a Crisis", criticising the role Mark Overmars played in several problems plaguing the Dutch games industry. The article ends on:
"Mark, above all else, is responsible for the creation and hype surrounding one profession: the all-round 2D game designer. A profession nobody ever asked for and nobody ever will. He presented game design as a low entry bar trade that everybody can practice; small scaled, feasible and autonomous. All of this with the underlying goal of promoting his own commercially available software that interlocks with that dream.
Many other schools through all of the Netherlands have followed the example of Utrecht and now also offer 4-year courses. Game design courses that are as inviting as they are useless. The result: masses of youth being trained for unemployment.
Mark now makes games, and as one of the few in the Netherlands, gets paid for it."
As of now, Mark Overmars has provided no comment.
~fin~