2009 has been a good year for TIGA, with the last 12 months having been TIGA’s finest since the organisation was launched back in 2001. The reasons why TIGA feels it’s able to look back and feel proud? Well for one they have campaigned long and hard for games tax relief, with TIGA playing a key role in getting it implemented in the March 2010 budget. That led to support being received from Labour, Liberal Democrat and Conservative minister who may have not taken the issue seriously if not for TIGA’s involvement.
Other achievements TIGA manage to accomplish were: “[organising] a number of trade events, helped to raise awareness of gaming in the national press and was instrumental in the creation of the parliamentary All Party Computer and Video Games Industry Group.”
There is however, another important accomplishment that shows how TIGA has gone to great efforts to improve the industry and that is supporting Train2Game.
Having seen potential in Train2Game’s aim in creating more skilled people to work in the video games industry, TIGA put the course to the test to see if it could pass being benchmarked against the Qualifications Credit Framework. The results were that TIGA (along with The Universities of Bedfordshire and Portsmouth) were satisfied, with the designer, developer (and now artist and animator) courses equivalent to the final stage of Higher National Diploma Study or the first two years of a Bachelor's Degree.
This has gone a long way in helping Train2Game grow, as evident by the introduction of the art and animation course and continue to attract potential students who feel they have something to give back to the Industry.
So we at Train2Game would like to thank everyone at TIGA for their support, what they have done of the UK video game industry and what they will do in the future.
You can check out the full story here: http://www.train2game.com/Games-Design-News/Gaming-Industry-News/TIGA-hails-2009-achievements$19775731.html
