Mark Androvich 15:25 (BST)
30/05/2008

TIGA has welcomed the official opening of the 'White Space' learning and knowledge creation centre at Abertay University in Dundee - along with the Scottish Executive's provision of GPB 56,800 to help sponsor the 'Dare to be Digital' competition during the summer.

The White Space facility, a GPB 2.5 million development, is being used by computer arts and games students, PhD researchers, lecturers and businesses. It provides a learning and creative environment that encourages knowledge sharing, team working and technological and business development.

"Scotland has some great video game developers, including Realtime Worlds, Denki, Dynamo Games, Black, Outerlight, 4J Studios, Black Company Studios, Tag games and Rockstar North," said TIGA CEO Richard Wilson.

"Abertay's learning centre and the Dare to be Digital projects should help these and other games developers."

'Dare to be Digital' involves teams of five students, working in regional centres for 10 weeks to develop a prototype videogame. Approximately 100 teams of five are expected to take part throughout the country. 20 of these teams will go through to the full competition, which runs from June 4 to August 9.

"The Dare to be Digital programme is a fantastic scheme, with a great reputation in the games industry," Wilson said.

"It encourages promotion and learning about making videogames, it gives students a chance to work with some first class game development businesses and and it gives developers an opportunity to work with graduates before hiring them.

"This is a scheme that deserves further expansion."