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As we visit Iceland towards the end of 2009, its financial problems of 2008 are still the focus of worldwide media attention, to the extent that the closure of the country’s two McDonald’s restaurants makes headline news. But the people living here are looking forward, not back, and working on building industries to which their national character is more naturally suited.
If the place you call home is a volcanic island prone to unpredictable circumstances, you have to be able to adapt to the environment. “You have to be a jack of all trades and you have to be able to adapt quickly and be solution-oriented,” says Hilmar Veigar Pétursson, CEO of Eve Online creator CCP. “These are attributes of Iceland, and if you look at what industries these types of attributes and behavioural patterns apply to, obviously it isn’t banking. Our character is more fitting with creative things – that’s why we make music, we write books.”
Increasingly, it’s about making videogames, too. New Icelandic game companies are emerging at a cracking rate, and there is no shortage of investors and government initiatives eager to lend their support. It all adds up to perhaps the most intoxicatingly energetic game development scene we’ve witnessed since we began our journey across the globe for the Region Specific series. Iceland’s fast food options may be marginally thinner on the ground nowadays, but its game industry is too focused on its craft to even notice.