Toonz Animation launches Game Development course

Toonz Animation on Wednesday announced the launch of Unity Game Development course and certification programme in Kerala.

A Technopark based company here, producing animated films and TV series for broadcasters both in India and abroad, Toonz is the first Unity Authorised Training Centre (UATC) and Unity Authorised Certification Centre in Kerala, and only the fifth in India. Unity is a cross-platform game engine developed by Unity Technologies and is used to develop video games for PC, consoles, mobile devices and websites. Rajesh Rao, Chairman of NASSCOM Gaming Forum, inaugurated the UATC at a function held in Technopark this morning.

"As per the Indian Gaming Market Review conducted by our forum along with App Annie, India is already in the global top 5 for game downloads, and it will grow further," he said.

The gaming industry in India is seeing exponential growth thanks to the unbridled spread of smartphones and rapid adoption of 4G with better internet speeds, he said.

Game Development in India is growing rapidly with around 250 game development companies in 2016 compared to just 20 in 2010, he said.

Talking to reporters, Rajesh said "Indians are more into discovering games now. We don t have enough qualified professional Game Developers and we need lot more people."

P Jayakumar, CEO of Toonz Media Group, said the course will help the participants enter the lucrative gaming industry. The Toonz Academy, started in 2002, has

produced some 6,000 animation professionals and has a very high placement rate of over 90 per cent and about 20 per cent are placed internally, he said.

Arvind Neelakantan, Product Evangelist, Unity Technologies (India), said, "Unity plays an important part in a booming global games market with over 40 per cent in Games and 80 per cent in VR (Virtual Reality)."