“Indian video games market is on the cusp of becoming even bigger”: Ganesh Chaudhari, Technical Manager at Sumo Digital

The Indian video game market has seen a meteoric rise in community engagement and revenue over the past couple of years.

Esports, content creation, and even game development have been flourishing. Many industry leaders feel that this is just the beginning, and the ecosystem will go up and beyond in the coming years.

Ganesh Chaudhari, Technical Manager at Sumo Digital, has been quite vocal about his thoughts on where video games in India stand today and where they will be in the next five years.

In a conversation with Abhishek Mallick of Sportskeeda Esports, he opened up about his journey in the field and what Sumo Digital has in store now that it’s branching out to a studio in Bangalore.

Here is an excerpt of the conversation.

Q. Sir, with Sumo Digital looking to expand further in India and setting up a second studio in Bangalore, what can you tell us about this move and some of the organization’s expectations from this venture?

Ganesh Chaudhari: The new Sumo studio in Bangalore follows a continued period of growth worldwide for Sumo Digital and marks the developer’s second studio location in India. Along with the expansion of Sumo Pune, the new studio will provide even more opportunities to deliver specialist development services on multiple console titles.

Bangalore is India’s IT capital, with an existing pool of talent to work with and the skills and expertise to grow another world-class game development studio. We’re incredibly excited about this opportunity.

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Q. In a previous interview with me, Mr Stewart Neal, Studio Director at Sumo Digital, opened up about the potential of the Indian video game market and where it stands today. Can you talk to us about some of your thoughts on the matter and where you see the industry in the next five years?

Ganesh Chaudhari Over the past few years, the Indian video games market has shown significant growth, and I feel it is on the cusp of becoming even bigger. As a result of the pandemic, more Indians have been introduced to video games as immersive entertainment. This, in turn, has led to raised overall awareness of the Indian games industry as a robust and viable business opportunity.

Combine that with fresh Indian talent pursuing games development as a career, and we are looking at robust growth for the games market in the coming years.

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Q. Mobile gaming has always been at the forefront and the more popular option for gamers in India. And while PC gaming is slowly gaining steam with the help of certain titles like Valorant and Apex Legends, consoles haven’t been all that lucky. In the near future, do you predict a significant decrease in the disparity between these platforms?

Ganesh Chaudhari: If the waiting period for a PS5, which is the leading console in India, is any indicator, the disparity is eroding fast.

Console adoption by Indian gamers is aligned to the same trends seen in APAC. We are now witnessing console gaming rising exponentially in India, and it is likely to become more established in the coming years.

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Q. Spyder has been one of the most significant projects by the Pune division, which got positive responses from players worldwide. Can you shed some light on some of the development processes behind it and the hurdles you had to face in bringing this unique “spy game” to life?

Ganesh Chaudhari: The first thing that comes to mind when talking about Spyder is that it started as the winner of an internal Sumo Game Jam! This was a big motivator for the entire team throughout its development and successful launch on Apple Arcade.

One of the first challenges that the development process addressed was getting the Spyder-versus-the-world scale right. The game is played from the Spyder’s perspective, so keeping the play areas and the world proportionate was a top priority for the art, design, and engineering teams. It also drove gameplay development (including the puzzles).

The third-person camera and movement controls were challenging as the Spyder could walk on surfaces, climb walls, and move while hanging upside down from objects. Plus, there’s the necessity to support identical gameplay across iOS, tvOS, and macOS devices.

But the love shown for Spyder by gamers was worth overcoming all these challenges.

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Q. Talk to us a bit about your early career, your journey in the industry so far, and how you became the Technical Manager at Sumo Digital.

Ganesh Chaudhari: I started my career as a software engineer at Motorola India. Entertainment technology was always on my mind, so I segued into 3D animation training and freelancing for interactive 3D presentations with game engines.

I took to full-time game programming in early 2011 by joining MicroObjects Pvt Ltd’s game team at Kochi, where we made mobile games. I moved to Sumo Pune in 2015 when the engineering team was formed as one of the early starters.

Since then, I have worked with fantastic Sumo teams at Pune and in the UK on games like Snake Pass, Team Sonic Racing, and Forza Horizon 4 for consoles and PC. I have been Technical Manager for the Sumo Pune engineering team since 2020.

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Q. Apart from setting up an additional studio in Bangalore, Sumo Digital has also planned to expand significantly on their Pune branch. What are some of the things that you will be looking to improve there? What’s on the roadmap?

Ganesh Chaudhari: We obviously want to work on more games! The Engineering team at Sumo Pune is currently involved in co-developing more than ten games with other Sumo Group studios by working on exciting game programming features in areas such as gameplay, AI, graphics, networking, UI, and systems.

The plan is to strengthen the team’s core skills further, add fresh talent, and keep working on next-gen games for PC, consoles, and popular platforms, old and new.

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Q. What changes do you feel are necessary to help the console industry grow in India? Will the implementation of regional pricing and cross-platform play be viable solutions?

Ganesh Chaudhari: Sorry, I don’t think I can talk much about pricing, but cross-platform is an amazing deal! It cannot be implemented in every game, though.

Aside from this, continued improvements to internet infrastructure will also support console gaming growth. As the wider industry continues to adapt, it will support subscription models such as Xbox Game Pass, PS Now, and cloud gaming initiatives such as Xcloud.

It’s important that gamers in India have access to the robust connection needed to jump online and pick up where they left off.

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Q. Video games or esports, for that matter, are yet to be considered a mainstream sporting event in India. Do you think that it’s something that will be changing shortly?

Ganesh Chaudhari: I do. The Indian talent in video games and esports is catching up quickly with the rest of the world. YouTube, Twitch, and other social media tools provide them with the platform to reach their audience and connect with people who enjoy watching these games on a competitive level.

This, plus organizations working on esports events and promoting the esports culture in India, bodes well for the future and to gain mainstream popularity.

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Q. What do you feel about the Indian video games development scene? What are your thoughts on the nation’s developers and how you want to see them grow in the next couple of years?

Ganesh Chaudhari: The Indian video game development scene is vibrant and teeming with talent in all development disciplines. More youngsters than ever before are pursuing game development as a serious career path. It is one of the reasons why Sumo is opening a new studio in Bangalore and expanding in Pune.

It is great to see the Indian game development community continuing to raise the bar and make high-quality, exciting games for PC, consoles, mobiles, and other leading platforms.

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Q. What’s next for Sumo Pune and Sumo Bangalore? Are you and your team already working on your next IP?

Ganesh Chaudhari: True to the Sumo culture, we are working on many game projects across many genres and popular platforms with cutting-edge tech.

With Sumo Pune and Sumo Bangalore, we hope to add even more, with plenty of opportunities for team Sumo to work on specialized and all-around game programming.