Online gaming goes Bollywood savvy

Durgesh Gupta - Televisionpoint.com | Mumbai
Have you ever wondered if you could play hero in your favourite blockbuster? Might be out of the question in real life, but don't lose hope if you're a gamer. The booming gaming industry, besides eyeing Bollywood for content, is coming up with exciting options like the one where the gaming geeks can slip into character themselves.

Interestingly, most of these games have all the thrills and even the trademark songs and dance sequences of the respective films. Gaming sites like Games2win.com primarily focus on Indian flash games. Such sites apart from the films create games based on the latest news and events in the country.

Last month they came up with Singh is King, a game, which has Prime Minister Manmohan Singh as a substitute of Akshay Kumar trying hard not to woo Katrina Kaif, but to save himself from losing MPs. It is set in Delhi.

Speaking to Televisionpoint.com, Alok Kejriwal, co-founder, Games2win.com, says, "The gaming industry is growing massively. And seeing the potential, even the advertisers are extending huge support. Therefore, lots of innovations are required to beat the competition."

The fad may be new for India, but even Hollywood blockbusters like King Kong, The Incredibles and Star Wars have already been made into computer games. But what makes the Indian market special for PC and Internet gaming?

According to experts, while in the US, the average age of gamers is between 28 to 35, on the other hand, Indian gamers are essentially teenagers, to whom the newly addictive world of gaming has been revealed relatively recently. Experts also believe that the potential of the industry is immense and as the technology evolves, the format of the games will also develop.

Already there are games made on like Tamil and Bengali films. Alok agrees that the main reason why consumers like these games is the fondness for Bollywood. He says, "These games are evergreen and can be played repeatedly."

A woman plays the protagonist of the story in the latest launched PC game Agni - Queen of Darkness of FXLabs. The story revolves around a mother who loses her child at the hands of the denizens of underworld. To have a stronger connect with the Indian audience, FXLabs chose Malaika Arora as the ambassador for their game.

"Indian audience do connect themselves with the themes, which revolve around family-oriented issues especially when it involves mother and a child. Our main focus is to introduce gaming to a different segment of people such as movie-goers and non-gamers," says Sashi Reddi, founder and chairman, FXLabs Studios.

"I believe that building games with local content will help us break through this barrier. And what better local content than Bollywood, which is as old as any other industry in the world. My belief is that once games based on Bollywood, borrowing many of the successful aspects of the film industry, hit the market Indian youth will embrace gaming as another great form of entertainment." Sashi explains.

After all, gaming is as big as films in many parts of the world. In India too, I think we will see gaming become mainstream as the industry puts out games for the mainstream audience. Once Bollywood games show the way then I believe that other genres of games will have an easier time succeeding in the Indian market. So far the responses from the industry have been positive," adds Sashi.

Another such hit biker-game was Dhoom 2, again based in film of same name. It has the entire characterisation of the film. Bollywood Buckwass film has a Salman Khan look-a-like trying to avoid shooting black bucks in a jungle. It sounds like a perfect symbiotic relationship.

Some of the India's well-known production houses are planning tie-ups with foreign as well as Indian software companies to produce movies based on video games. So, for all those waiting for Aamir Khan's Ghajini, also get ready for launch is its game version, where the protagonist is the animated version of Aamir.