FXLabs to focus on movie-based games

FXLabs Studios, a Hyderabad-based developer of game products for PCs and video game consoles, is planning to focus more on games based on movie properties, said company founder and chairman, Sashi Reddi.

"The Indian film industry has been a strong supporter of animation and games, and all our future partnerships for games business will closely be tied to movies. We recently launched Jalsa, an online game based on the Pawan Kalyan-starrer Telugu movie, and our idea is to release one online game based on a movie every quarter," he told mediapersons here on Thursday.

FXLabs is a joint venture between Reddi, who is also the chairman and CEO of Philadelphia-based software testing firm AppLabs Technologies, and city-based Suresh Productions.

Thus far, around $7 million (Rs 28 crore) has been infused into the company, with half of it invested by Reddi in his personal capacity.

Announcing that AGNI, which the company claims to be the first video game designed and developed in India, will now be available in around 225 retail chain stores nationwide including Landmark, PlanetM, Music World, Crossword, Odyssey and Big Bazaar at Rs 499, Reddi said the company had struck a deal with US-based game publisher Merscom to market it in Russia, Poland and Hungary in their respective languages in the next few weeks. The company has also partnered Japak and Sify for online sales of AGNI.

An English version of AGNI will also be released in US and UK markets in the next three months. The company has spent around Rs 8 crore and two years in developing the game. At present, it is hard to assess the revenue generation and the company expects to get return on investments in the first year of the launch, he said.

"Mobile games is one equation which is missing in our portfolio and we are looking at different partners for foraying into this arena," Reddi said, while refusing to disclose more details.

FXLabs' video games based on Dhoom2, the Yash Raj Film's blockbuster, are slated for a release in the first week of next month, while Ghajini, which stars Aamir Khan, is expected by this year end.

The company has also signed an exclusive agreement with Archie Comics Entertainment for the development of the first video game based on Archie characters including Archie, Betty, Veronica, Judhead and Reggie, and the first game in the series, Archie's Riverdale Run, is expected to be released in August 2008, he added.

Nasscom has pegged the worldwide video and console gaming market at $29 billion, with India contributing a mere 0.25 per cent. With the increasing popularity of these games, the domestic market is set to touch $400-500 million by 2010.