CODE announces first Service Start Grant supporting service businesses in game development

CODE is very pleased to announce Niberspace Ltd. is the first team to be awarded the Service Start Grant, a specialist, on demand grant around supporting service businesses in the game development sector, ideally developing original IP in Aotearoa New Zealand.

Pictured: NiberSeries City

Niklas Bergstrom has professional experience as an Unreal Tech Artist approaching twenty years, which is at the exact stage where he finally knows, from experience, the best way to approach the creation of every level asset. 

Having been part of teams shipping over twenty commercial games, Niklas noticed a clear pattern of assets and technical solutions required to build levels/cities which he has approached in every conceivable way.

Niklas approached CODE back in the early days in 2020, when we were in the depths of the pandemic and the video game development industry was in a very different place than it is now. 

CODE was not originally set up to facilitate technical services businesses but it became clear early on with our interactions with Niklas, that he had a passion for the tools design and processes rather than just the content of the game.

As such he has created NiberSeries:

NiberSeries is a product-line of semi-procedural assets for Unreal Engine, to be sold on Fab (formerly known as Epic Marketplace). Each product is sold individually and can be useful to make a game/environment, but can also be combined to generate and populate entire cities.

Pictured: Combining NiberSeries pedestrian pathways, traffic, roadways and houses.

For example a traffic-, crowds- or buildings-pack can be used to spawn/animate its assets along a simple spline. Which could be useful for someone who already has a city that they merely want to spawn some crowds in the background for.

Niberspace Ltd. is the first team to be awarded the Service Start Grant, a specialist, on demand grant around supporting service businesses in the game development sector, ideally developing original IP in New Zealand.

Pictured L-R: Niklas Bergstrom, Founder of Niberspace Ltd; NiberSeries City

Niklas is a games industry veteran with over nineteen years of industry experience and has worked on over twenty released commercial video-games. He started out as an Environment Artist but has since worked exclusively as a Technical Artist. Originally from Sweden, he’s lived in Ōtepoti Dunedin for 6 years. He’s now a permanent resident with the intention to stay in town for the long term.

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CODE is the New Zealand Centre of Digital Excellence – a Dunedin-based hub designed to progress the sustainable growth of New Zealand’s video game development industry. CODE’s regional programme in Dunedin is funded by Kānoa – Regional Economic Development & Investment Unit – and its national expansion by Hīkina Whakatutuki, Ministry of Innovation, Business and Employment (MBIE).

CODE aims to support new or young businesses in the video game industry that are providing tools or technical services for game developers with a Service Start grant* – aside from CODE’s usual game content funding programmes. These businesses can provide employment, build community capability, and create new pathways for recent graduates into the globally-expanding video game industry.

*Please note, applications in this category are for Dunedin based providers only or providers wishing to relocate to Dunedin. A separate national Service Start programme (which excludes Dunedin providers) may be opened in future, but for the time being the national focus necessarily remains on early stage studios entering the market with games.

Further details about CODE funding can be found here.