Report: US industry employment count rises marginally

Employment within the US games sector has risen slightly on last year thanks to the opening of a number of new games studios dedicated to social and online gaming, research has found.

A census of North American gaming companies found that employee numbers have risen from 44,400 in 2008, to 44,806 in the US. Of that small rise, many come from an unusually large number of new studios, particularly social and online ones, which have sprung up to counterbalance the closures felt throughout the rest of the industry.

Meanwhile Canadian companies have seen "explosive" growth throughout the year, said the report, with the establishment of new studios and the expansions of existing ones contributing to a 30 per cent increase - to 12,480 - in the region's employee count.

The findings come from the third annual Game Developer Census compiled by Game Developer Research.

California remained North America's heavyweight area, with 20,815 developers employed there (46 per cent of the US total). Washington was the second most popular with 4500 employees, and Texas third with over 2600.

However, anecdotal evidence uncovered by the research indicated American game development was becoming less clustered around urban centres.