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The DeanBeat: New Zealand levels up game industry amid a world of giants

  • Posted byby Dean Takahashi
  • Updated
  • 9 min

New Zealand is a small country in a remote part of the world, but that doesn’t mean it can’t make its mark on the gaming industry. After all, Finland has a similar population of 5.6 million people, and its game developers have entertained billions of people with titles like Clash of Clans and Angry Birds.

Using Finland as inspiration, countries like New Zealand want to build their own gaming ecosystems with high-paying jobs that can be done anywhere, particularly in an age of remote work. And New Zealand, which is hosting a 600-person game conference this week in Wellington, already has a lock on most things based on The Lord of the Rings — an industry unto itself.

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Written by

Dean Takahashi

Dean Takahashi is editorial director for GamesBeat. He has been a tech journalist since 1988, and he has covered games as a beat since 1996. He was lead writer for GamesBeat at VentureBeat from 2008 to April 2025. Prior to that, he wrote for the San Jose Mercury News, the Red Herring, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, and the Dallas Times-Herald. He is the author of two books, "Opening the Xbox" and "The Xbox 360 Uncloaked." He organizes the annual GamesBeat Next, GamesBeat Summit and GamesBeat Insider Series: Hollywood and Games conferences and is a frequent speaker at gaming and tech events. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.