₦airaland Forum

I've rarely come across anyone professionally doing game development for a living in Nigeria except hobbyist or for fun. Like I use pygame in python sometimes to create fun stuffs for family or friends.

Do people actually use unity 3d and unreal engine and make a living in Nigeria? Maybe Lagos? They are even more rare than mobile devs.

Any game developers here?

What's your take?

They exist but mostly targeting global clients rather than the local market. The economics are tough — Nigerian mobile users have high engagement but low spend rates, so ad-supported casual games are basically the only sustainable model locally.

Most Nigerian game devs I've seen use Unity for mobile games on international app stores, or take freelance contracts from studios abroad. Very few can sustain it purely off Nigerians paying for games.

The itch.io community has some Nigerian indie devs if you search around. Small but active. The space is growing slowly sha.

Thanks for shedding light on this. Interesting take

as69:
They exist but mostly targeting global clients rather than the local market. The economics are tough — Nigerian mobile users have high engagement but low spend rates, so ad-supported casual games are basically the only sustainable model locally.

Most Nigerian game devs I've seen use Unity for mobile games on international app stores, or take freelance contracts from studios abroad. Very few can sustain it purely off Nigerians paying for games.

The itch.io community has some Nigerian indie devs if you search around. Small but active. The space is growing slowly sha.

Game devs is for kids and overgrown babies. People with bills to pay don't do game dev.

davidaluu:
I've rarely come across anyone professionally doing game development for a living in Nigeria except hobbyist or for fun. Like I use pygame in python sometimes to create fun stuffs for family or friends. Do people actually use unity 3d and unreal engine and make a living in Nigeria? Maybe Lagos? They are even more rare than mobile devs. Any game developers here? What's your take?

They're on X not nairaland


You'd be surprised some Devs haven't even heard of nairaland in their entire lives

davidaluu:
I've rarely come across anyone professionally doing game development for a living in Nigeria except hobbyist or for fun. Like I use pygame in python sometimes to create fun stuffs for family or friends. Do people actually use unity 3d and unreal engine and make a living in Nigeria? Maybe Lagos? They are even more rare than mobile devs. Any game developers here? What's your take?

Game developers in Nigeria are scarce. Let start from your workstation your gadgets and software application. It cost fortune for you to put these up for game development

Sheriman:
Game developers in Nigeria are scarce. Let start from your workstation your gadgets and software application. It cost fortune for you to put these up for game development

Cost a fortune? Computer village still dey na..

There are lots of game developers in Nigeria. I happen to be one of them.

Here are some of my works: https://david-edoh.github.io

Check LinkedIn (Search "Game Developer in Nigeria", and you'll be amazed that there are a lot of Game Devs in 9ja. Some with really interesting indie projects too.

100%

as69:
They exist but mostly targeting global clients rather than the local market. The economics are tough — Nigerian mobile users have high engagement but low spend rates, so ad-supported casual games are basically the only sustainable model locally.

Most Nigerian game devs I've seen use Unity for mobile games on international app stores, or take freelance contracts from studios abroad. Very few can sustain it purely off Nigerians paying for games.

The itch.io community has some Nigerian indie devs if you search around. Small but active. The space is growing slowly sha.

Davitron:
There are lots of game developers in Nigeria. I happen to be one of them.

Here are some of my works: https://david-edoh.github.io

Check LinkedIn (Search "Game Developer in Nigeria", and you'll be amazed that there are a lot of Game Devs in 9ja. Some with really interesting indie projects too.

Link not working

Yes game developers do exist. Interestingly, game development and website development are two of the major goals that attract young Nigerians to software development. I have sat across at least 50 developers in job interviews, being through at least 3 startups in the past decades. One of the major goals that attract young engineers to software development, even beyond website development, is game development.

Now we are encouraging game developers to work with the help of AI and trust me, we see interest from many Nigerians, as obvious in this twitter thread https://x.com/i/status/2044088533858627843 discussing using Claude, CORE's memory layer and Blender.

Cool direction honestly. Basically AI doing animation on behalf of you. Like giving it access to tools like blender or Maya 3d and letting it figure out the rest. It's called agentic AI, working on something similar

9jageek:
Yes game developers do exist. Interestingly, game development and website development are two of the major goals that attract young Nigerians to software development. I have sat across at least 50 developers in job interviews, being through at least 3 startups in the past decades. One of the major goals that attract young engineers to software development, even beyond website development, is game development.

Now we are encouraging game developers to work with the help of AI and trust me, we see interest from many Nigerians, as obvious in this twitter thread https://x.com/i/status/2044088533858627843 discussing using Claude, CORE's memory layer and Blender.

This sounds good David. I am interested in learning more. For a project grounded in physical simulation as yours, take a look at CORE's perception middleware. Adding in as a lightweight extra layer could help with spatial memory and keeping track of objects. check it out here https://coreworldmodel.com

Let's discuss further on this your project.

davidaluu:
Cool direction honestly. Basically AI doing animation on behalf of you. Like giving it access to tools like blender or Maya 3d and letting it figure out the rest. It's called agentic AI, working on something similar

Every country has its own unique developers and very talented people, but in reality, very few games are actually developed. A simple example is the casual game Sudoku: https://www.jigsaw-sudoku.com

Yes, game developers exist using Unreal Engine, unite, e.t.c

Hehe they exist but their creativity is zero lol. One make game of Keke.

Where is the massive data and time they need. One will be building one came for half a decade... I believe na grass the person go dey chop for 5 years

Games is not what u develop with NEPA or gen oo. Make una get sense

Kaczynski:
Game devs is for kids and overgrown babies. People with bills to pay don't do game dev.

Last year, video games industry was $197 Billion.

Average games developer salary US - $90K.

Though not the best, it's better than many more careers.

Kaczynski:
Game devs is for kids and overgrown babies. People with bills to pay don't do game dev.

There's something about poverty. It damages your thinking to the point that you just live like a slave.

trytillmake:
Cost a fortune? Computer village still dey na..

You are both saying the same thing
It costs a FORTUNE
It ain't cheap

davidaluu:
I've rarely come across anyone professionally doing game development for a living in Nigeria except hobbyist or for fun. Like I use pygame in python sometimes to create fun stuffs for family or friends.

Do people actually use unity 3d and unreal engine and make a living in Nigeria? Maybe Lagos? They are even more rare than mobile devs.

Any game developers here?

What's your take?

Are there video games people make money from?

Kaczynski:
Game devs is for kids and overgrown babies. People with bills to pay don't do game dev.

So game developers that are among the world best selling games are kids and overgrown babies who don't have bills to pay?

Dshocker:
Are there video games people make money from?

Yes, take rockstar for example and they still make mad money.

Just make a good game and make it online, people will buy and play. But unfortunately video games are not for Africans.

marlow1962:
Yes, take rockstar for example and they still make mad money.

Just make a good game and make it online, people will buy and play. But unfortunately video games are not for Africans.

I actually meant, if there are online games i would play, and get paid?

Dshocker:
I actually meant, if there are online games i would play, and get paid?

I doubt that, video games rather take your money than to give you money.

marlow1962:
I doubt that, video games rather take your money than to give you money.

Have you heard of NBA 2K, people make as high as $5k monthly playing it.

Dshocker:
Have you heard of NBA 2K, people make as high as $5k monthly playing it.

Yes I play the 2k24 on my console. But they don't get paid directly by the game devs, their (players) payment comes from live stream of their matches.

Yes. There are game developers in Nigeria and I am a game developer.

SAIL Innovation Lab and GAMR is doing a good job of training game devs in Nigeria.
I'm a beneficiary of their scholarship.

Nigeria lacks teamwork culture. Most games require high level different section experts to work together to create a good game. Its difficult for expert in one area to link up with other experts in different areas to work together to create something meaningful in Nigeria. Everyone wants to do it themselves and end up not succeeding, making it look like there are no brains at all.

Dude you really just said this?

Kaczynski:
Game devs is for kids and overgrown babies. People with bills to pay don't do game dev.

I was dabbling into game making some years back..blender and unity . A car racing game with Lagos streets, a yoruba animal names game, a game about eba and soup..my laptop packed up and the new one wasn't strong enough for the work..also i wasn't really a coder per se so it was hard to bring out a finished product..

this video is the driving game i was working on... Hopefully i
can pick up when i get a very strong laptop ...if anyone wants to donate i will humbly accept lol


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K54HdhR616k