The thriving video game sector is one of the commitments of the Digital Content Hub of Valladolid, within the Council's Innovation and Smart City Plan, with the aim of boosting the local digital ecosystem and laying the foundations for Valladolid to become a hotspot for digital content.
The Agency for Innovation and Economic Development welcomes this start-up company from Valladolid, a national and international benchmark, as part of a collaboration agreement.
The Valladolid City Council presented today at the Agency for Innovation and Economic Development (IDEVA) the video game ‘The Occultist’, which Pentakill Studios is developing at IDEVA's facilities.
The presentation was attended by the Mayor of Valladolid, Jesús Julio Carnero, and the Director General of Industry of the Junta de Castilla y León, Jesús Jiménez, as well as the CEO of Pentakill Studios, David Lorenzo. The event brought together entities from the city’s social, economic and academic fabric and representatives of the video game industry.
The agreement with the City Council is the starting point for Valladolid to become a benchmark in the field of indie video games. It also seeks to give visibility to local productions with national and international exposure as one of the lines of action promoted by the Digital Content Hub of Valladolid within the Innovation and Smart City Plan of Valladolid (SmartVA! Plan).
The Digital Content Hub aims to promote entrepreneurship and generate a consolidated ecosystem around video games, virtual reality and audiovisual production. As the Mayor of Valladolid, Jesús Julio Carnero, has pointed out: ‘Its vision integrates: talent, training in digital arts, boosting new independent studios and start-ups, and fostering multidisciplinary teams. In other words, the components of this project that we are presenting today’.
Cutting-edge industry
Carnero also stressed that ‘investing in an emerging sector that brings together digital professionals from multiple disciplines means investing in a cutting-edge industry, generating new jobs and attracting and retaining talent for Valladolid’.
It should be remembered that this growing industrial sector involves the training, development and improvement of cutting-edge digital skills and abilities with new employment niches. Its turnover in Spain has increased by more than 16% in 2023 (2,339 million euros), with more than 20 million players, according to data from the Video Game Spanish Association.
That is why the Innovation Plan includes among its strategic axes the boosting of the local digital ecosystem and thus laying the foundations for Valladolid to become a hotspot for digital content. The City Council has specifically focused on the creation of digital arts and video games and on promoting programming from an early age, as well as training in the field of digital skills for its competitive excellence.
Public-private collaboration
In this line of work, through the alliance with Pentakill, embodied in the signing of an agreement in December 2023, the Consistory has supported the promotion of the project in the most important events of the video game sector worldwide in the USA, Germany and Japan, among other countries.
The company has also received support from Iberaval and public aid from the Junta de Castilla y León to expand its workforce; and from the European Union's Investigo Programme, through the Transformation, Recovery and Resilience Plan.
For its part, the Studio is collaborating in key aspects for boosting this sector and the digital arts: generating employment, attracting investment for the city, attracting and retaining talent and improving education and training in digital technologies compatible with the curricula of universities and vocational training centres. Pentakill itself has a training school specialised in digital arts.
A Spanish success story with an international journey
‘The Occultist’ has won 30 national and international awards and nominations that recognise the work and quality of the videogame, including the Devcom Blockbuster Award 2023, finalist for Best European Game at Gamescom's EuroPlay 2021 and nomination for the TIGA Awards 2023. Likewise, with this project they have participated in the most important international video game fairs worldwide, such as Gamescom and Devcom in Germany, GDC and Game Connection in the USA, and Tokyo Game Show in Japan.
Its latest award was the City of Valladolid 2024 Award for the best emerging initiative at the Spanish Industry Awards.
The company, which has 32 multidisciplinary professionals, was founded in 2021 with the main objective of developing ‘The Occultist’, a first-person narrative horror videogame featuring some scenarios and elements of the city of Valladolid. The company is not only focused on game development, but also on R&D with the research and development of new tools and innovative processes aimed at improving the efficiency of video game development. They are always looking to be at the forefront in order to offer the most innovative results with a workflow similar to that of the big triple A videogame studios. In addition, it is the only company in Castilla y León with a licence to develop for Play Station and Xbox.
