Gameloft



Imagine, if you will, a company that lives on the philosophy of creating movies that heavily imitate current feature films for the sole purpose of getting a quick buck.

Now apply that philosophy to making games for mobile phones, iOS and Android.

Thus, you have Gameloft, a developer that of portable titles that are playable and (often times) graphically polished but not quite perfect reproductions of titles such as Halo, Final Fantasy XIII, Burnout, Diablo, and many others. They are an offshoot of French megadeveloper Ubisoft (the two companies' founders are brothers), and thus are also responsible for creating portable versions of Ubisoft's franchises, such as Assassin's Creed and Rayman 2.

This formula has made Gameloft one of the most successful mobile developers, but the message Gameloft's success sends makes them one of the most controversial. To console and PC developers, it says that gamers want mobile versions of all these games, and if they don't provide them, someone else will. To other mobile developers, it says that you can be successful simply by copying someone else's idea and doing a half-decent job of it. The actual quality of their games is similarly mixed, characterized by high production values for mobile games but weak voice acting and story and slightly outdated gameplay mechanics.

Considering that many of the games they rip off of were initially nowhere to be found on mobile devices, Gameloft is in fact one of the notable companies that further popularised smartphone gaming. This has changed in recent years however, with mobile ports and adaptations of popular franchises such as Call of Duty, Grand Theft Auto, Need for Speed and many others making their way to app stores, making Gameloft's stated mission rather moot.

They moved into downloadable console titles, publishing games like Dungeon Hunter Alliance and Modern Combat for the PlayStation 3, as well as Let's Golf 3D for the Nintendo 3DS.

Gameloft was acquired by media conglomerate Vivendi in 2016, and as such no longer has ties with its former sister company Ubisoft.

Their monthly Gameloft Video Podcast can be found on their Youtube page.