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20% is huge. Especially considering the costs of making games these days
This is good news in two major respects:
1. An increase in French developper's budget means better games and a higher chance for new material ( more money means more legroom for taking chances).
2. Recognizing games as being equally important as movies paves the way for their recognition as a genuin e form of art. France is notorious for its snobbery when it comes to high culture ( I would know, i'm french) its recognition of games as art can only have positive effects on the industry in general.

mgslegrand

@lalahsghost: Er... *Classic.

lalahsghost

@kman2686: LOL Clasic!

lalahsghost

This is excellent, excellent news for gamers. It's about time that video games received their due credit as an art form, and France and the EU have just taken us one step closer.

ianovich

@peacefuloutrage: The US-led world view (to which Europe subscribes) places restrictions on protectionism and subsidies. As this is a subsidy, it makes for unfair competition - so it's appropriate to restrict those subsidies to cases where they really achieve some goal (French culture) rather than only being protectionist. Or so the opinion goes.

Personally I think this subsidy is a good thing but I hope they do manage to use it to support games with a genuinely French feel, rather than games designed for American tastes that happened to be developed mainly in France. I doubt that restriction will really work - they would have needed to get something more concrete in there for that, for example an agreement that all games would be in French language dialogue (with optional subtitles in other languages) rather than being produced in English as well...

quen

@FanDam:

"criteria of quality, originality and contribute to cultural diversity"

Nah, Ubisoft won't get a cent:)

AbyssUK

awesome news...

french hookers are the world's best, and the sexy french language/accent only exacerbates the problem.

problem? yes, problem. everyone is jealous....

gaint_superlogical_crabs

This is good for the French, but it's stupid a nation has to ask permission to help its citizens out.

*France raises hand* "May I go to the bathroom?"
*EU* "Yes, you may, but only for 2 minutes."

peacefuloutrage

Well, this really helps Ubisoft.

FanDam

Thats great news! The French always strike me as having their heads screwed on and have such delicious crepes. MMmmm nutella crepes... (drools) :-)

NunianVonFuch

Very good news.

DiskoDanyo

Awesome. So now we'll not only get WW II games from US developers, but every freakin' European one as well.

Although I would REALLY like to see a boobies game from a Swedish game developer. Blondes FTW!

Pixelantes Anonymous

@lalahsghost: On the Case with Inspector Clouseau (Hotel Dusk but funny)
Vinyard Tycoon
CoD3: The White Flag Missions
Quel Fromage

kman2686

@Vidril: It's a tax CREDIT.. meaning that much like films in France.. they will receive a significant amount of tax money BACK. The article points to this possibly being selective though... for enrichment of "culture".

A step in the right direction regardless. Numerous artistic/entertainment mediums benefit from such cuts. Glad to see electronic gaming joining that front.

ProjectThanatos

Cultural Dimensions of France...

"Raving Rabbids make Croissants and baguettes"

Franco-Prussian War FPS's

"Cooking Mama Crepe Edition"

Tour de France games out the yin-yang
^ Same thing with Fencing and Gran Prix Racing

French Fashion Show Barbie - Made with Unreal 3 Engine ... you know to give bumpmapping on those frilly lace dresses :)

Can you tell I read kotaku?

lalahsghost

Yep great news.
In the last years France experienced a real Exodus of Gamedevs so no wonder.
Hopefully the other EU countries will show some support too.

Garo

A step in the right direction. Hopefully, this will extend to the entire EU.

Shiryu

So... the french are back to over taxing everything again? XP

Vidril

Am I the only one who sees this as a negative? The French government will hold the purse strings for subsidization of approved forms of communication and expression. Now, I don't consider this the first step on a slippery slope to communism or anything (France took that first step a long, long time ago), but it just seems odd to get excited about what essentially amounts to propagandizing games.

Honus_W_Scruggs

@Honus_W_Scruggs: It just means that certain games coming from France will receive a benefit from becoming more "French" rather than having another Tom Clancy title.

Nexus6

Hell, I'd pay money for a Pink Panther point-and-poke adventure game.

Sabre_Justice

This is pretty cool, and will be abused thoroughly, all for the better.
Funky cultural game gets amazing budget for tool and engine development, gets a 20% tax credit and developer has amazing tools and engine for the next badge of generic titles.
Excellent stuff!

Zentac