Pismo Business Incubator: The New Game in Town

The tiny Croatian town of Novska feels like a world away from the ditzy coastline of the Adriatic Sea, which serves as the main tourist magnet of the country. In fact, you’d probably not have many reasons to venture to this community of 11,000 people, located 100 kilometres south of Zagreb and near the Bosnian border, unless you want to visit the largest wetlands reserve in the country (Lonjsko Polje) or if you happen to be into…video games. You read that right. Novska has envisioned itself as becoming something akin to Silicon Valley’s Palo Alto, but for video game development.

For the past five years, quietly but industriously an eco-system dedicated to this modern industry has been taking shape up in Novska and its heart and engine is a business incubator called PISMO, which already hosts 80 startups working on everything video game-related: from the coding process to creating music and 3D images via photogrammetry.

More than a child’s play

As you might expect, the local residents would have met the news of developing a video gaming hub in their quiet town with a mixture of disbelief and confusion. After all, the common image of a gamer is that of a long-haired pimpled teen who never leaves his parents’ basement and subsists on a diet of potato chips and energy drinks. How could these people bring money, employment and prosperity to a place traditionally reliant on textile production and metalworking?

Well, the reality is that the video gaming industry in the world today generates about 200 billion dollars per year and prepping up and setting base to claim a chunk of this change sounds like could be a lot more meaningful than traditional blue-collar industries.

Croatia already has some traditions in the video-gaming industry, with games produced by studios in Zagreb are three times more popular on the Steam online gaming platform than other titles. Thus, setting up a video gaming hub in Novska seems like a logical outgrowth of this and an ideal way to stimulate economic and demographic growth in the rural backcountry.

According to Andreja Šeperac from the Simora Regional Development Agency, the body which led the development of the PISMO incubator, the town’s selection was serendipitous yet decisive. When a call for EU-funded projects surfaced, Novska was quick to respond, securing two suitable buildings within days. With land plots, building permits, and technical documentation in place, Novska emerged as the frontrunner and from there on history began to be written as they say.

The idea,” Šeperac explains, “was to create an industry that could keep our youth here and give them opportunities that matched their interests and skills.”

It may have worked even better than that, as other people from all over Croatia, interested in game development began showing up, attracted by the new possibilities to become part of an exciting industry and a member of a professional community. The low housing prices were an additional stimulant. Actually, the fact that property prices have grown since the start of the incubator might be the most direct evidence that whatever they’re doing in Novska is working.

The structure of PISMO

Established with EU funding in 2016 (to the tune of 2.6 million euros from the ERDF, programming period 2014-2021), the project has rapidly expanded, with the first operational building inaugurated in 2019. Today, Pismo boasts two primary facilities: Pismo 1 and Pismo 2.

The first one is a beautifully renovated 19th century, three-story house that you wouldn’t expect is the place where first-person shooter or horror games get conjured up and designed in the warm, cozy offices nestled inside it. Pismo 2 is more of a spacious warehouse hosting all sorts of futuristic-looking equipment, which developers can use to test their creations including the donning of costumes to create realistic motion-capture sequences.

To date, over 1,000 projects have emerged from the incubator, ranging from educational applications to fully-fledged video games. Among these is a highly anticipated game financed by a private investor from Lithuania, set to debut on Steam on 3 December.

We’re expecting our first unicorn,” Šeperac revealed, signaling the high stakes and expectations surrounding this project.

Pismo, however, was not set up solely with the idea of attracting developer talent that already exists – its mission is to grow and foster it right there on the ground. In that sense,

Specialized education

in the form of training programs, is another pillar that props up the whole raison d’etre of the burgeoning ecosystem. These programs, lasting between 4 and 6 months, are open to anyone from Croatia who has completed high school and is currently unemployed. Not only do they not cost a single cent, but the Blender and Unity programs, which train 3D animators and developers respectively, but participants get minimum Croatian wage plus travel expenses for their duration. What’s more, the City of Novska had stepped to show its support by creating dormitories for the students.

Program participants are expected to create their own finalized project to be presented at a conference (the next one is in December). Moreover, graduates can access financial support of up to 20,000 euros to establish their own businesses within the incubator.

Novska’s gaming transformation has not only created direct opportunities but has also stimulated the growth of secondary industries. The local community has embraced the gaming revolution, with private investors constructing new accommodations and residents converting extra spaces into rental properties.

The ripple effect is evident throughout the town. Coffee shops themed around gaming have emerged, and gyms now offer gamer-friendly schedules and rates.

Everything can be gamified

The Pismo incubator, however, looks beyond the world of video games for entertainment and is also actively involved in the gamification of SME and public institutions’ operations in order to make them more comprehensible, accessible and even appealing to the general public.

That activity is undertaken as part of the European Digital Innovation Hubs (EDIH) Network, co-financed by the Digital Europe program of the European Commission.

We need to help traditional industries to upgrade, to take on digital transformation and to understand digital transformation, not to be afraid of it. So, we are developing, for instance, a digital twin for learning how to drive an excavator,” shared Andreja Šeperac.

Similar tools are being developed for the town’s woodworking industry, which has for a long time been the backbone of the local economy. Pismo is also there to provide consultancy and know-how to public institutions looking to get a more robust presence in the digital realm. Andreja gave the Croatian financial agency FINA as an example of a public body that was forward-thinking about shattering its bureaucratic image.

Regional ecosystem

Novska is fast shaping into a successful story of transformation for the future, but you’d be mistaken to think that this only concerns this one small town. Reflections from Novska’s moves have also served as an inspiration for other towns in the Sisak-Moslavina region to forge their own path to future tech industries.

Sisak, the county’s capital and traditionally reliant on heavy industries, boasts a renowned technical school that has embraced gaming and robotics, producing generations of gaming technicians and robotics experts.

Another city, Petrinja, which was devastated by the 2020 earthquake, has launched a drone programming initiative, training specialists to develop cutting-edge drone technologies.

Novska’s rise as a gaming hub has defied expectations, proving that even small towns can lead the way in innovation with vision and persistence. From hosting international gaming events to nurturing startups and transforming traditional industries, Novska is becoming synonymous with opportunity.

It’s brave and a bit crazy,” confided Andreja Šeperac, “but it’s working.”

Co-Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union. The European Union cannot be held responsible for them.