Want to fly a warplane on your time off? Take the controls of a Sukhoi Su-30 or a Phalcon AWACS or any of the other planes the Indian Air Force has in its hangars, and learn what it means to come in on a wing and a prayer. The good news: Even if you run out of fuel in mid-air or are in the path of an oncoming missile, you’ll live to fly another day. Welcome to Guardian of the Skies, the latest initiative from the Indian Air Force to woo young recruits. It’s a 3-D mobile arcade-style game that gives players the chance to understand planes. The Air Force, facing a shortage of 659 officers and 3,674 airmen, hopes this game will inspire more young people to try out the real thing.

The task of developing the game was given to a small company, Delhi-based Threye Interactive, despite serious competition from established biggies like Disney UTV. “Our competitors were big entertainment firms with little or no expertise in aviation. Our main focus is mobile gaming and we have two aviation experts,” says Anurag Rana, 31, co-founder and vice president, product development, Threye. Rana has a private pilot’s licence, and co-founder and creative director Sameer Joshi, 40, was a pilot with the Air Force, before leaving to fly commercial aircraft. Joshi is also part of Bangalore-based Team Indus’s mission to the moon (see page 56). The third founder, Sidhant Rahi, 26, who heads business development, isn’t a pilot but had thought of a career in the armed forces before deciding to stick to the civilian world. (In fact, all three founders cleared the entrance exam to the National Defence Academy; only Joshi joined.)

Clearly, their ‘industry’ knowledge helped. What gave them more credibility, however, was the fact that they had already developed an air-combat game, Operation Morning Glory, based on (but not commissioned by) the Air Force. Guardian of the Skies was launched on July 14, so it’s way too early to know if it meets the Air Force’s recruitment target. What’s interesting is the fact that gaming was chosen as the tool.

Mobile gaming may be the best way to target the youth; various studies suggest that those between the ages of 14 and 24 consume more content on phones and tablets than television. The Indian mobile gaming market is poised to grow to Rs 4,000 crore by 2018, according to consultancy KPMG. Which is good news for the Air Force. For companies like Threye the numbers need not mean much. Jehil Thakkar, partner, KPMG, says that monetising games is a big challenge because gamers, typically, don’t want to pay for downloads.

But Rahi is hopeful, since “many companies now realise that mobile gaming is great for brand promotion and placements”. There are successful games made in India, such as Jewel Match by CSharks and Game of Death by Dumadu Games. Thakkar isn’t as hopeful, saying that companies prefer established players or games that have already proved their mettle.

So far, Threye has managed its cash flow well, and grown 500% year on year by providing augmented reality and experiential marketing services to Lemon Tree Hotels, JW Marriott, Bharti Realty, Pernod Ricard, etc. “We spend 20% of the revenue from services on developing new products and R&D,” says Rahi. (Threye was funded by its co-founders.) The attention the IAF game is getting might be just the thing Threye needs to take off.

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