Central Coast Studios, the long-in-development screen production hub planned for Calga on the New South Wales Central Coast, will reportedly include integrated virtual production and motion capture facilities for both screen and games, with additional capacity for esports facilities.
The $260 million project has been in development since 2020, with a formal announcement in 2025. Since then, the team has been gathering support for the endeavour, as plans progress through various approvals.
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Game development ambitions on the NSW Central Coast
In a new press release, the Central Coast Studios team has confirmed its planned hub will feature real-time game engine virtual production and motion capture facilities for AA and AAA game development, as well as infrastructure to support esports.
Plans for the hub include the establishment of LED volume stages and on-site performance capture, with this intended for both screen and games production, to support ‘cinematic environments to be generated live and in-camera, rather than built later in post-production’.
Speaking on the importance of this technology for Australia’s local game studios, Simon Alty, the former VP and Managing Director APC at Bethesda Softworks and the current Executive Chairman of GamesPeople, confirmed a need for improvements to allow world-class development in Australia.
‘The use of real-time technologies, born from games development but now used across the entire entertainment spectrum, isn’t simply a creative tool, it’s an operational shift,’ Alty said in a press release.
‘When iteration happens instantly and assets are shared across disciplines, scalability improves and cost exposure decreases. That’s critical in today’s global production market.’
‘World class tools and facilities like this drive industry development while democratising the industry landscape, creating an entry point for all kinds of projects – from those of scale through to independent production.’
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Central Coast Studios’ plans to provide education and real-time practical skills
In addition to providing a central facility offering screen production tools and technologies, Central Coast Studios is also intended to become a hub for education. Currently, developers are ‘in discussion’ with universities and other education providers, with the overarching goal of delivering on-site programs to train students practically.
There are also plans to offer internships and pathways into crew roles, in an effort to strengthen the training-to-work pipeline across specialties like real-time rendering, cinematic pipeline development, environment design and performance capture.
Many of these skills are transferrable, as game development and film production grow closer together.
As Central Coast Studios notes, Australian developers may currently have to consider international moves to obtain these specialist skills due to a lack of local facilities – a need which the team’s hub aims to address.
Stephen Macchia, founder of Noisy Nit Games, said: ‘Real-time production tools are changing how stories are built across games and screen, and facilities designed around those workflows create exciting possibilities for Australian developers.’
Ana Thu Nguyen, fresh off the development of film production Mortal Kombat 2, further outlined the importance of shared digital pipelines, and how essential they’ve become to screen production. ‘On productions like Mortal Kombat 2, animation, performance capture and live-action function as one system,’ Nguyen said.
‘When those pipelines are unified onsite, it empowers directors, performers and technical teams to collaborate in real time. A facility designed around real-time collaboration allows productions to move faster and make more confident creative decisions.’
Should Central Coast Studios progress past the planning stages and construction approvals – a process which is still ongoing – there are hopes it will generate $750 million in annual economic activity, and that it will create around 2500 jobs for the Central Coast region.
At this stage, it appears there are still many barriers to climb before full-scale development, but in a time of great hardship for the local entertainment industry, a bit of hope is sorely needed.
