Audiokinetic, Ageia Join New Emergent Partner Programs

Emergent Game Technologies has announced a new partner program that integrates those partners' middleware technology into the company's development framework with the aim of broadening its range of game production solutions and design tools. The new partner program has two levels -- Premier Partners' products are available for purchase directly from Emergent, and the company says it supports developers by streamlining the evaluation, purchase and support process. The Certified Partners program features products from middleware companies who provide technology that is complementary to Emergent's Gamebryo development engine. According to Emergent, the Certified Partners program will see the company working with its partners to co-develop an integration that will work out-of-the-box with Gamebryo, and ensure that a partner's code and documentation meet Emergent's quality standards. Being a Certified Partner also requires that sample code is provided to show developers how to use Gamebryo with the partner product. Emergent says the first company to join the Emergent Premier Partners program is audio software developer Audiokinetic, with its Wwise software, while physics hardware manufacturer Ageia is the first to join the Emergent Certified Partners program with its PhysX hardware-accelerated technology SDK. Participating partners will co-develop a product integration with Emergent's partner engineering team, including samples, demos, and documentation. The company says the products will all be certified as having been "rigorously tested" in a game development environment. Additionally, Emergent Premier Partners will receive co-marketing and joint sales support by Emergent, who will serve as a value-added reseller for its Premier Partners' products. For game developers, the program creates a production framework designed to be scalable with the associated middleware products. Emergent also says that it's increased the degree of technology interoperability so that developers can choose the products suited to their needs and add new tools as they become available on Emergent's Gamebryo framework. Emergent CEO Geoffrey Selzer said, "The partner program is a significant part of our larger mission to integrate partners, community, developers and other technologies into a singular ecosystem. It is our framework approach that allows us to empower developers by facilitating the maximum flexibility and creativity in a scalable development environment."