The portal, initially providing four games, is expected to be ready by the time the football World Cup kicks off in South Africa next year. MTN, the official sponsor of the World Cup, is also developing mobile phone games for its users in 22 African countries.
The Vodacom Group sponsors African sports such as rugby and football and the new gaming service will include PC multiplayer gaming and a dedicated Web site offering news, reviews and gamer forums.
Vodacom is expanding its traditional cellular-based offerings into the converged communication market by offering services such as online gaming, said Dot Field, Vodacom's chief communications officer.
The expansion into gaming coincides with infrastructure projects aiming to provide affordable broadband to people in rural and urban areas across Africa.
The games portal will allow Vodacom subscribers and nonsubscribers play the initial games: Left 4 Dead, Crysis Wars, Crysis and Battlefield 2. The cellular giant will offer more games in the future.
Football is a popular game in Africa, although there is a shortage of trained football coaches.
"Most Africans love football video games such as the Football Manager and other FIFA series, mainly used by football club managers in most countries to offer training that would otherwise be missing," said Eyram Tawia, a game developer from Ghana.
Due to the level of international focus on football in Africa, more money is likely to be committed to hiring gaming software developers, but the continent is lacking competent gaming developers outside South Africa.
It would be easy for techies and major companies to engage in more business if there were established games development studios, said Wesley Kiriinya, a game developer from Kenya. This is one of the new frontiers that telecom companies should be using to attract new subscribers to their networks, Kiriinya said.
"I am part of a team creating a development studio that develops high quality mobile games but there is serious deficiency in skills," said Kiriinya. "The problem lies in software skills and the level of commitment."
In a continent where history is rooted in folklore and the honor of heroes it is surprising that the gaming sector has not developed in a way that video games can be used to pass on historical information and provide sources of income.
While Tawia and Kiriinya agree that major companies do not support local developers, the developers themselves need to show more commitment and higher level of creativity to get the support.
"Unlike other types of software, gaming demands creativity; the development team needs to understand games," added Kiriinya. "Playing games and developing games are like two sides of a coin."
Given the complex nature of game development and the lack of skills, Tawia argues that formation of an African Game Developers Association would encourage more software developers into game development and a forum where the community will share ideas and engage international game development groups.