Video Games Will Become A $99.6B Industry This Year

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I got all excited when I read this headline saying the game industry is on the rise. That is until I realized they are claiming that consoles AND computer gaming will be overtaken by mobile games for the first time ever. :eek:

Market research firm Newzoo revealed today that it expects the global gaming market to be worth $99.6 billion in 2016. That’s up 8.4 percent when compared to last year. It also expects 2016 to be the first year that mobile overtakes PC and console, with Newzoo expecting that market to make $36.9 billion in 2016, up 21.3 percent from 2015.
 
i actually think eventually, mobile will gaming will be the dominate gaming. Ppl spend insane amount of money on their phone and their games. My friend buys a $50 google play card every week now. He no longer buys games on his ps4 or pc because of it. I already told him he needs some serious help that spending habit of his, but he thinks he is fine *shrugs.
 
I have no doubt mobile games will be the most polar medium. Consoles way back in second place.

Like it or not, desktops are a minority now. Aside from a few friends in the industry, nobody I know have PC desktops anymore.
 
Yakk said:
I have no doubt mobile games will be the most polar medium. Consoles way back in second place.

Like it or not, desktops are a minority now. Aside from a few friends in the industry, nobody I know have PC desktops anymore.
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Mobiles are becoming the lead platform, but no, PCs are not a minority. They make more money than consoles now:

PC market has surpassed console - DFC

A lot of that is from free to play games however. Alternately, in AAA space, for Ubisoft at least, PCs have passed the Xbox, with only the PS4 ahead of them.

Ubisoft: PS4, PC lead software sales, while Xbox One lags

Your statistical sample of people you know playing PC games seems to be a bit small.
 
Of course mobile games will take over. After all, are they the king of nickel and dime ing customers?
 
A lot more people have smart phones these days. Sometimes, entire families. That family might have 4-5 smart phones (plus a tablet or few), but only one PS4/XBox One. People always have their phones with them. It's no surprise that mobile gaming is so big.
 
Ur_Mom said:
A lot more people have smart phones these days. Sometimes, entire families. That family might have 4-5 smart phones (plus a tablet or few), but only one PS4/XBox One. People always have their phones with them. It's no surprise that mobile gaming is so big.
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This and it is so easy to get people to part with a dollar or two than to drop 60 on something they have never played before.
 
Most everyone owns a mobile phone. The majority of people are not gamers - the casual game market is huge. Think Candy Crush. Words with Friends. Etc. The games are also usually "free" (with in app purchases of course) - the barrier to entry is stupidly easy for people. The downside to real gamers - these are casual games and in-app purchases suck.
I rarely play any mobile games. I hate on screen joysticks. Most of the games aren't what I'm interested in (although, there are some I have played in the past). Even using a ChromeCast or AppleTV, I never play the "casted" games.
I tried out a few games on the new AppleTV. They basically just took the mobile version, slapped a new UI on it, and pushed it out. I don't blame the developers at all - its risky to make a game. Why not go with the easiest/safest approach?
We will still get PC games as long as their is a market for them. I hope it keeps going strong - otherwise, we will be forced into in-app purchases and crappy casual games.
 
Let's say a family has 4 smart phones. Most games for mobile devices are .99 to 4.99. With the average good game being around $3. However, I will use $5. If each of the 4 family members purchase 1 game that is only $20.

It looks to me that a typical console or PC game is around $50. So for mobile games to exceed both console and PC game sales, by far more people are buying more games for their mobile devices.
 
Darunion said:
This and it is so easy to get people to part with a dollar or two than to drop 60 on something they have never played before.
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Dollar or two, then you see your iTunes bill - $30!? On what?! Farmville (or something like that) and Vegas Slots are on there all the time. Wife loves them. She spends a lot on the microtransactions. I've seen a lot worse, though. People spending $200 a payday on in-game shit.

I've paid for a few apps. There was one on the iPad that was cool. Great graphics, medieval style fighting and stuff. Can't remember it now. Monkey Tower Defense was another good one.
 
$100.000.000.000 is nothing compared to the hundreds of trillions they lose because piracy
 
Zuul said:
$100.000.000.000 is nothing compared to the hundreds of trillions they lose because piracy
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Yea, but that piracy number is still tiny compared to the losses of the movie industry. So, the gaming people shouldn't feel too bad. It could be worse!
 
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Ugh. And we thought consoles would hold back gaming...p2w cartoon garbage is all I can find on mobile. Have an s6 edge, would love to put it's processing power to work on some cool RTS game, can't find a damn thing.
 
Does this include all gaming related revenues or just the games themselves? PCs have lots of ancillary revenue opportunities with makers of controllers, keyboards, mice, monitors, etc. Are these already rolled into this number? If not then PCs and consoles will retain a big advantage over mobile for the gaming industry as a whole.
 
kbrickley said:
Does this include all gaming related revenues or just the games themselves? PCs have lots of ancillary revenue opportunities with makers of controllers, keyboards, mice, monitors, etc. Are these already rolled into this number? If not then PCs and consoles will retain a big advantage over mobile for the gaming industry as a whole.
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I would imagine it would just be the games. I'm not sure having to buy a bunch of extra gear gives PC game designers any kind of edge if you're just talking equipment - think of how much is spent on smart phones now.
 
TwistedAegis said:
I would imagine it would just be the games. I'm not sure having to buy a bunch of extra gear gives PC game designers any kind of edge if you're just talking equipment - think of how much is spent on smart phones now.
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Developers will almost always run to where the money is, since they tend to be a little more hand to mouth funding wise. However, an industry that has multiple companies across many technologies benefitting is going to get better long term support and a broader range of support since it isn't just a developer's cash cow but also lots of hardware companies cash cow. One additional note on smartphones is that although many of them make high revenues, only two companies make a profit from their phones (Apple and Samsung). There are lots of profitable (sometimes highly profitable) companies in both the console and PC gaming space.
 
ManofGod said:
Of course mobile games will take over. After all, are they the king of nickel and dime ing customers?
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Nickle and dime with a little bit of psychology mixed in allows them to create addicts - as with anything, addicts don't realize the true expense of their hobby. The gameplay of a mobile game is literally built around this.

Couple it with lower development costs, and they can throw a ton of money at marketing (and/or Schwarzenegger apparently).
 
I miss the old days when you bought the game, you had the whole game, patches were just released to improve and fine tune the game.

Now it's pay full price for the game, with the remaining content held back for pay DLC. Games are also starting to become more subscription based pay to continue playing.
 
After quickly glancing at the title, I thought it meant games will cost $99 from now on.
 
rigurat said:
I miss the old days when you bought the game, you had the whole game, patches were just released to improve and fine tune the game.

Now it's pay full price for the game, with the remaining content held back for pay DLC. Games are also starting to become more subscription based pay to continue playing.
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There are certainly some games that abuse DLC, but for the reputable ones it has just replaced the expansion mostly. Also, modern games get patched way more reliably over the internet. Nice not having to send away for discs or buy game mags with the patch discs. I miss some of the creativity and sense of wonder from the old days but not the expansion models or patching :)
 
tetris42 said:
Mobiles are becoming the lead platform, but no, PCs are not a minority. They make more money than consoles now:

PC market has surpassed console - DFC

A lot of that is from free to play games however. Alternately, in AAA space, for Ubisoft at least, PCs have passed the Xbox, with only the PS4 ahead of them.

Ubisoft: PS4, PC lead software sales, while Xbox One lags

Your statistical sample of people you know playing PC games seems to be a bit small.
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Unless I missed something those don't claim PC games make more money than console games. Even the Witcher 3, a high regarded game by a PC centric developer with a DRM free option sold only reached 30% of sales on PC. The rest was split between the two consoles. While PC as a platform is certainly important I don't see it surpassing console game sales anytime soon.

http://gamerant.com/the-witcher-3-sales-pc-consoles-125/undefined

The Witcher 3 almost sold as many copies on PC as it did on Xbox One. Maybe these figures changed in the past few months. For the most part, the PS4 is the dominant platform this generation.

rigurat said:
I miss the old days when you bought the game, you had the whole game, patches were just released to improve and fine tune the game.

Now it's pay full price for the game, with the remaining content held back for pay DLC. Games are also starting to become more subscription based pay to continue playing.
Click to expand...

The majority of the time this isn't true. DLC is designed to be sold separate from the get go. Games aren't being torn up with content of the base game being sold at a later date. It may be made alongside the main game or even developed by a different studio.

However, concepts and incomplete content that did not make it in time, or could not fit in the budget, ect. may indeed end up in DLC or sequels. This has been the case long before "DLC" was a term. The 2nd STALKER game is essentially all cut content spliced in the the first game. The 3rd game still utilizes cut content from the first, such as an underground laboratory and one of the three main maps. It really is nothing new and makes perfect sense from a development perspective. Besides, what would you want them to do? Throw out a good concept forever because it could not make it in the first game? Delete any unused content? Or have that turned into something useful and sold to gamers?

Now crappy DLC, free to play games and MMOs I completely agree with you. CS GO is an excellent example of DLC being low in quality and diluting to the core experience.
 
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