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Record Video Games Sales in 2001
night_flyer noted an article running @ ZD talking about how
2001 was a record year for video games with
doing 9.4B and PCs getting almost to 6B. Mentions Grand Theft Auto
3's huge sales, as well as The Sims. Also the X-Box, and Game Boy
Advanced contributing to the big numbers.
They all sold more games than any other manufacturer.
When everyone sells more than everyone else, how can you not have a banner year?
I wonder how much of the RIAA's decrease ended up increasing the game industry? People have limited funds, and if they're spending more money on one form of entertainment, they're going to be spending less on another.
Let's not forget other great franchise games like Final Fantasy X that led to the PS2 sales so people could buy other games. At least that's why I have one and now I've got two or three other games just cuz.
Instead of the Killer App, it's the Killer Game that drives the market and there are more serial games now than ever.
--- Don't be a player hater: I meta-mod ALL negative mods as Unfair.
Or as one of my Sims likes to Say,
"This graa es fredushay!"
I believe Final Fantasy X has shipped more than all of those titles. Maybe?
http://ps2.ign.com/news/41328.html
It's interesting that in a $9 Billion industry, there's so little money going to Linux gaming.
What's not to understand? If you're comfortable with open source and free software and these packages are all that you use, why would you go out and actually pay for programs when you haven't spent money on software in two, five, or even ten years?
As good of a "service" as it was to have Loki allowing folks to only install one operating system on their machines and be able to play games, their business model just wasn't feasible. Perhaps if they truly understood the mindset of their target consumers and that they just simply weren't going to be paying any money for software, then they would have avoided starting a company and failing soon thereafter.
I realize this will probabyl get modded down to tarnation, but I'm hoping that someone appreciates my opinion as it is and doesn't take it personally. I'm right, people.
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Tell me, who's gettin' screwd in this picture ?
yush
Why is it so interesting? How many people do you think use Linux on the desktop? I'll be EXTREMELY generous, and give it 5%.
Out of $6 billion, that leaves a $300 million POTENTIAL market (which, keep in mind, is a very generous figure). That's *not* that much, considering some companies make more than that on one game alone.
Plus, that is the POTENTIAL market. Keep in mind that a lot of people don't want to wait for Linux ports of the games or just don't want to play games period... or (gasp) actually prefer to use Windows for their gaming needs.
Linux gaming is NOT a viable market at this point in time.
-- Dr. Eldarion --
people dont have as much disposable income, and tend to purchase entertainment that can be "reused". Books & Boards Games are always big sellers in bad economies, video games just follow the logical progression.
what falters in bad economies are "night on the town" style entertainment like movies and fine dining (with the notable exception of bars)
Thanks to file sharing, I purchase more CDs
Thanks to the RIAA, I buy them used...
Think about it, the growing power of the pc and its cheapness is allowing more and more people to run the best games on it, at $50 a piece. Along with that you have the ps2 which has sold some insane number like 18 million units (including one to me last week). I bought it for final fantasy X but decided I wanted to play it with my little brothers so went out and bought 3 more games. This is probably the first year that we've had 3 consoles that are all roughly equal in the minds of users so maybe the more of a choice has lead some people to check out details alittle more which I know once I got into hardware specs I couldn't help but buy one. Just wish the ps2 and xbox were alittle cheaper, but theres always the gamecube and computer games to cover that market. I suppose thats the biggest thing, its no longer you buy a system at $200 (the original consoles, nes, genesis, sega cd, saturn, ps1, 3do, super nes, etc) and thats it. Now you've got your super systems (xbox, ps2), your less pricey but still nice systems (gamecube, gameboy advance, psone combo) and with everyone owning a computer, your very low cost games (darkvault of camalot, soldier of fortune, wolfenstein, sims, etc). Definitly looks like a good time to be in the gaming industry with so many options.
can't sleep slashdot will eat me
Here's some random video game trivia I picked up for the incredible book The Ultimate History of Video Games to celebrate this good news!
...
... MAME on a fast PC with an X-Arcade = the best video game console out there!
- The PacMan character shape was derived from the game designer looking at a pizza he ordered after eating one slice of it.
- Pac Man was originally called "Puck Man" in Japan, but worried that american adolescents would deface the cabinets, replacing the 'P' with an 'F' to spell "Fuck Man", they changed the name.
- Both Steve Jobs and The Woz used to work at Atari in its early years. Atari founder Nolan Buschnell (also the founder of Chuck E Cheese) was hesitant about hiring Steve Jobs because he literally smelled bad and looked like a "20 year old ho chi minh". It turned out that almost everything Jobs took credit for at Atari was stuff that Woz actually did, which leads me to
- Atari gave Jobs the task of changing the design of one of their games (I forget which) to use less chips. Jobs then handed this task over to Woz. Jobs was promised a substantial bonus for every chip removed from the design, and he promised Woz half of this bonus. Woz's design was brilliant and removed something like 75 chips, which led to a bonus of something like 50 grand. Jobs gave Woz 500 bucks and told him that was half the total bonus. By fucking over his best friend, Jobs now had some capital to go and start Apple.
-The name "Donkey Kong" came from the Japanese designer (Miyamoto? I forget) trying to translate "Stubborn Gorrilla". He looked up "Stubborn" and saw "Donkey" as part of the translation and went with it.
-Magnavox designed the first video game console, the "Odyssey".
-"Atari" means "check" in the context of the japanese game Go.
-The company Namco got its big start by the illegal bootlegging of Atari arcade machines for the Japanese market.
-Space Invaders was such a hit in Japan that it caused a national coin shortage.
-The company name "COLECO" stands for "Colorado Leather Company". They also invented Cabbage Patch Kids.
Now, it is possible there's some factual errors above (don't have the book on me right now so I'm working on memory), so feel free to correct me!
(RANT)All that said, people, please go and support your local arcades. The arcade industry is DYING and it seems that nothing is being done because home video games are being so damn successful. I truly miss the days when arcade developers had significant R&D budgets and were capable of releasing arcade games that looked and played far better than anything you could play at home. I miss the days when I'd think how great it would be to be able to play those games at home. It just saddens me that 2d arcade style games are dying as a genre, and people keep unfairly comparing them to their 3d counterparts. and I don't care what you say, games like Metal Slug, Street Fighter 3, and Last Blade 2 have _FAR_ better graphics than any 3d first person shooter!!!!(/RANT)
And one more thing
Are there any statistics about corresponding increases in car wrecks? I bought a PS2 just for Grand Theft Auto 3 (and also bought a bunch of other games); so I definitely spent way more on games in 2001 than I have in years.
But now when I'm driving around (I'm in a somewhat rural area), when I see a good pile of dirt by the side of the road, I feel a little tempted to floor it and see if I can complete a Unique Jump, preferably without landing upside down, so my car doesn't burst into flames and explode. Thank god there aren't any rocket launchers lying around on the side of the road.
You're forgetting that the Console had 9B while the PC had 6B. You can pirate the PC games, but it's much harder to pirate a console game. I mean I can give a friend a warez copy of Diablo 2 or the sims, but unless I go over to his house and solder a chip into his PSX/PS2, there is no way I can give him a copy of GTA3.
Also notice that top selling pc game is a game that requires little Hardware. The sims doesn't support accelerated 3-d at ALL. Which is one reason that it always looks the same on every platform.
I'm not sure if international sales count in this, but the only game I've bought this year was Uplink that was featured on Slashdot. Other than that, nothing else has really caught my attention in the gaming market. Maybe if they came out with something new and interesting I might buy it.
What the game companies need to do is figure out innovative ways to break out of standard genres like FPS or RTS, which is probably why I liked Uplink and probably why The Sims did so well, because they aren't standard genres that have been rehashed over and over again and are just getting old now.
Things you think are in the Constitution, but are not.
The article mentions that the number for the console market ($9.4B) includes hardware, which in the console industry is sold at a loss.
The PC number ($6B) did not include hardware. I have no idea how much hardware was sold, but there are some pieces of hardware that were sold solely for the purpose of gaming (I know you didn't purchase that GeForce 3 Ti 500 to browse the Net). Is it possible that the PC market is actually bigger than the console market? Of course, it would be very difficult to ever nail down PC hardware figures.
Just off the top of my head, Max Payne and Black & White.
Both blew my mind, and were a lot better than one more half-life expansion.
Is because it appeals to women. Not to say men don't like it, but it appeals to women in a BIG WAY. It's like a virtual dollhouse, except much more advanced and you don't lose any of the pieces.
;)
Really, I've seen them do all sorts of imaginative/mentally-unhealthy things with the game. From spending hours creating their virtual dreamhouse to throwing the perfect party to hooking up their virtual persona with a virtual Justin Timberlake.
I mean, can you really think of any better, more efficient way to foster unrealistic expectations of life than The Sims? God bless innovation!
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