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Fortune Magazine On 'The Biggest Game In Town'
Thanks to Fortune Magazine for their feature on why games are seriously big business. The introduction reads: "Music? Sales down. Hollywood? Hit or miss. Tech? Flat. No wonder everyone wants to be in videogames", as the piece goes on to throw out some interesting statistics: "Within three weeks [of release, Madden NFL] grossed $100 million -- two million copies sold at $50 a pop. In roughly the same period, the summer hit movie Seabiscuit returned $78 million." The amount of hours spent in front of games is also highlighted: "On average an American will spend 75 hours this year playing videogames, more than double the amount of time spent gaming in 1997 and eclipsing that of DVD or tape rentals today." But despite the article's EA-hyping, it points out the cyclical nature of the industry and failures, too, such as The Sims Online, to which "...just under 10,000 are now subscribed."
If you are a large game house like EA with solid games like their EA Sports line, you can expect big returns for yearly updates.
Try to break into the business without having serious funding. It's almost impossible.
The only thing that is clear from this article is that them that's got will get and them's that's not shall lose. And it still is news, I guess.
You really can make statistics say anything you want. Nevermind that a movie lasts 2 hours (maybe 4 if you're an Oliver Stone fan), whereas a game is required to supply 50+ hours of gameplay or it's considered a waste of money.
How we know is more important than what we know.
You also have to realize that a huge amount of games are made for the sole purpose of promoting a movie or other product. Most are made very quickly, and you can tell by the quality (** cough ** Harry Potter ** cough **). But, companies like id are there spending years making games, and create a solid game, but making small amounts of profit out of it. I have tried playing these games, and it looks like very little effort even went into them. Join with me, fellow /.ers, and boycott games!
... at least until Doom III comes out. (YAY)
... so I am partially correct.
Well
I don't understand what is the big draw in these games. People play replicas of previous year's games, with a few minor changes, and are willing to shell out $50 for each minor revision. If software was like this, then there would be 20,000 Microsoft's running around.
You also have to keep in mind that 1/3 of the games are from Microsoft
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The Sims online is a failure with just under 10k people paying $10 a month?
That's still $100k a month. Even paying for the huge pipe the game's servers need, there's still gonna be left over cash.
People tend to forget games like Evercrack, DAOC, even SWG, are huge cash cows.
Maybe if Sims Online drops below 5k users then there may be some issues with supporting constant developer updates, but even then, the game still makes enough money for it to live on.
Just as Ford shelled out to have 007 drive an Aston Martin in "Die Another Day", car manufacturers will go out of their way to provide prototype designs and specs for their new muscle cars for inclusion into games like Grand Turismo. As the article points out, gamers spend enormous amounts of time with a good game, which gives your product much better exposure than a 30-second TV commercial or a print ad.
The bold print giveth, and the fine print taketh away
...in the Offline Online Game graveyard? I see that The Sims Online seems to have died horribly. We're now getting all the pre-release hype about Ultima X: Origins (or whatever), but will that be yet another EA online flop?
that they'd at least try a free download / longer trial before they gave up.
How we know is more important than what we know.
Many Thanks,
Luke
HERE is an article describing exactly what you are trying to say (I think). It was either posted here or on Fark a few weeks ago.
If Chaos Theory has taught us anything, it's that we must kill all the butterflies.
On average an American will spend 75 hours this year playing videogames, more than double the amount of time spent gaming in 1997
Dear God! When Wind Waker came out I spent like 50 hours in a weeks time with it, I picked up Disgaea last Thursday and I was at 30 hours by Sunday.
Either 75 is a really low estimate (thats what, an hour and 15 min a week?) Or I can expect some friends and family to be ambushing me with an intervention pretty soon....
On Wall Street they say "buy low, sell high" On the pad we say, "buy high, sell high" Isn't that somehow better?
Now does anybody have a job for me in this supposedly booming industry?
One that I can actually live on?
I'm fluent in over six million forms of cummunication... sigh.
Years later, a doctor will tell me that I have an I.Q. of 48, and am what some people call "mentally retarded".
Now that games are selling more and becoming a common past-time, will it ever reach a stage where they will eventually become cheaper? Will we start seeing games available on average for $25 a piece or will a new model for distribution be required for costs for the end user to be reduced?
Music? Sales down. Hollywood? Hit or miss.
:)
Now, how much does filesharing influence this? For music, I'd say quite a bit. Not so much for movies - it's l33t to have the latest blockbuster on (S)VCD, even before the premiere, but in the end - if you liked the movie - you still go to the theatre and watch it on the big screen. Supposedly true for music CDs also, but I guess to a lesser extend.
What about games? Yes, you can find virtually any title on (most of) your favourite P2P network. Documentation may be missing, or may be included as a PDF, but there are commercial box version available that do not offer much more than that, especially since the advent of DVD cases...
So either John and Jane Doe take delight in d/l movies, but not games, or the number of people playing a game are much larger than the sales figures. If you have a pirated version of the game, the drawbacks are much lower than those of a pirated movie. And I'm not even convinced that the majority uses the pirated games as a "full demo" and buys the game afterwards, if they like it.
Just my 2 cents. I would be nice to have numbers so a definite statement could be made...
My cats ate my karma. They also wrote this comment.
As was recently revealed Star Wars Galaxies reportedly has already over 275,000 subscribers, (sorry I dont have a link to article right now, perhaps someone else can supply). The SWG subscription is what most consider a little (a lot) on the high side at $15 dollars a month. Which comes out over $4 million per month just in subscription fees!
Being an avid fan of SWG, I can only see this number steadily increasing, especially if the developers can continue to fix problem areas of the game. This isnt even considering the amount of money they will make when releasing the planned space expansion (2004-2005?), which will almost certainly be bought by every subscriber (at $40 a pop, another $11 million in sales at least, im sure more by then.)
Its easy to see how when you hit the right market in the gaming industry, the sky is most certainly the limit! Besides with how bad this summers "blockbuster" movies were, who wouldnt rather stay at home in front of a nice video game?
I played a portion of the beta.
Enough to realize the game was just tedium to make money. It was a job. I have a job. It pays me well. I don't want another job, I want to have fun. Sure it was nice you could go on, talk to some friends, sit around and chat, buy up a house. But most of the game I could just play on the offline version and have more fun, more control over other people. You can cheat, which sadly drives a lot of the players. I can't say that I've known many serious Sims players. Inevitably, everyone I've known who has played it, has gone and cashed up to build the mansion for their sim to play in. Sadly that's teh only goal I've seen of the game, is to become successful and build up career, but what's the point with free money (which is why I don't use the codes). No, most of them don't sit down and play for hours on end.
"Within three weeks [of release, Madden NFL] grossed $100 million -- two million copies sold at $50 a pop. In roughly the same period, the summer hit movie Seabiscuit returned $78 million."
Yeah, and Spiderman grossed $114 in 3 DAYS. The Matrix Reloaded grossed $94 million or so in 3 DAYS. And since when is Seabiscuit a "summer hit movie"? No offense to horse-lovers out there (you perverts), but I don't know anybody who's even slightly interested in it. I don't know anybody who's seen it, or wants to see it. I know more people that have had root canals done in the past 3 weeks than have seen Seabiscuit, so does that mean that everybody and their brother will want to be dentists in the next few months?
"It's better to have a gun and not need it than need a gun and not have it." ~ Christian Slater, True Romance
I can't believe I'm the first to post this (and my apologies if I'm not).
Quoting the article: "The Jedi Knights challenge the ruthless Federation"
Developers take note: *that's* a game. Chewbacca vs. Worf, Vader vs. Janeway, Jake Lloyd vs. the Enterprise-E... the possibilities are endless.
Create that game, EA, and you'll be rolling in money plucked from the wallets of hyperventilating geeks.