Bored Ape Yacht Club
BAYC cracks the code for NFT fandom
Bored Ape Yacht Club
Karol Severin
Karol is a co-founder and Research Director at MIDiA. With over a decade of experience in consumer research, industry analysis, and consulting, Karol oversees the direction, coverage and quality of all MIDiA’s research output. Prior to co-founding MIDiA, Karol gained experience in TMT market research and consulting, as well as an entertainment industry startup founder. He holds a business management degree from Queen Mary, University of London, with specialisation in strategy, quantitative methods, and entrepreneurship.
Fandom drivers
From fan psychology to NFT demand
Fandom is entertainment’s growth currency, yet it remains both under-valued and poorly understood. While other entertainment currencies can be accurately measured (number of streams, number of sales, number of views, etc.) it is only the effects of fandom that can be quantified (number of likes / shares, merchandise sales, etc.
Ubisoft+ is coming to Xbox as shifts in distribution continue
Ubisoft has announced that its subscription service Ubisoft+, currently available on PC, will come to Xbox in the future. It will also make its upcoming title Rainbox Six Exploration available on Xbox Game Pass and PC Game Pass from day one.
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Gamer consumer deep dive Q3 2021
This report presents a deep dive into gamers across five areas: Gamer segments Console owners Services and apps Games behaviours Entertainment behaviours Including more than fifty slides of data and analysis, as well as detailed Excel files, the topics covered include: mobile gamers, console gamers, computer gamers, Xbox, PlayStation, Nintendo, Discord, YouTube, Twitch, Stadia, Arcade, games videos, gamer overlaps, gamer demographics, games genres, games titles, in-games spending, NFTs, cross-entertainment behaviours, and much more.
Gamer penetration: Two findings from end-of-year health check
Gamer penetration is one of those stats that most people are intuitively aware of – mobile is the largest, followed by PC and console gamer bases…However, when we get complacent with existing knowledge and take it for granted for too long, this is when one runs a risk of missing something important.
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2022 MIDiA predictions
The year of the creator
In this report MIDiA Research analysts present their predictions for what will be the big trends in digital media and tech across music, video, brands, marketing, games, and sports in 2022 and beyond. Companies and brands mentioned in this report: Adele,...
PlayStation Plus overhaul: a defensive catch-up move, or foundation for growth offensive?
According to Bloomberg citing people familiar with the matter, Sony plans to weave PlayStation Now (its on-demand games streaming offering) into PlayStation Plus (subscription necessary to access multiplayer features, and a small, windowed selection of games).
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Games worlds
Assessing audience reach, value and relevance
As more online games worlds enter the market, brands and marketers need to focus more on monitoring the nuances of each games world community to identify the most effective partnership opportunities. The key factors to pay attention to are reach, audience value, and relevance.
Labels could have helped Epic reimagine music – now Harmonix will do it instead
Epic Games announced it is acquiring Harmonix, the maker of Rock Band. While this makes sense for the Fortnite maker and its entertainment metaverse, it has the risk of diluting the potential music expertise that labels and other music companies could (and should) offer to games partners.
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Quick take: Bridging IRL and digital – the next phase of entertainment consumption
We are entering a new phase in the evolution of consumption. Traditionally, IRL dominated entertainment consumption. With the advent of the internet, smartphones and other technological innovations, companies and consumers created de-facto digital replicas of IRL.
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Reality check: NFTs are still niche, but they do have mainstream potential
The rise of NFTs has certainly been one of the talks of 2021. Looking at emerging trends and then separating the hype from the substance is MIDiA’s specialty. This is particularly pertinent as the most hyped trends are often labelled as ‘going mainstream’ too early, which can be a misleading label that causes stakeholders to over-focus or over-invest on the trend too soon.
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Quick take: Another blow for Epic Games as Fortnite shuts down in China
It has not been the best year for Fortnite. Following the fiasco with its Apple lawsuit, as well as year on year consumer penetration having declined , the Fortnite maker announced that it is shutting down its Chinese version of Fortnite, Fortress Night.
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FaZe goes public – what to watch out for
FaZe is going public via a SPAC merger. It is positioning itself as the company who can help brands reach Gen Z. Can it succeed? Every generation or so, there is a company that builds its narrative to investors around being the company to help reach and influence the ever-so-fickle young demographic.
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EA’s exclusive FIFA license is under threat as games go cross-entertainment
Last week it was reported that FIFA and EA are at an impasse regarding the renewal negotiations of an exclusive license deal. EA stated that it is considering renaming its flagship football title, while FIFA responded with a press release stating that “the future of gaming and esports for football stakeholders must involve more than one party controlling and exploiting all the rights’’ This is less about who is right and who is wrong, and more about the synergy of this once symbiotic partnership having run its course.
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The key winners and losers of the Covid-bounce effect in games
As we have covered before, games engagement began to experience effects of the Covid-bounce . As usual, however, there are winners and losers within the wider micro-dynamics. The following graph demonstrates how 20 key games franchises fared in the US between Q2 2020 and Q2 2021, in terms of consumer penetration growth: Roblox and Rockstar are the biggest winners Roblox grew 49% in penetration year on year.
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Why games-related video warrants a specific category on mainstream video services
In Q2 2021, 11% of US consumers stated that they watch games-related videos every month. This is now nearing the same penetration rate as fandom of reality TV shows or the news (both at 12%), and greater than fandom for factual (7%) or anime (9%).
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Opportunity for entertainment companies as the ‘Covid Bounce’ effect is in full swing for games
Following the pandemic breakout in March 2020, MIDiA predicted that Covid-19-induced games engagement growth was temporary and will face a correction as the world starts coming back to life. Indeed, with four quarters of data in hindsight, the Covid Bounce effect for games is in full swing.
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Games discovery and conversion
Navigating between generations in the 2020s
The 2020s population is split between digital natives and older digital migrants, which shapes how consumers discover and convert to new games. Younger consumers are more likely to discover via channels and formats pioneered by digital natives, such as creator coverage and social media feeds.
Justice is served…Initial thoughts on the Apple vs. Epic ruling
The court ruling in the Apple vs. Epic Games case has taken media headlines by storm. However, given the diversity of narratives around the outcome, it is clear that the ‘winner’, is not exactly clear yet.
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Quick take: Word of mouth is no longer the single most powerful games discovery tool
Do you know the saying ‘ word of mouth is the most powerful marketing tool ’? Well, things are changing - or at least evolving. MIDiA’s Q2 2021 consumer survey states that 25% of consumers typically discover new games on social media feeds – the same penetration rate as consumers who stated that they discover games ‘from personal recommendations’.
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