Blog: Games - Page 3

Read our latest daily deep dives, hot takes, and exciting updates about the entertainment world. Check out the latest insight from your favourite analyst, or search by coverage areas - music, entertainment and fandom, creator economy and social.

PlayStation’s financial results: The good, the bad, and the hopeful

Cover image for PlayStation’s financial results: The good, the bad, and the hopeful

Rhys Elliott

16 May 2024

PlayStation Plus

Sony released its earnings for the 12 months ending March 31, 2024 (FY2023). As always, gaming was Sony’s biggest vertical and the heart of its cross-media strategy . Revenues grew +17% in FY2023 to $28.

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Helldivers 2's woes show publishers should nudge, not push, gamers

Cover image for Helldivers 2's woes show publishers should nudge, not push, gamers

Rhys Elliott

10 May 2024

Helldivers 2 is one of the most popular games of the year so far and has been PlayStation’s biggest PC and live-service success story to date. But PlayStation drew the ire of the game’s PC fanbase by announcing it would force Steam players to link their account to a PlayStation Network (PSN) account.

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Focusing too much on Xbox's hardware decline misses the point

Cover image for Focusing too much on Xbox's hardware decline misses the point

Rhys Elliott

2 May 2024

Microsoft recently released its Q1 2024 financial results (fiscal Q3). Gaming revenue was up +51% and Xbox content / services revenue was up +62%. These gains mostly came from Microsoft’s Activision Blizzard acquisition.

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Fallout is another transmedia hit, but the strategy needs to evolve

Cover image for Fallout is another transmedia hit, but the strategy needs to evolve

Rhys Elliott

26 Apr 2024

Everyone was talking about the Super Mario Bros. Movie (The Mario movie ) and HBO’s The Last of Us this time last year, and now Fallout has entered the mainstream thanks to the Amazon show. But, for game publishers, the transmedia strategy is nowhere near maximising its potential.

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Collector’s editions are becoming a backdoor for monetising early access

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Rhys Elliott

17 Apr 2024

Since publishers first increased AAA game prices from $60 to $70 in 2020, many people have asked MIDiA if publishers will raise that price further. Our answer: they already have – sort of, anyway. Via collector’s editions – more expensive versions of games with extra content – publishers are already leveraging superfans’ FOMO to grow launch revenues.

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Game budgets have gone out of control – let's shrink the scope

Cover image for Game budgets have gone out of control – let's shrink the scope

Rhys Elliott

11 Apr 2024

PlayStation Productions

AAA game development budgets and timelines for single-player games are getting out of hand. This was not always the case, but there has been an insidious creep over the past 20 years. While the cost of game development is a black box, leaks and disclosures around court cases and acquisitions show that budgets are now in the hundreds of millions for many AAA games.

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Steam is the unlikely winner of the modern console wars – for now

Cover image for Steam is the unlikely winner of the modern console wars – for now

Rhys Elliott

4 Apr 2024

Thanks to console manufacturers and third-party publishers moving content to Steam, Valve now boasts one of the most diverse AAA offerings on the market, benefitting from new strategies adopted by Xbox and PlayStation.

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Take-Two acquires Gearbox as cross entertainment synergies ramp up

Cover image for Take-Two acquires Gearbox as cross entertainment synergies ramp up

Karol Severin

28 Mar 2024

take two interactive

We have barely made it to the end of the first calendar quarter of 2024 and MIDiA’s prediction about a $100 million+ acquisition in the games industry has panned out. Take-Two Interactive (Take-Two) is acquiring The Gearbox Entertainment Company from Embracer for $460 million, paid with common stock.

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Quick take: The games industry health check

Cover image for Quick take: The games industry health check

Karol Severin

27 Feb 2024

In recent weeks and months, a growing number of people have been asking: “What is going on with the games industry?”, “Is the games industry doomed now?”, “Is it done growing?”, “If neither a new Switch or GTA 6 are getting released this year, is the games industry going to have a weak year?”, or some other typically sceptical permutation thereof.

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Why the Xbox announcement is an important and strategically smart nod to developers

Cover image for Why the Xbox announcement is an important and strategically smart nod to developers

Karol Severin

16 Feb 2024

Xbox announcement

Xbox announced on its podcast with Phil Spencer, Sarah Bond and Matt Booty, that it is bringing four of its titles to other consoles. While no specific titles were named, it ruled out Starfield and Indiana Jones, and mentioned that two of the games are community driven and the remainder are smaller games that may have reached a plateau on Xbox.

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The context behind Disney’s investment into Epic Games

Cover image for The context behind Disney’s investment into Epic Games

Karol Severin

15 Feb 2024

Disney announced it is investing $1.5 billion into Epic Games. The same announcement talks about a creation of an “ expansive and open games and entertainment universe connected to Fortnite ”. This move makes sense for Disney on several levels and is perhaps one of the most impactful games-related moves for Disney’s overall cultural relevance, engagement, monetisation capabilities, and profitability.

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For years, we said to take games efforts of these companies seriously – now they are serious players

Cover image for For years, we said to take games efforts of these companies seriously – now they are serious players

Karol Severin

12 Jan 2024

MIDiA has always been bullish about traditionally non-gaming tech companies’ opportunity in games. The first time we wrote about Netflix’s opportunity in games was in 2017. We also wrote about the significance of Apple Arcade early on ( here , here , and reiterated reasons for the games industry to take it seriously again, here ).

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More games will need to grow time spent in 2024 – what type of research can help do it?

Cover image for More games will need to grow time spent in 2024 – what type of research can help do it?

Karol Severin

18 Dec 2023

While the new year is usually a time for hope and new beginnings, 2024 may not necessarily be smoother sailing for the global games industry than 2023. Yes, companies have experienced reduced operational expenditure following thousands of layoffs and are not entering the new year with as much of a cost burden.

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The $100m+ in-game opportunity behind music producers

Cover image for The $100m+ in-game opportunity behind music producers

Kriss Thakrar

15 Nov 2023

monetizing fandom

MIDiA’s latest forecasts predict that the video game industry will be worth over $300 billion in 2030, a figure that makes a minnow out of a music industry that will reach $87 billion in retail terms by 2030 .

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Embracing the cultural ascent of games: Zelda, Sony, and games-video symbiosis

Cover image for Embracing the cultural ascent of games: Zelda, Sony, and games-video symbiosis

Perry Gresham

10 Nov 2023

Legend of Zelda

Gaming has been mainstream for a while, but in recent years it has started flexing its cross-cultural muscles, intersecting with music, sports, and increasingly with video . The latest example is a new live-action movie, based on The Legend of Zelda games franchise, announced this week as a collaboration between Nintendo and Sony Pictures.

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Games industry returns to growth, but inflationary pressures will make it worse off still

Cover image for Games industry returns to growth, but inflationary pressures will make it worse off still

Karol Severin

7 Nov 2023

Following over a decade of stellar growth (for an industry that is 50-years-old), the growth pace of the global video games industry has arguably peaked. The grand finale of its growth heyday was artificially fuelled by the Covid bounce in 2020 (26.

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Are the ongoing layoffs in games indicative of a wider issue in the games industry?

Cover image for Are the ongoing layoffs in games indicative of a wider issue in the games industry?

Karol Severin

6 Oct 2023

The layoffs wildfire that struck the games industry at the start of 2023 does not seem to be stopping - the most recent being Epic Games last week. Firstly, on a personal level, it has been really sad and upsetting to see all these people being laid off in 2023 – especially when the reasons behind these layoffs are really not through any fault of their own.

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Epic blames layoffs on low creator margins — what does that mean for the rest of entertainment?

Cover image for Epic blames layoffs on low creator margins — what does that mean for the rest of entertainment?

Tatiana Cirisano

4 Oct 2023

Content Creators

Increasingly, engaging with entertainment involves some form of creation — be it turning your life into a Wes Anderson film , making songs with Grimes’ vocals , or learning the choreography to your new favourite music video .

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Unity’s pricing is a symptom, not the cause of tougher times ahead for the games industry

Cover image for Unity’s pricing is a symptom, not the cause of tougher times ahead for the games industry

Karol Severin

14 Sep 2023

game developers

Earlier this week, Unity announced that from 2024 it will start charging developers for the number of downloads / installs of their games. Developers unsurprisingly threw their proverbial toys out of the pram following the news.

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BlackPink, superfans and the video game threat to social video and streaming TV

Cover image for BlackPink, superfans and the video game threat to social video and streaming TV

Ben Woods

1 Sep 2023

Being an entertainment fan in the modern era can be a disjointed experience. Take Star Wars . A fan of the long-standing sci-fi franchise must invest significant amounts of time and money across multiple entertainment platforms if they are to truly indulge in their fandom.

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