Blog: Gaming

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.

Chaos and uncertainty: Tariffs’ impact on gamers and the games market

Cover image for Chaos and uncertainty: Tariffs’ impact on gamers and the games market

Rhys Elliott

10 Apr 2025

Business Strategy

Tariff turmoil related to the US’ trade war is intensifying. Other countries have retaliated, and while Trump has eased tariffs in some countries, the situation is far from being resolved. The tariffs have major implications for the games market in the US.

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85% of Rocket League players do NOT count electronic music as a favourite music genre – own goal or opportunity?

Cover image for 85% of Rocket League players do NOT count electronic music as a favourite music genre – own goal or opportunity?

Rhys Elliott

28 Mar 2025

Business Strategy

Key takeaways from this blog: Only 15% of Rocket League players list EDM as a top genre, per MIDiA data, despite its dominance in the game Players are twice as likely than average to prefer EDM, often due to in-game exposure (per MIDiA interviews) Psyonix should diversify its soundtrack, as explored in MIDiA’s ‘Pixels to Playlists’ report, to boost engagement and match broader player tastes Anybody who has played Psyonix’s Rocket League knows that the game is almost synonymous with electronic music.

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20% of gamers love couch co-op: Split Fiction’s success is proof players want more

Cover image for 20% of gamers love couch co-op: Split Fiction’s success is proof players want more

Rhys Elliott

20 Mar 2025

Audience Insight

Key insights from this blog: MIDiA's research shows that a significant portion of gamers consider couch co-op a favourite genre. The runaway success of Split Fiction supports these findings Producing more couch co-op games would cater to gamer segments that MIDiA has identified as being underserved, including women and older gamers As growth across gaming slows, couch co-op games are a key opportunity the industry needs to seize Split Fiction , the co-op-only adventure game from Hazelight Studios, has sold over 2 million copies in one week, generating revenues of over $100 million.

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Why do gamers play games? Half say mainly to relax, but the other half has different goals

Cover image for Why do gamers play games? Half say mainly to relax, but the other half has different goals

Rhys Elliott

6 Mar 2025

Audience Insight

We are proud to have launched our new gamer segmentation , which focuses on motivations, attitudes, and underlying reasons behind gaming behaviours. This article zooms in on some key data and insights from our segmentation, based on both qualitative and quantitative data.

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Can the smart TV become a canvas for content creation?

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Ben Woods

21 Feb 2025

Audience Insight

YouTube’s growing strength on smart TVs is a head scratching moment for the video industry. The social video platform recently revealed that US consumers watched 1 billion hours of YouTube content daily on their smart TVs in December 2024.

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The case for more digestable games: Over a third of console and PC gamers play LESS than 5 hours a week

Cover image for The case for more digestable games: Over a third of console and PC gamers play LESS than 5 hours a week

Rhys Elliott

20 Feb 2025

The attention economy is oversaturated. Games are not just competingwith other games but with TikTok, YouTube, Netflix, and well ... life. But the games industry – especially premium games on console and PC – has a unique twofold challenge: Supply : New AAA games can take five years or more to make (and often have budgets in the hundreds of millions) Demand : Player attention and play time are already maxed out MIDiA’s consumer research for Q4 2024 underlines just how little time consumers have to play.

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Social platforms are eating passive entertainment. Are games eating social?

Cover image for Social platforms are eating passive entertainment. Are games eating social?

Hanna Kahlert

22 Oct 2024

At Sony Music’s Interactive Tech Day in London on 22nd October, gaming was, ironically, the highlight. From artist takeovers of Roblox destinations to concert-type experiences in Fortnite Islands, the company’s music strategy is increasingly crossing over with the gaming world – a goal mirrored in the increasing closeness of Sony Music and Sony Interactive Entertainment, according to their respective speakers at the event.

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Branded podcasts level up: Ubisoft’s gaming podcasts bring games to life for new audiences

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Rutger Rosenborg

7 Jun 2024

As the podcast listener base grows , companies across several industries — from automotive to fast food — see podcast production as a way to market to new audiences (sort of like an audio blog). Branded podcasts are nothing new for big games publishers like PlayStation and Xbox.

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Are we approaching an analogue revival?

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Hanna Kahlert

11 Jan 2024

It is now 2024 (yikes), and New Year’s resolutions are making the rounds. Anecdotally, at least seven of us at MIDiA have resolved to go more analogue this year. More broadly, many people, alongside the traditional attempts to go to the gym more or do ‘Dry January’, seem to be opting to cut down on their social media and broader smartphone usage.

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

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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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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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Less is more, but it’s already all ‘too much’: The rise of digital disengagement

Cover image for Less is more, but it’s already all ‘too much’: The rise of digital disengagement

Hanna Kahlert

5 Jul 2023

A new Europol report has predicted that as much as 90% of all content on the internet could be ‘synthetically generated’ (made or modified by AI) by 2026. That is a two-and-a-half-year window and closing, with the end result being only a small minority of online content having been conceived of, much less created by, actual humans.

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Is the quality of games going down?

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Perry Gresham

24 Feb 2023

trueachievements

“Things aren’t like they used to be”, a common refrain of anyone over the age of about 25, is a sentiment especially prevalent amongst gamers today. Is this blind nostalgia, or have games really gotten worse? To investigate this, I looked into user rating data from TrueAchievements.

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The streaming wars will be won with technology, not content

Cover image for The streaming wars will be won with technology, not content

Ben Woods

31 Jan 2023

The modern entertainment industry is a tale of re-invention. The need for vast amounts of content to justify the value of a subscription video on-demand (SVOD) service has made the artists, series, and franchises of yesteryear just as valuable to platforms as the next blockbuster hit.

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The metaverse transition: Fortnite

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Samuel Griffin

19 Jan 2023

The metaverse transition: Fortnite Unreal Engine has been at the bleeding edge of digital development since its release, being fundamental to the development of household titles such as The Witcher , Fortnite , Disney’s The Mandalorian, and HBO’s Westworld.

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The co-op opportunity

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Perry Gresham

25 Nov 2022

This month Microsoft released the results from a consumer survey they commissioned into Christmas-period gaming habits. According to the survey, video games are a more popular seasonal activity than either board games or outdoor activities (among those who celebrate the season).

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Grand Theft IP

Cover image for Grand Theft IP

Perry Gresham

23 Sep 2022

grand theft auto

intellectual property

This week gaming entered leak season, with large amounts of content unexpectedly released for two major upcoming titles: Grand Theft Auto VI (GTA) and Diablo IV. GTA developer Rockstar Games confirmed : “We recently suffered a network intrusion in which an unauthorised third party illegally accessed and downloaded confidential information from our systems, including early development footage for the next Grand Theft Auto”.

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Has Blizzard’s mobile gamble paid off?

Cover image for Has Blizzard’s mobile gamble paid off?

Perry Gresham

11 Aug 2022

microtransactions

Blizzard was once perhaps the most loved game developer – with a devoted fanbase built on the back of iconic titles like Diablo and World of Warcraft. However, over the past few years there has been a shift in the perception of the developer, especially within its core fanbase.

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From 8-bit to fantasy: Proms’ focus on gaming underscores its cultural relevance

Cover image for From 8-bit to fantasy: Proms’ focus on gaming underscores its cultural relevance

Samuel Griffin

10 Aug 2022

After the humble beginnings of the first melodic loops from NAMCO’s Rally X , the cultural symphony of music, video, and games has since matured toHildur Guðnadóttir and Sam Slater’s recent score for Battlefield 2042 .

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More M&A activity could shift power from games companies closer to big tech

Cover image for More M&A activity could shift power from games companies closer to big tech

Richard Broadhurst

22 Jul 2022

attention recession

The first half of 2022 revealed how fragile the digital economy can be. The gaming industry, after a bullish run over the course of the pandemic, was not exempt from the blend of economic uncertainty, attention recession, and behavioural shifts.

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