Reports: Call of Duty

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Cover image for The future of creator apps

The future of creator apps
Fuelling engagement with fandom

Ben Woods

29 Jul 2025

Creators Spotify Artists

The AI boom has unleashed a wave of creator tools, but some are struggling to make the transition from interesting and experimental to compulsive and essential. Fandom offers a solution by tying creation to a consumer’s personal passion, appetite for community engagement and a desire to have a stake in the entertainment they love.

Cover image for Is in-game advertising the next frontier for PC and console games?

Is in-game advertising the next frontier for PC and console games?

Rhys Elliott

15 Jul 2025

Apple YouTube Netflix

In-game advertising (IGA) in AAA console and PC titles is experiencing a resurgence. Advancements in technology, shifting consumer behaviours, evolving monetisation strategies, and a now-mature games market have reignited interest. With AAA publishers adopting free-to-play models and hybrid monetisation – mirroring mobile gaming’s success – a...

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Flipping the script
Game IP transmedia needs to evolve

Rhys Elliott

9 May 2025

Amazon Netflix Xbox

The entertainment landscape is changing. As superhero fatigue sets in, game IP is now dominating screens, from HBO’s The Last of Us to the Minecraft movie. Unlike movie trends (Westerns, superhero movies), the game-to-movie trend is here to stay, as the games market is a cross-genre treasure trove of beloved IP and fandom, with new IP arriving fr...

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MIDiA's gamer segmentation
Prioritise why – not just how – players engage with games

Rhys Elliott

25 Feb 2025

Amazon Netflix Gaming

The games landscape is more dynamic and interconnected than ever, demanding a deeper understanding of why players engage with games – not just how. We are proud to introduce MIDiA’s gamer segmentation, which focuses on motivations, attitudes, and underlying reasons behind gaming behaviours.

Cover image for The single-player opportunity

The single-player opportunity
Course correcting from a red to blue ocean

Rhys Elliott

30 Sep 2024

YouTube Netflix Xbox

The AAA PC and console games market is facing growth issues, money is more expensive, and developers are facing pressure to become leaner, more profitable, and take fewer risks. Many game makers, including those that found initial success in single player, have been chasing the live-service trend.

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Tipping point
The coming consolidation of live service games

Karol Severin and Perry Gresham

17 Jul 2023

ariana grande Call of Duty FIFA

The games industry has become addicted to the promise of lower risk and better ROI from live service games. As a result, there has been a flurry of live service titles released over the last 10 years. This is the key reason why the games industry’s core business model has shifted from unit-sales based to engagement based.

Cover image for Rebooting video fandom

Rebooting video fandom
Games as a video streaming genre

Tim Mulligan, Karol Severin, Perry Gresham, Samuel Griffin and Ben Woods

20 Mar 2023

Apple Apple TV Netflix

With gamers being mainstream, video streaming services and their content offerings can benefit by increasing focus on the preferences of gamers. Crucially, this enables subscription video on demand (SVOD) services to drive engagement, broaden reach and improve retention.

Cover image for The next challenge for esports

The next challenge for esports
Striking the balance between creators and athletes

Karol Severin and Samuel Griffin

9 Dec 2022

Call of Duty Business Strategy Games industry

Esports organisations are past the initial ‘hype stage’. They are now in a phase where they need to make their business models work commercially. The ongoing adverse macroeconomic climate only exacerbates this. Sustainable long-term growth for esports organisations lies in the wider, gamer-related, entertainment culture – not just in the comp...

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The future of music
The rise of a counterculture industry

Mark Mulligan, Kriss Thakrar and Tatiana Cirisano

30 Jun 2022

Consumer behaviour Spotify Music creators

Music streaming and the attention recession have turned music into a background activity. Artists en masse are struggling to cut through the noise, realising that streaming is neither a place to build deeper relationships with fans nor to generate meaningful income.

Cover image for Esports viewers update

Esports viewers update
A valuable segment with a (solvable) growth problem

Richard Broadhurst

5 May 2022

Vevo Facebook Twitter

Esports currently struggle to attract consumers beyond esports enthusiasts and players of esport-centric titles. Despite growth problems, the esports viewer segment remains valuable. These consumers have large amounts of time and money spent across entertainment, as well as high ad tolerance.

Cover image for From marketing to monetisation

From marketing to monetisation
The games video opportunity for games companies

Karol Severin

22 Feb 2022

YouTube Twitch facebook gaming

Games-related video consumption is now as big as established TV and video genres. Despite games companies providing the fuel for the games video sector (i.e., games experiences, processed into content by creators), the monetisation is mostly enjoyed by established games video platforms.

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Games worlds
Assessing audience reach, value and relevance

Karol Severin

25 Nov 2021

Apple GTA Call of Duty

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.

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Digital consumption habits
How tomorrow’s audiences will reshape entertainment

Hanna Kahlert

24 Mar 2021

Streaming Discovery Discovery

Digital-first access has shaped mainstream consumption, but for digital natives, it has also shaped their core behaviours. Music consumption is now fragmented across artists, becoming a personalised, anytime anywhere activity – making the value exchange more niche and personal.

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Sports audiences
The Gen Z opportunity

Alistair Taylor

8 Feb 2021

Apple Apple Spotify

Digital natives are more likely to consume non-live sports than older, traditional sports fans, which presents rights holders and broadcasters with untapped potential for monetisation by harnessing and actioning this insight. While the most valuable sports audience currently remains among pay-TV subscribers, planning for meaningful non-broadcast re...

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Sports Consumption
Measuring COVID-19’s Impact

Alistair Taylor

10 Jul 2020

Apple Discovery Amazon

With the pandemic-enforced postponement of live sports creating an entertainment void for sports fans, understanding COVID-19’s impact on overall sports consumption and where audiences are substituting their finite attention is paramount for sports distributors and rights holders.

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Recovery Economics
Music, Games, Live Streams and the Future of Concerts

Mark Mulligan, Karol Severin and Keith Jopling

11 May 2020

live music live Artists

In April 2020 Travis Scott’s Fortnite event pulled in 27 million players. While this was happening, the global artist community was scrambling to plug the income and engagement gap caused by COVID-19’s cessation of live music, by turning to live streaming.

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COVID-19
The Self-Isolation Entertainment Boom

Mark Mulligan

6 Apr 2020

Free Report

Streaming Spotify Artists

Following our first COVID-19 impact report, this report deep dives into how media consumption patterns have changed in the initial weeks of COVID-19 dislocation. While it is crucial to remember that these behaviour shifts are a snapshot of a unique moment in time, there are nonetheless some that will persist post-pandemic.

Cover image for Sports Consumer Trends

Sports Consumer Trends
The Sun Sets on Pay-TV Dominance

Alistair Taylor

6 Feb 2020

Amazon Facebook BBC

With subscription video on demand (SVOD) services surpassing pay-TV penetration en route to becoming a mainstream medium, sporting consumption habits have inherently changed. Rights holders, broadcasters, streaming services and betting and gaming companies will all feel the impact of fast-changing consumption habits and new regional nuances.

Cover image for Battle Royale

Battle Royale
The Monetisation Sweet Spot

Karol Severin

23 Jan 2020

Facebook Twitter Gaming

Niche is the new mainstream. Battle Royale players are one of these niches – far from mainstream in terms of consumer penetration, but impactful and valuable. Across music, video, news, magazines and games, they engage and spend more than average gamers.

Cover image for US Gamers

US Gamers
Targeting Games Franchises to Compete in the Attention Economy

Karol Severin

27 Sep 2019

YouTube Netflix Facebook

Games used to be isolated from other media activities. This has all changed with the rise of the attention economy, and the shift of gaming devices from purely consoles, to smartphones now supporting other media formats. This dynamic opens a floodgate of opportunities for media and entertainment companies, tech majors, telcos and brands alike to cr...

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