Brace yourselves because the game Industry is headed for another full crash

The game industry will experience another crash similar to the famous crash of 1983, and here's some thought on why this is happening.

[ApocalypseShadow]

I won't be on the plane if it crashes. And if I am, I have a life presever: tons of single player games on back catalog.

But let's talk about the article. There won't be a crash. The economy would crash before the industry does. I was there during the first crash. It was too much garbage on the market and no quality control. Nintendo's quality control and great first party games helped keep the industry alive. Too restrictive on contracts. But the quality of games was better than atari days.

There's nothing wrong with remakes or remasters if the quality is good.

Technology isn't going to stop advancing. Making better, quality products isn't going to shut down the industry.

Next mistake was calling the virtual boy vr. It wasn't. It was a 3D viewer. A portable version of this(Famicom 3D system)
https://www.picclickimg.com...
Nintendo has always made portables of their console tech. Just look at their history. It just failed miserably at it.

VR and Oculus concentrating on making it standard is a good thing. It needs the financial backing.

Competition will always be there. It's what drives companies to do better.

Not setting a date at the end means you don't know if it will. But title the article as if you know it will. That's lame.

[Gamist2dot0]

I think at the beginning of this gen had Sony followed suit with MS with online only and limiting game sharing, TV focused because of the data that these companies were looking at and saw lots of opportunity for profit. Sony's 1st party games released on initial release date instead of delaying their games for perfection, moved away from single player games and focused on multiplayer with the push on loot boxes and micro-transactions would have lead to a highly potential crash.
But all that didn't happen so I'm a happy gamer right now and looking forward to next gen.

[Gaming101]

The author clearly doesn't have a business degree, nor does he have a clue about economics or history.
This is another Armageddonist who tries to predict the end of things, and he's just as nuts as the people on the side of the street screaming the world will somehow come to an end... usually out of some narcissistic idea that they can't imagine a world that will continue on after they don't exist anymore.

[Rambokind]

Developing technologies costs money, however. You can't keep hoping gamers will subsidize these costs.

[ninerguy1608]

Yep. If it ever did happen I have tons of games I haven’t even touched. At 43 that’s enough to last me a few years since I only play about 15 hours a week.

[Iltapalanyymi]

Good, i've been waiting for this to happen for a while now.
Luckily i have preserves for downtime, lots of old games to play.

[Akarogg]

Why

[rainslacker]

I wouldn't eagerly await it if I were you. If the industry crashes, it won't be like the last crash. It'll be the closing of the kinds of studios that make the kinds of games we like, because they aren't as lucrative as the half-assed MP/MT/DLC mobile games masquarading as AAA games that we see making the most money today. Those games will still exist, but what we mostly like will fade away.

At least for a while, until the market is ripe again for the big AAA games again, because people get tired of the milked MT/DLC/MP market, and realize that a good amount of money is being lost from a huge market which cares nothing about those games.

Subscriber services have a chance to crash under their own weight, but I really am unsure if that would be a full industry crash....or like the one I describe above.

[william_cade]

Don't you have a phone?

[Cobra951]

Not for Chinese-made Diablo knockoffs I don't. ☺

[rainslacker]

I do....but its a Windows Phone....and it keeps crashing on me.

[Ceaser9857361]

Windows Phone are no more i guess Since Nokia has resumed their business . MS and Nokia's partnership has ended.
On October 8, 2017, Joe Belfiore announced that work on Windows 10 Mobile was drawing to a close due to lack of market penetration and resultant lack of interest from app developers

[rainslacker]

True, but I had one for quite a while. It was a decent phone, so long as you don't mind not having support for a lot of things, but did keep crashing after I started the preview program they had because they wouldn't support the older phones because they didn't have enough cores. I have a cheap ass Android phone now, and its fine for as little as I use my phone, and doesn't crash, although the battery is starting to not hold a charge much anymore.

My comment was just a joke though.

I also wouldn't say that MS partnership with Nokia has ended...as MS actually acquired Nokia and now owns them. What they abandoned was Windows Phone OS. Which is a shame, because it was actually a great phone OS, but as you said, failed to gain support from the great development community.

[PapaBop]

I'd like to say that it would be a good thing and could result in a much better and consumer friendly industry with less predatory tactics being used but honestly, the resulting outcome will likely just see more studios who in all fairness, we probably take for granted do their own Diablo Immortals. Less risk, potentially a far bigger reward and a less educated audience who have far less stigma attached to microtransactions.

[WeaseL]

Sounds just like when people predicted console gaming was dead after the 360/PS3

[paintedgamer1984]

Just like consoles are on their way out... said the end of last gen. I do agree, individual companies that have anti consumer tactics should be burned at the stake. Companies like that are really not advancing my fav hobby in any meaningful way.

[FinalFantasyFanatic]

If anything, we're saying a massive backlash against these companies, especially the ones showing contempt for their customers (I don't sympathize with them because they deserve it).

[Harkins1721]

This has been said so many times already.

[Casepb]

It won't happen. Gaming is just way too hugely popular right now. Never has it been this massive before. It would take something huge in the economy to crash the game industry, and then all of entertainment will follow, movies, music, streaming. It will just never happen. Unless of course the end of civilization as we know it comes.

[Cobra951]

Exactly. Props.

[Fist4achin]

It's not like the release of movies and music stopped during the crash of 08. Regardless of financial situation, everyone needs some sort of entertainment outlet and gaming is now probably the number one form of entertainment. I don't see it going anywhere either.

[DefenderOfDoom2]

YouTube is also big time entertainment today . YouTube and video games are a perfect match.

[P_Bomb]

Music industry will collapse first. Record companies have been on life support since the internet and digital replaced analog as the preferred method of recording, distribution, advertising/media etc. Stars are disposable. Songwriting by proxy. Singles dominate albums. Used to be you’d go on tour to support an album. Now that event album has become almost superfluous. Artists don’t need millions in loans from labels like they used to and retain more of everything staying indie. 30 year old IP like Zelda sell more units than most 30 year old bands.

[JackBNimble]

Gaming is a multi-billion dollar industry, it's not crashing anytime soon.

[rainslacker]

It won't be a crash like the one from the 80's. It'll be more a restructuring of the industry to focus on games which are more profitable with less investment. AAA games will become fewer, more money grabbing schemes will be thought of. Subscriber services will become more ubiquitous, although they may crush under their own weight as they all fight it out for supremacy, and mostly, whatever it is we like in the community will mostly go away for a while. It'll resurge after a while, because the market will still exist, but there is a potential that the consoles as we know them may end up being much different.

[FPS_D3TH]

My backlog could not give a shit tbh. There’s days I wish it would crash with some of the bs publishers pull on gamers. Far far far too many games I could play for the next 5 years if it crashed today.

[Fist4achin]

Im right there with you with a backlog still going back to ps2 and og xbox. Yes. Kind of hard being a huge rpg fan with life going on....

Hang in there and game on!

[Cobra951]

History doesn't repeat, like ever. Too many variables change, and new ones are introduced. The tech world and perception of gaming have moved so far beyond 1983 that it's silly to think the entire market will crash again. There will be shakeouts, to be sure. The pursuit of easy money practically guarantees those. In this case, that's money-milking machines on mobile devices, disguised as games.

If everyone was like me, the "AAA" industry would take a plunge to be sure. I stopped buying "AAA" games nearly two years ago. The GaaS and monetization spreading through it like cancer have completely put me off. Luckily for them, I'm in a small minority.

[GamingInFrames]

Anything is possible, but remember, mobile gaming was supposed to destroy the console industry.

[sampsonon]

this article is so full of it i wouldn't even know where to start to be honest.
Sony owns the market when it comes to consoles.
exclusive after exclusive selling like hot cakes will keep the industry afloat.

nintendo? lol ok

Hollywood will crash before the gaming industry does. you should write about that instead

[DeadSilence]

The author has a point, consumers won't accept this kind of monetization if it keeps getting worse.

[T2X]

Incorrect. The games were about the same price adjusted for inflation. Problem was it was too new of a thing and quality sucked for about 60% of what would now be called shovelware. There's a great book called the complete history of Video games. I recommend it to those interested. The business end of games back then was filled with uncertainty and risk. I don't see that happening so much now. But that's an opinion.

[Petebloodyonion]

I doubt that a crash is coming due to numerous counters arguments to the author

1) The price of games are now cheaper compare to 1983 if you put inflation in the calculation.
2) Yes, there's a lot of distribution canals but 90% of the games can be found on all platform in a similar state. Only exclusives games are well exclusive.
3) The consumers can me make an educated purchase compare to 1983. Back then the only reference you had for validating the quality of the product was the back of the box.

[wtf0]

this article ( or the same likes I should say ) come about yearly and the market hasn't tanked yet.

[MWH]

Seems like some wants it to happen to have the time to play their back logs in their vaults until the next clear sky.

[Vanfernal]

After RDR2 just had the biggest opening in the entertainment industry this doom and gloom article doesn't have much footing.

[Thundercat77]

Let me fix that title :

"Brace yourself because SOME PUBLISHERS AND DEVELOPERS are headed to a crash.

[rainslacker]

That's a more likely scenario.

Even with the first crash, games still got made. There were a lot of studios closing, and consoles makers couldn't sustain themselve.

The original crash happened because the market was lost. Gaming wasn't as big, so losing the mindshare of the general consumer through crappy practices was more of a problem. Losing mindshare nowadays is accepted because, for every one that leaves, there will be 5 more to take their place, and its quite possible they'll make more money off any one of those five. We see this attitude in the industry from some publishers, and it works for them

We'll see a change in how games are made. Spencer wasn't wrong when he said that SP games were complicated. And that's familiar to the original crash. When investment in the industry was far over what the return was. While that kind of investment isn't as much of a loss now, even though monetarily its much more, the investors themselves are more prone to going after lower risk, higher reward scenarios....which unfortunately for us, is going to be MP games, that rely heavily on MT. Paying for AAA budgets is going to reduced unless its a sure thing, and it takes the passionate investor investing in gaming, not their own wallet, to actually make it happen.

Unfortunately, the ones that end up sticking around are the ones that are probably going to cause the others to fail, because they'll be making the most money.

What I see more of a problem is this subscription service being pushed as if its the real next big thing. In a time when digital adoption is still only around 25%, this notion that subscribing to services is going to be more readily adopted is laughable. But given the history of how gaming became what it is now, with all tthese crappy practices, I can't see publishers giving much focus to the SP games as it makes more sense, and likely is the only financially viable way to do it, to actually just make games in smaller doses....ie, smaller or episodic. Or focusing more on F2P types stuff, but now locked behind a paywall. We'll still see back catalogs on there to give the illusion of big games to play.

But all these publishers will be fighting over a limited market, despite making these services available to many more people than the traditional. All this fighting over market means that some publishers aren't going to make it, and if they put too much into services, they're going to lose out big. This could cause problems among their investors, and lose them a lot of fans not through attrition if they don't care about keeping us as a customer. Some will fail, the smaller publishers won't be able to compete in that market, and may end up not being able to sustain themselves in the traditional, so they'll likely move to things like mobile more because its the only way they can survive. The winners will continue on, and dictate the course of events going forward.

The traditional market is going to have to put up with all this change though.

If publishers are smart, they won't go too quickly to this new paradigm, and realize that they're giving up a market that is well established, spends a lot on games, and is quickly becoming less and less crowded with competiting games.

But it will be a crash of sorts. Not of the industry itself. Just in the market that we partake in.

I'm often write about things that happen well into the future, and I really hope I'm wrong here.

[Tross]

It's possible, especially with companies trying to force an all-streaming future and gamers not being amused. I never thought I'd say this, but thank goodness for my backlog. Personally, I'll cross that bridge if we get there. No use fretting about something that has not yet come to pass.

[rainslacker]

Fretting doesn't make a difference, but it's nice to vent.

Making a fuss about stuff we don't like can make a difference, although ultimately, it probably won't change much in the grand scheme of things. These kinds of changes we're seeing now are rather grand scope things, and not just about one game, but about the entire way a market buys and consumes games....which is much bigger than any console war. It can be hard to see it coming, but when people say options are good, they don't realize that they don't always end with things in our favor.

[rainslacker]

I'd agree with maybe half of this article, but not about the part about how hard it is to get a job. It's not hard to get a job if you are qualified. However, most studios will prefer someone with experience, but that isn't always available, so you just have to hope you are impressive enough to get a job over someone who has shipped a game, or lucky enough none apply or accept an offer. The industry is going to fast to keep jobs filled through nepotism. If you have 1000 people who are in the industry, but 5000 jobs, then obviously, you can't fill all 5000 jobs with 1000 people. And that's kind of how the job market is in the industry.

Biggest issue that keeps people out of the industry is geography. Most dev houses are located in centralized areas. Many people are hesitant to move.

Other than that, the only thing I think leading to a potential crash is the actual games themselves, unless there is a massive shift in the DLC/MT market which can fuel a few games making tons of money.

Subcriber services may lead to a kind of crash of those services, as well as the scope and resources of the games themselves, but I doubt it'll be a full industry crash like it almost was back during the first crash. But if a new crash comes, it'll change how we as gamers are given the kind of content that we now like.

[-volt-]

It needs to happen. Its oversaturated

[DimensionalSound]

Oh most definitely!

[AllMightyFox]

The market speaks but no one is listening ……

Is this article a surprise when many games are getting hated reviews ?!?

When I myself quit PSN ($60 is $60) I realized that many games being produced were trash, as in I pay $100 for a game without much content (Battlefront 2, Destiny 2, BO4, etc.).

Worse is these games all require servers, meaning they are limited runs, you can't buy and play at anytime in the future like old PS1 or Gamecube games, etc.

YOU CAN"T BUY GAMES ONLY LEASE !!!!!!

Then each article is trying to hype up games while omitting and down right lying about bugs, glitches, monetary features and more … so not a single review carries merit anymore.

Now does all this and my choices mean a gaming crash ?!? ..... NO, because like casinos these games aren't being designed for average consumers, but rather the whales who will empty their wallets, bank accts, and those people aren't smart enough to learn soo, no hope in that changing.

Is Activision/Blizzard going to change and give up their $4 billion a year micro-transactions ?!? … HAHAHAHA !

They aren't getting my $$$$ and I play plenty of games (collect), but soo long as stupid people exist to get fleeced there won't be a crash ….

TRUTH SMASH !!!!