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Game sales to hit $70 billion by 2015 - Analyst

DFC Intelligence forecasts 16 percent growth in worldwide revenues of PC, console, online, portable markets over six-year period.

Despite some depressing sales figures in recent years, analysts have generally remained upbeat about the future of gaming. While those reassurances are usually couched in vague terms, one firm is putting a solid number and a due date on its positive prognostication.

Online games like Champions Online can be more profitable for publishers even if they bring in less money in the short term.

Online games like Champions Online can be more profitable for publishers even if they bring in less money in the short term.

DFC Intelligence this week released a series of reports forecasting the next few years of the interactive entertainment industry, predicting that worldwide gaming revenues will total $70.1 billion in 2015. That's a jump of roughly 16 percent from the $60.4 billion DFC tallied for 2009. Those figures represent the firm's best estimates of the global total of revenues derived from console, PC, portable, and online games, from boxed products and subscription fees to microtransactions.

Compared to gaming's explosive growth up until the economic downturn of 2008, a 16 percent rise is fairly modest for a six-year stretch. However, DFC believes the industry will continue to shrink for the next couple of years, with the bulk of its projected growth to come between 2013 and 2015.

The industry faces a number of challenges to revenue growth in the next few years, according to DFC. Most of the firm's anticipated decline is chalked up to a slowdown in the console market as the current generation of systems age.

Another factor cited is the trend toward online gaming. While subscription fees and microtransactions are more profitable for companies than boxed retail products, DFC notes that they generally provide less in the way of overall revenues in the short term.

23 Comments

  • gbrading Site moderator

    Posted Jul 8, 2010 6:26 am GMT

    I think forecasting into the next decade is extremely difficult.

  • skillz191

    Posted Jun 1, 2010 6:50 pm GMT

    take that porn, tryin to beat the game industry

  • Willy-Wilks_777

    Posted May 30, 2010 6:34 am GMT

    I could do with that amount of money:/ Anyway... Gaming is AWESOME!!!

    And inaka rob; that was funny XD

  • KrazzyDJ

    Posted May 28, 2010 11:27 pm GMT

    As much as everyone would love to hate analysts, one will still hope that this turns out to be true. And who knows, maybe this might be possible considering that 2013 - 2015 could most probably be the period we'll see new iterations of the current consoles !!!

  • blackace

    Posted May 28, 2010 7:53 am GMT

    I have played a MMORPG game since WoW. I have no desire to go back to that. I would have to hit the lottery for me to even consider playing WoW again. I am going to try SW: The Old Republic, but I may only play for a few months. I've come not to believe anything analyst say because they are usually wrong 50% of the time. Their guess would be as good as mine. Console & handheld gaming is like 95% of the gaming market. PC makes up maybe 4-5% and the bulk of PC gaming is outside of the U.S.

  • lock445

    Posted May 27, 2010 5:25 pm GMT

    Gaming is awesome!!

  • Gelugon_baat

    Posted May 27, 2010 4:51 pm GMT

    These analysts sure are optimistic. However, they just have to realize that the digital games industry haven't really been around long enough as the other industries - there aren't that many case studies, landmark events and other information to form a reliable foundation of knowledge to make forecasts and predictions on yet.

  • inaka_rob

    Posted May 27, 2010 4:42 pm GMT

    Game sales to hit $70 billion by 2015: $60 billion predicted to come from Call of Duty Duty Map Pack Downloads.

  • aryeec

    Posted May 27, 2010 4:11 pm GMT

    @ArMnD9 You do know that the idea that armageddon will be in 2012 is not a new idea? It came about in the 70s or 80s when someone finally translated hieroglyphs? The movie was just a ploy to take money from the paranoid.

  • AceCometh

    Posted May 27, 2010 4:08 pm GMT

    I just quit online gaming. So long World of Warcraft. Hello Red Dead Redemption!

  • broncean

    Posted May 27, 2010 3:57 pm GMT

    It will definitely rise, i don't know if to 70 billion, but most of that will be inflation and not increase in revenues..

  • johny300

    Posted May 27, 2010 3:09 pm GMT

    I hope these predections are true because it means that the gaming industry will evolve so we could have games that satisfies us 360/ps3 owners.(not that i complain from what we have now)

  • ArMnD9

    Posted May 27, 2010 3:08 pm GMT

    @ amre1939 They really fooled you with that one, hahaha
    Stupidest movie in the world. Worst than Disaster Movie, and i havnt seen either.

  • amre1939

    Posted May 27, 2010 2:44 pm GMT

    it won't reach, cause the world is gonna end in 2012 XD

  • DeMoN_SouL_666

    Posted May 27, 2010 2:42 pm GMT

    Sorry to everyone being positive here, but haven't anyone noticed recently that a lot or previous predictions from analysts turned out to be wrong? what makes this even close to true? one of the key factors that contributes to the growth is the acceptance of the coming technologies, I'm talking about 3D gaming, Cloud-Gaming, increased subscription fees, all the way to issues like paying for demos and rising costs of DLCs, everything is vague at the moment and only time will tell, not analysts!

  • Kats_RK

    Posted May 27, 2010 2:39 pm GMT

    :O

  • Flint247

    Posted May 27, 2010 2:24 pm GMT

    Wow o.o

  • berto64

    Posted May 27, 2010 1:53 pm GMT

    video game sales are getting higher,so it means we as all gamers will see some cool or awesome gamesand cheaper prices over the six years.and by the time the 8th generation video game consoles are released.there are gonna be cheaper,and fun to play

  • Spitz6860

    Posted May 27, 2010 1:44 pm GMT

    16% over 6 years? that's less than 3 % a year, a bit conservative i think? i don't think MS and Sony will wait for 6 years to release their next gen console

  • OneMoarLevel

    Posted May 27, 2010 1:42 pm GMT

    how many millions is that?!

  • mclaren08

    Posted May 27, 2010 1:38 pm GMT

    Excellent, the more projected money, the more investment is made into gaming.

  • monson21502

    Posted May 27, 2010 1:04 pm GMT

    70 billion. just saying that gives me chills

  • Lightchaos-20693173927190915074555969291770

    Posted May 27, 2010 12:34 pm GMT

    Wow, now that is a lot of money. Good news for all of us gamers, that means we will continue to get more awesome games each year!

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