What will crash the Gaming Industry?

Hey System Warriors! Happy Monday to you all...

The gaming industry has been mostly bulletproof since the old Atari, ET days... It grows and grows and has always made compelling cases for its growth. It advances technologically and it retains customers by creating a landscape of games that range from all over the spectrum of interactive experiences. Point is, no one is scratching their head wondering WHY this hobby is so popular, but there will always be questions surrounding its sustainability and popularity.

.... And so to that end, what do you believe will ultimately cause the next gaming crash, and what will that crash look like when it happens?

Will bad customer policies like the drm xbox1 sink it...?

Will it come from services that starve developers of profits to make new games?

Will it come from a lack of originality in game design? Companies unwillingness to put real development into changing the interactive experiences from the status quo?

Maybe it comes from creating less parity between an interactive experience and a cinematic experience. People realizing that games offer less and less agency, less challenge, less desire to challenge themselves?

Or maybe my demographic of Gen 1 gamers simply moves on over time as less and less original experience litter the scene we simply grow away from it.

In short, the Gaming industry has been a growth business for most of my life.... When does it slow down and what are those circumstances?

The death of exclusives will crash the gaming industry.

I don't see it crashing as there is an infinite amount of money pouring into it.

Look at Hollywood: creatively bankrupt, but so much money and talent behind it that it'll never go away.

@R4gn4r0k: Heck no, John Wick 4 is releasing soon. Thats Hollywood at its finest.

@mesome713: why? Wouldn't the death of exclusives mean more people playing them?

@TheEroica: The industry needs regulation and competition to survive. Thats what causes all crashes in entertainment.

@TheEroica: NFTs, microtransactions, and live service games that release in an unfinished state.

Games like Gotham Knights, Avengers, Battlefield 2042, GTA Trilogy, Halo: Infinite, etc. or money grab games like Diablo Immortal, Dead Rising 4 (pay DLC to do the last mission?!?!!), Star Wars Battlefront II, etc. They will cause a crash if devs keep making games like that.

It was funny back when Daikatana released in an unfinished state, not so much when it was GTA Trilogy or Halo: Infinite.

2 major factors I can think of are: 1) cost and 2) mobile games

Cost is an issue nowadays, just look at pos5 and how expensive it is, even though the hardware is a turd compared to the xbox series X. Consoles are more expensive than ever before, and if not for MS and the xbox series S, id say console gaming is screwed.

Mobile games are a real and present danger. They are cheapening the gaming experience with gambling mechanics for that huge dopamine spike in kids and teens. This is not a good thing, and these companies should be demolished. Google and apple need to be dragged in front of congress and their ceo needs to get their bare ass whipped for the travesty they created. Actually, same with the tiktok ceo. These mobile games are an embarrasment, and a disgrace, and a real bad sign of where gaming is headed. Thankfully, MS is here to save the day with the xbox and gamepass, heck yeah!

Hard to say. I mean the games industry is really really really big and quite diverse. I dont see just one thing crashing the whole industry.

I can't see mobile gaming crashing. Short of online payment systems completely breaking down worldwide (in which case we have bigger issues) i don't see it happening. Even a downturn in the world economy could actually benefit mobile gaming.

On the traditional AAA side the combination of a lack of market expansion and the rising costs of development are going to make that very ugly. Something is going to give. At some point investors are going to look at it and think "nah...juice is not worth the squeeze". I dont have high hopes for AAA games this gen.

It could be a boon for the AA sector though.

Probably something weird like climate change interfering with global power supply, requiring people to use less electricity.

I feel like maybe there will be a reckoning for some big AAA companies as game development costs spiral out of control (feels like we are already seeing that with Ubisoft), but I don't think that will crash the entire industry

The simple answer is when most consumers lose interest in gaming, such as gaming is no longer relevant to most people's lives.

Capitalism.

The pursuit of infinite growth at the expense of sustainability and customer satisfaction--coupled with the obsession we have with the social media aspect of gaming (streamers, influencers, review bombing, etc)--will lead to the downfall of gaming.

Also mobile gaming because it makes traditional gaming (i.e. with dedicated hardware) look so unprofitable and unappealing (from a business standpoint, at least). Honestly I wonder why some of these publishers even bother sometimes with us when their mobile divisions are making billions.

More availability = more competition.

If a game is only one platform, it receives less competition. Fewer reasons to improve.

The folks that "crash" are the ones that fail to adapt, i.e. print media during the internet boom, movie theaters during streaming's rise, etc. All these industries created MORE competition by broadening the scope of their product, while the establishment often failed to adapt.

Don’t think it’ll crash anytime soon,it’s going to outlive the sex industry in my opinion.

I don't see gaming crashing. There are too many people looking for games to play, and too many ways to play them. But I do think certain sectors could crash, and the most likely one is the AAA space. Budgets keep ballooning with every new gen, and at some point they just wont be able to sell enough to pay off. Back in gen 5, a team of 50 people could make a new game every year. Gen 6, a team of 100 people could make a new game every 1-2 years. Gen 7, a 150 person team released something every 2-3 years. Gen 8, 200 people would spend 5 years on one game. I don't know what the output will be for gen 9, but we are three years in and it has barely started. That can't go on forever.

And what sucks is everyone knows this, and can't figure out how to deal with it. The biggest players are all trying to get bought out before they cave it. Activision, Ubisoft, EA, Take Two, all of them.

@mrbojangles25: If everyone has the same games, then that makes less competition. Might as well buy a MacBook and watch the rest crash.

I don't know of a particular element ... but i bet the suits will be behind it.

Over saturation in my opinion. More games being made than ever. Too many options. Costs are higher to make but people have so many options the pie gets split more and more.

Why wouldn't Sony just tie their games to a psn app similar to Netflix on a roku box? Why not have unified hardware that allows for each service provider to have a store front allowing Sony to continue developing Sony games and nin/xb do the same?

We certainly don't need different hardware to have competition.

I can’t really think of any thing that would cause the gaming market to crash. It’s just too big and too diverse for that to happen these days. Also a lot of things that may negatively impact it are able to be reversed fairly quickly.

If the subscription model takes off, (and I mean actually take off, not this “unique users” nonsense. Something that shows some sort of impactful financial growth) we will see gaming start to fall off. Multiplayer, ftp games have already diluted the industry. Dozens of projects have been canceled in order to support a ftp shooter. And if the big 3 all fully deploy a subscription model, the number of games that release will decrease. As will the quality. Just like with the music and movie industries. Gaming will consist of a few mega titles, and then a sea of indie titles. Because if a publishers doesn’t see the game as a potential smashing success, they won’t invest.

Easy answer, it won't crash.

I wonder about the over saturation of game releases.

Back in the day, only so many games were released at a time. Games were even mostly only good or bad.

Now there is far more games released than can be played.

For me personally, 90% of games probably fly under my radar. Mainly because I consider myself a retro gamer first, so I spend the majority of my gaming time with old games. And Brook Wingman adapters have allowed me to rediscover old games, allowing me to use newer controllers. But then there's SO many indie game releases as well. So many developers and studios.

The internet really changed things. Games are delivered so easily. I think this really started during the 8th gen. When I just to physically go out and buy games or rent films, I used to care more about them, put more effort in. But I think the ease of access has made media more disposable. With hundreds of games to play or video on demand, if you you don't grab my attention fairly quickly, I'm moving on to the next thing.

Is this just me, if not, what does this do to the indie developers, or are there SO many gamers now, that someone always finds something they like.

A Jihadist who hates movie games.

To be fair, only AAA games on current gen consoles cost more to make. But that isn't where the over saturation is imo. Feels like we're being flooded with the smaller indie games. Every time I go through a menu of games, there's something new I haven't heard of.

same, so many games i don't have time for all the ones im interested in. Feels more saturated than ever.. Honestly haven't been buying games lately, gamepass alone has more content than I can handle realistically. There is no shortage of things to play... but that means I have no reason to buy anything at full price. There is no incentive to buy anything at full price for myself.

Especially for me, as a retro gamer, there's thousands of games for me to play spanning generations... Why am I going to rush out and spend more than £50 - £70 on ONE game. I'll wait for a sale.

Customers will bend over and take whatever their corporate masters tell them to, so it definitely won't be any anti consumer practice that does it.

A huge global depression or zombie apocalypse should do the trick.

I suppose I can see that.

Point I'm trying to make is that it will make hardware manufacturers compete over hardware, and not exclusivity. Consumers won't be locked into a specific platform based on withholding the title from other platforms. Hardware makers will need to compete over price and performance, not who can horde the most game properties.

Additionally, there would be more inter-genre competition. Instead of 5 games competing on platform A, and five games competing on platform B, now we have 10 games competing on all platforms. You wouldn't be the best game on your platform; you'd be the best game on ALL platforms. The pool would be larger, and you'd need to up your game as a result.

I think you'd see more creativity as well. If suddenly there were 5 COD clones competing for the market, maybe you are going to try something else and compete by not making a COD clone but something else instead. If there's only two COD clones to compete with on a platform that has exclusivity, then there's less reason to branch out.

Anyway I'm not a business person I'm just talking here lol.

nuclear war

I completely disagree with that. Exclusives hold the industry back. Imagine a world where console manufacturers had to innovate the hardware/OS in order to entice a consumer to buy their console, instead of the games. Being able to play any game from every studio - that would be something sweet to see.

That is what happened with the PC - once everything in the 80s became "IBM Compatible" (thanks to Microsoft), the home PC market exploded.

Bro, Capitalism is why people have a PC. It's why people have a smartphone. And, it's why people can play video games.

Yes, capitalism is why 😋

Sure. Let's go with that.

God forbid we stop and think for a second that maybe these innovations could (and have, and do, and will) also happen outside of the current economic-political system, and the fact that they did happen under capitalism is mere coincidence.

Look, I'm not communist and I enjoy many aspects of the free market, but it's pretty plain to see now that capitalism is not going to work for much longer. At least not in it's current form.

Need to adopt a blended socialist-capitalist structure. I still love gaming, but I think the gaming business was better in the 90's and early 00's before big-business saw how profitable and easy to milk the consumers are. Now it's all about exclusivity and who can provide a GaaS without spending too much on it.

Bingo

@mrbojangles25: But having no exclusives means no games that cater to a certain hardware. Look how Nintendo catered its games to all its consoles. Those same games wouldnt work on other console manufacturers cause they lacked the innovative features. Later they copied the competitors features like analog sticks, extra buttons, rumble, wireless controllers, motion controls, dual screens, 3D gaming, physical DLC, gyro, VR, etc.

PC gave us how many of these innovations? PC is coping the competitors innovations. PC had to copy Apple exclusives, Nintendos exclusives, etc. If you take away these exclusive innovators, you then take a way innovation. Youll be playing on mouse and keyboard for the rest of your life.

Were us Americans so much smarter than the Soviets before 1991? Nope. But, our consumer technology was light years ahead of the USSR when we got a peek at what was going on when the Iron Curtain fell. Why? Capitalism.

Capitalism has been in place in the US for over 240 years, and we (the USA) are the biggest single economy in the world. Why? Capitalism. Socialism, like fascism and Communism, are failed experiments. Even China has moved to Capitalism (while claiming to still be Communist).

Everything we enjoy as citizens of the United States of America, we enjoy for three reasons: a kick-ass military, Democracy, and Capitalism.

@dabear:

" Everything we enjoy as citizens of the United States of America, we enjoy for three reasons: a kick-ass military, Democracy, and Capitalism. "

And Socialism. Everything people love about being American is thanks to socialism. National Parks, Retirement, Social Society, Healthcare, Works Comp, Unemplyoment, etc. I can name socialist traits all day that America has adopted. Not to mention we have the most amazing Unions in the whole universe. NFL, NBA, NHL, WWE, AEW, etc.

4090 owners. We can't allow them to stay.

Gaming is so diverse when it comes to the types of games, the platforms they are played on, the scopes and budgets, etc.. There will not be a crash. Just constant evolution and adaptation.

Barring some terrible scenario that crashes way more than just gaming, don't really see it.

People like to play, people like escapism, always have. Can't imagine the digital form of that just going away. Even the "crash" of 1983 was wildly exaggerated. Or at least overstated by many when it's brought up.

Can imagine certain sectors of gaming imploding. Or gaming as we currently know it undergoing significant transformation. Possibly even unrecognizable to todays "traditional" gaming depending on the time scale.

But they'll still always play Tetris.

China invading Taiwan would cripple worldwide technical sectors.

Consoles will die once publishers leave for subscription service.

@mesome713: exactly, people are dumb af to think US is capitalist. It's very much "controlled" or highly fenced in version of capitalism. To the point one could call it socialism. The fact that patents, trademarks, IP laws are a thing goes against capitalism. It also goes against our free speech laws. Ideas aren't property, they never will be. This is why people like ghosts are doing a good thing. We need more people like him. These guys are stealing from us, because ideas aren't property. They are meant to be freely shared. The fact they charge us money for something like this is very socialist. America has always been highly socialist. Socialist for the people who belong to the right group, and capitalism for everyone else. All good, as long as society benefits. But when that changes, and if the laws dont change, there's going to be a revolution.

...and NASA, law enforcement, safety services, ummm what else oh ya THE ENTIRE MILITARY, roads, hmm...

Again, to reiterate, I don't think capitalism and socialism are mutually exclusive, but unbridled capitalism (especially in the form that favors corporations at the expense of consumers, as we have now) is going to be the end of us.

Anyway I am done arguing this point as we are not on Political Gamers (happy to resume it there, however).

It’ll never crash,it’ll just take a different direction of technology,like Star Trek’s holodec,whatever it’s spelled,and so on and so forth? Gaming will never lose its fan base,no matter what direction it takes.

@mesome713: You're stating things are socialist when they are not. I guarantee you those that formed the Unions in the 20s would have literally end your life back then if you called them "socialists".

If you' called Teddy R a "socialist" for national parks, you'd be arrested.

People like you sure do bend the truth about what is "socialism". By your definition, the Roman Empire was "socialist", Caesar be damned!

@mrbojangles25: The military? Roads?

Was ancient Rome and Greece "socialist"? How about ancient Egypt? By your definition, all civilization is just socialism.

Your comments are revisionist history at its worst.

An endless amount of of micro-transactions.

Someone can walk in off the street and, provided they meet physical and mental health standards, join the military. They would have food, clothing, lodging, training, transportation, healthcare, and job placement handled for them. This is all provided for by the taxpayer. Sounds pretty socialist to me.

Anything provided for society by the tax revenue generated by society is inherently socialist, to some degree or another. We need not be afraid of the word "socialist" or "socialism"; we've been this way for thousands of years.

Things you own privately ultimately are products of capitalism. Things owned in part or entirely by society is socialism.

Many medical breakthroughs in the last 10-20 years are entirely funded by US government, aka US taxpayers. These grants and funds incentivize research, promote cooperation and also individual successes. Best of both worlds! The issue arises when capitalism rears its ugly head, and they charge an arm and a leg for this medication (that cost them nothing to research and pennies to manufacture, most of the time) so CEO's can make 4,000% the salary of their best researchers.

By the people, for the people. Socialism! It's not revisionism, it's just the truth.