Great reads for the dark winter evenings, then – and for the next few days, our self-publishing provider, Lulu, is offering 25% off all purchases, so this is a perfect time to add GAMESbrief Unplugged to your bookshelf.

You can order GAMESbrief Unplugged from our book store – [Volume 1] [Volume 2]. Just enter the code LULUBOOKUK305 to activate your 25% discount.

The coupon expires on January 31st (that’s next Tuesday), and there’s a maximum saving of £50, although since each book only costs £8.97 ($14) even before the discount, that shouldn’t be a problem. Happy reading!

No related posts.

A week ago last Monday, I, like many Londoners, was glued to my computer screen. We watched as, through a sultry summer night, the social order broke down and young people spent an evening, and subsequent nights, existing within an entirely different set of social norms from usual. The overwhelming evidence for people on the streets that night was that breaking stuff, stealing it or setting fire to it was what people like them (i.e. young Londoners) did.

This week, at GDC Europe, Richard Garriott gave a lecture on the three ages of gaming, arguing that we are finally — now that we have left the constraints of single player and MMO gaming behind us — entering an era when games can reach a global, mass market audience. In the questions at the end, a gentleman (his accent sounded Russian) said (I may be paraphrasing a little) “Your games are propaganda machine. Do you accept this fact, and how do you respond to it?”

Chinese propaganda in 1975 showed games 'training the body for revolution'. Over forty years later, have video games trained British youth for revolt, or for conformity?

Garriott agreed with his questioner’s assertion — that games are a part of society, and a key influence in society — and in these times of austerity and economic uncertainty, the role that games play in society merits a proper debate.

Video games and riots

I’m not saying that video games caused the riots, although many people have been saying just that. One of my Facebook friends (a young, female student) said, “This is what happens when you let the ‘youths’ stay in all day and play COD, they get too good at it so have to bring it out to the real life streets. Again FUCK OFF AND GO HOME.” The idea that games were somehow involved in inciting the riots has come from sources both predictable (the London Evening Standard said looters were “inspired by video game Grand Theft Auto”) and unpredictable (ex-Oasis man Noel Gallagher blamed “brutal TV and video games“).

The causes of the riots are complex: A sense that the rioters were disconnected from their local society. Short-term poverty and long-term despair are breaking out. A culture of consumerism and entitlement. The possible causes are legion, and will doubtless be debated for years.My degree is in medieval history, and my favorite comment on the riots came in a letter from Professor David Parker, Emeritus Professor, University of Leeds to the left-leaning UK broadsheet, The Guardian.

“For many years I taught a final-year undergraduate course on the uprisings of the peasants and artisans that swept across large parts of 17th-century France. Buildings were attacked, their contents pillaged, crops destroyed and occasionally a perceived oppressor was killed. Had my students explained it all by simply invoking feral criminality they would have failed.”

Games as propaganda

What do opportunistic riots in London and games as propaganda machines have in common? They concern an issue that governments have faced since the days of the Romans. How to keep the population entertained and disinclined to rebel, riot or otherwise stir up trouble.

Noam Chomsky has long argued that organized sports fulfills this role: it exists as an adjunct to the state, to distract, entertain and otherwise occupy an electorate who might otherwise become activists, or spend the hours they spend discussing or reading about sports on politics instead. In fact, he says the purpose of those sports are to “dull people’s brains.” (He also argues that school and college sports encourage us to respect authority, to do what we’re told, and to accept the status quo, all of which have enormous advantages for a state.)

Over the past few years, in the UK at least, the political authorities have become more supportive of games. Partially due to the sterling efforts of industry bodies like TIGA and UKIE and partly because politicians are waking up to the fact that the majority of the electorate now play games, they no longer view our industry as a whipping boy that makes an easy target whenever a violent tragedy engulfs the media schedules.

Could there be another reason? Could it be that as the economic downturn continues to bite, politicians are looking for anything that will distract the population from its economic woes, and from turning on the politicians for causing or failing to end these financial difficulties? In the UK, for example, we’re already getting Olympics overload, even though we’re more than a year away from the event itself.

Are politicians cottoning onto the idea that people who play Call of Duty are at home, playing games, not rioting with their friends? That people playing CityVille or Tiny Tower are getting a sense of satisfaction from being in control of their virtual cities or skyscrapers, a control that is sadly missing from their daily lives?

In short, is the propaganda machine becoming useful to those in authority? And if so what can we, as developers, use this propaganda machine to do?

I hope that you choose to make games that make people think. To question authority and their role in the world.

Or you can just make mindless entertainment, like the Roman gladiatorial combats of old.

Which are you going to choose?

Related posts:

1. If video games cause violence, there should be a correlation between game sales and violent crime, right?
2. Do we need more laws to protect minors from video games?
3. Salman Rushdie, video games and my letter to the Financial Times

It’s been slightly longer than usual since the last article, but blame Develop in Brighton – bear with me though as we’ve had an interesting and revealing few weeks. First, a summary for those catching up/with poor memories.

Hard Lines – the story so far

Hard Lines came out on the 9th June 2011. Apple featured us in the New & Noteworthy section for a few weeks, and we’ve since dropped off that list, as well as the What’s Hot section we were in for a week or so afterwards. We’ve had a great amount of really positive reviews from press and players alike, but we have messed up on a few occasions. Our app icon was a bit lacklustre, we released a crash-prone build on the eve of our biggest coverage yet and finally the game was over 20mb for too long, losing out on 3G-using potential buyers.

How important are reviews to the sales of smartphone games?

So our media coverage, in terms of being a hot new game at least, is pretty much over. There are a few sites that want to review the iPad build we’ve just updated to which is nice, but the last piece of wide-exposure coverage we got was in the Observer on Sunday review we’d been waiting for. Really positive, very praiseworthy, big audience of people who most probably don’t read games websites or follow me on twitter. No sales spike to speak of – 20 extra copies sold.

So that got me thinking. I’ve got a chart below showing an overview of the big reviews we had (Kotaku, Touch Arcade, Pocketgamer, AppSpy and more) versus the sales spikes we achieved on the following days. Frankly, it makes pretty disappointing reading – there seems to be very little boost from reviews on even the biggest sites out there. This doesn’t really surprise when I think about it, but the gut feeling is ‘what the hell?!’. Essentially it makes the point very clear that the vast majority of the iPhone market don’t pay much heed to critical reviews. Most are followed by a spike of many 20 sales, and some are even followed by dips.

How do gamers find out about smartphone games?

They must find out about their games in other ways – twitter, Facebook, whatever it is it must be driven by their friends and recommendations, as well as of course good placement on the various charts within iTunes. Nothing new, just a bit disappointing I suppose – but that’s not to say these reviews are without worth. The hardcore (the opinion-formers) will certainly find out about your game through these positive reviews, and they’re the people responsible for the first snowflake of attention that you need if you’re going to build an avalanche of success.

So I’ve been working to get the company and the game noticed in other ways too. I’ve been quoted a few times in articles in the specialist press over recent weeks, leading to one particular chum on twitter asking if I’m on commission. I wish! Pocketgamer has been particularly good to me – they spotted a tweet I made about our recently release-update going into submission at Apple and posted a piece about it (slow news day? Maybe, but I’m not complaining!) but more recently I’ve had a couple of articles posted.

The first was a response from me about Michael Pachter’s opinions about crunch and overtime culture in games development. Read it here, but suffice to say I called his comments poisonous. Some people have commented that may be a bit ballsy for a small developer like mine, but I didn’t do it to get hits. I got in touch with Pocketgamer knowing that if they posted it, then hits would be generated, but I wrote it because I had something to say. Too many developers assume their opinions are of no interest whatsoever, but I still remember the days when I tirelessly combed the internet for any insights at all into how developers thought and worked. In the end, the article got the most hits for that week on PG.Biz. I’m quite proud of myself!

I also put my hand up when a spot appeared for a guest opinion piece – and decided to write about my experiences going to games development conferences. I’ve not been to a ton, but again with the idea that my insights are of interest to someone out there, I wrote about how to get the best out of a conference trip.

Of course I went to Develop this year as part of a panel (which you can watch on YouTube or embedded below) and that snagged me a free pass to the conference. There were some really good talks, and some I felt I didn’t need to attend – and so didn’t. I spent that time ‘socialising’ (better known as networking) with fellow devs, a lot of whom I only knew from twitter. It was a great opportunity to reinforce relationships with a great many interesting and intelligent people. Hello if you’re reading this! Ultimately it was of little direct use for Hard Lines, though again as Spilt Milk Studios’ flagship game anything that increases the exposure of one helps the other.

The impact of going free on an ios game

So onto the big news. I turned 29 on the 27th of July! Well, that’s not the big news, but it is the inspiration. I decided, on a whim, to make Hard Lines free for that day only. Using twitter, and sending out a hasty press release at lunchtime, we had to wait till the next day to find out what sort of success we had. Not only did it get reported on a few websites, the numbers we got stunned us.

We saw a truly massive spike in downloads, from 20 the day before, to just over 12,000 the day of the promotion. To put that in some perspective that’s a rise of over 16,000%, and better than the entire lifetime sales of the game previous to that day. Bear in mind we had a lot of Apple coverage too early in the game’s life, and the impact this free day had truly comes into focus. We doubled our player base in one day. So what do the next days look like? Take a look below.

Essentially, it was an anomaly. As soon as the game went back to paid, we saw a drop back down to sub-100 sales per day within 48hrs of the change. It’s a tiny bit disappointing to see it revert so quickly, but hey it was just a whimsical experiment. What is interesting is that the daily sales, though dropped back down to ‘a trickle’ are now sitting at roughly double those as the period before the offer. Double the audience, double the daily trickle. I don’t think that is a coincidence. It has certainly made us think about our In-App-Purchase and expansion plans in much more detail, suffice to say we’re really excited to see the response to our next update.

Hard Lines is updated – and has an in-app upgrade

Which, speak of the devil, is already out! We’ve added almost everything the community asked for – Game Center support with achievements & leaderboards, OpenFeint achievements to keep parity, various bug fixes and tweaks, and we’ve also taken the chance to introduce a much more polished app icon, and take the game’s binary below 20mb. This is pretty key I think – or at least more so than most developers think. I’ve lost count of the amount of supposedly tech-savvy people I know who don’t realise (or even care) when their iPhone is using Wi-Fi versus 3G. If we run with the idea that most sales are through word of mouth, then some mates sitting in the pub telling each other about this cool new game are a pretty powerful opportunity. And one that is instantly lost as soon as they can’t download it because they’re not on Wi-Fi.

Another opportunity we’ve taken is to make Hard Lines a universal app. This means it now runs properly and full screen on the iPad, and we’ve taken the opportunity to test some IAP. Instead of the norm – where companies make a separate ‘HD’ app for the iPad, we’ve turned ours ‘HD EXTREME’ mode into an IAP item, meaning people don’t have to duck out of the game, and hopefully it gets more visibility with the iPad owners. When you upgrade you get 4x bigger arenas and tweaked modes with their own leaderboards. It’s almost a new game, frankly, and the response has been good so far. The results so far, after a day on sale, can be seen below.

So it’s been a really exciting and exhausting few weeks. We’re right on the cusp of getting some great new content in the game (more detail in the next article, no doubt) as we respond in force to the power of the Free App. We’ve always taken a long-term view on this game (and any in the modern digital markets) so come back next time for even more insight, figures and honest opinion.

Fun facts:
Downloads – ~22,000
Top Country by Sales – USA
Main source of Quips – our garbled recollection of movies & pop culture
Donuts eaten during development – Less than 5

Follow Spilt Milk Studios on twitter!

Related posts:

1. Spilt Milk Studios Development Diary 12 – Hundreds and Thousands
2. Spilt Milk Studios Development Diary 18: Christmas Roundup
3. Spilt Milk Studios Development Diary 15 – Freedom Part 2

“	MPA win high court case against BT, giving a clear path towards anti-piracy site blocking in the UK – http://bit.ly/nVIEZB
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	Great. Internet censorship is now here and legal in the UK. Yet another reason to emigrate.
	edfear July 28, 2011

“	@edfear umm. It’s been here for years Ed, for other illegal things.
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	Not advocating piracy, but news that movie studios are bullying (through legal action) legislation into being is not necessarily GOOD news
	Michael_French July 28, 2011

“	@Michael_French what are the negatives?
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@milessi I’m just wary: dangerous lines can get crossed when cor porations gang up on service providers and demand their own way.
	Michael_French July 28, 2011

“	@milessi it’s only been to protect the public (which I still think is wrong). now it’s to protect corporations, which is a whole new level.
	edfear July 28, 2011

“	@edfear Yeah – I can’t help but be uncomfortable at seeing systems introduced to fight child porn co-opted to protect business interests.
	robfahey July 28, 2011

“	@milessi These firms need to embrace/understand distribution, not attack the remote fringes of it.
	Michael_French July 28, 2011

“	@Michael_French there are systems & guidelines that could be put in place that could stop that. It’s better that persecuting the public imho
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@Michael_French embracing distribution is fine. Embracing blatant copyright infringment and IP theft not fine.
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@edfear is it better to have site blocking for flagrant infringement, or persecuting the public via the DEA?
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@milessi No one’s saying they should embrace piracy or give up their rights. But money may be better spent fighting the source, not the web.
	Michael_French July 28, 2011

“	@Michael_French the source IS the web, isn’t it?
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@milessi The source is the groups that distribute screeners and DVD-rips, etc., no?
	Michael_French July 28, 2011

“	@Michael_French the distribution in file sharing is those that are downloading, as they upload at the same time, no?
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@milessi But that wouldn’t happen if the file hadn’t appeared in the first place. And anyway, that’s not my issue here.
	Michael_French July 28, 2011

“	@milessi The MPA has had access to an index site cut off. That’s just denial, isn’t it? Piracy will still happen with just one aid taken out
	Michael_French July 28, 2011

“	@Michael_French @milessi next logical step: total ban on public access to car boot sales and pubs
	sdgaffney July 28, 2011

“	@michael_french @milessi forgot the smiley there
	sdgaffney July 28, 2011

“	Plus, my annoyance with dumb corporations trying to argue with the internet isn’t helped by the fact MPA is really just MPAA.
	Michael_French July 28, 2011

“	@Michael_French whilst I don’t know if this is fact, I expect this will be the first of very many cases. With many taken out, it’ll help.
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@milessi And my concern is that it’s futile – sites will keep cropping up.
	Michael_French July 28, 2011

“	@Michael_French Do you have locks on your doors & windows? Or do you think that if you’re going to get broken into, it’ll happen anyway?
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@milessi Haha, oh, you know that’s not comparable.
	Michael_French July 28, 2011

“	@Michael_French isn’t it? You are protecting your assets. The film studios are looking for ways to protect theirs.
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@milessi Bits versus atoms, Miles, bits versus atoms
	nicholaslovell July 28, 2011

“	@nicholaslovell little difference, Nicholas, little difference. It’s still someone’s property and livelihood.
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@nicholaslovell in the same way as if I paid you to do some research for me & then put said research online for all, you’d have an issue.
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@milessi Newzbin2 isn’t a lock/key, if we continue the metaphor, it’s the phone book or a map.
	Michael_French July 28, 2011

“	@Michael_French disagree. It is the key to the lock, and they even they bung you the phone book too, and the entry in the phone book.
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@milessi @michael_french I don’t think anyone is taking issue w/ revenue protection as a concept, just that it’s dngrsly close to censorship
	sdgaffney July 28, 2011

“	@milessi I think you can have an issue with piracy without thinking that convicting or blocking is the way to go around it. it won’t work.
	edfear July 28, 2011

“	@sdgaffney but the internet is already censored for other illegal things.
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@edfear what will work then, Ed? Or is “having an issue” with it but not doing anything about it acceptable to you?
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@milessi more acceptable than what has been done today? absolutely. I’d rather focus on how to harness their interest in a way that benefits
	edfear July 28, 2011

“	@milessi I think it has all the difference in the world. That’s why so much of my research is bespoke, client-centric consultancy
	nicholaslovell July 28, 2011

“	@milessi Much of my generic, applicable to all, research I give away on the blog
	nicholaslovell July 28, 2011

“	@milessi I also think that, long term, you can’t win in the bits world with atoms strategies – smart companies will out-offer you
	nicholaslovell July 28, 2011

“	@milessi The “you” there was really “one”, but I didn’t want to sound like Prince Charles
	nicholaslovell July 28, 2011

“	@milessi agreed, but by taking the site itself down, not by instructing ISPs to block. Neutrality of ISPs should be protected as free speech
	sdgaffney July 28, 2011

“	@Michael_French @sdgaffney is the comments section back up and unmoderated yet, or is your employer still censoring the Internet
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@milessi @sdgaffney Er, it’s back.
	Michael_French July 28, 2011

“	@Michael_French @sdgaffney unmoderated? And do you allow cheat tools, Steve?
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@milessi A weak misdirection. It’s a very different point
	nicholaslovell July 28, 2011

“	@sdgaffney don’t disagree but taking down sites outside of jurisdiction is the problem if people inside the jurisdiction can access
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@edfear that’s marketing speak Ed – examples of how to fix the problem Hollywood have are what, exactly?
	milessi July 28, 2011

	@nicholaslovell not unless they have the content they won’t. Content is King.
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@milessi @nicholaslovell now *that’s* marketing speak.
	Michael_French July 28, 2011

“	@Michael_French @milessi I’ve never believed content is king. I believe Distribution is. And content that doesn’t adapt to how people …
	nicholaslovell July 28, 2011

“	@Michael_French @milessi … to how users want to pay for it (i.e. 95% get it for free, 5% get something special, emotional, status)…
	nicholaslovell July 28, 2011

“	@Michael_French @milessi … will not be content that survives
	nicholaslovell July 28, 2011

“	@Michael_French @sdgaffney for the record, I’m NOT saying I agree with what has happened today, but can’t see other ways.
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@Michael_French @sdgaffney but think the “censorship” argument is fatally flawed.
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@milessi @Michael_French @sdgaffney Bill Thompson writes well on the censorship issue (he broadly supports the ruling) http://bbc.in/oULsos
	nicholaslovell July 28, 2011

“	@milessi @michael_french ultimately, this is a business problem – how do you protect revenue, without needing gov to infringe free speech?
	sdgaffney July 28, 2011

“	@nicholaslovell I disagree. It’s a very valid point in the debate as content costs to produce however it’s delivered
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@nicholaslovell @michael_french @milessi if content isn’t important, why do you sell digital copies of your book for £99?
	FreakyZoid July 28, 2011

“	@nicholaslovell @michael_french @milessi shouldn’t you be giving it away?
	FreakyZoid July 28, 2011

“	@milessi I’m not surprised you disagree. But I subscribe to the theory that prices will fall to the *marginal* cost of production
	nicholaslovell July 28, 2011

“	@milessi For a digital product, the marginal cost of one more copy is zero. So we will eventually see prices moving to zero
	nicholaslovell July 28, 2011

“	@FreakyZoid @michael_french @milessi The model only holds when users are driven to purchase for emotional, status, personal reasons
	nicholaslovell July 28, 2011

“	@FreakyZoid @michael_french @milessi It’s something I wrestle with. Current conclusion: B2B advice is premium content, not driven by status
	nicholaslovell July 28, 2011

“	@FreakyZoid @michael_french @milessi I’m always trying to think of different ways to test that, though. I’m not fixed
	nicholaslovell July 28, 2011

“	@Michael_French @sdgaffney how is it not the same? Censorship is censorship. In both cases the censorship is to uphold the law.
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@nicholaslovell @michael_french if there’s no content, Nicholas, there will be no films to distribute.
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@nicholaslovell @michael_french @milessi can I dive in? I think the worry with the movie industry is they think shutting websites is the key
	stuartdredge July 28, 2011

“	@stuartdredge @michael_french t’s a fair concern, but don’t see that in the current marketplace as a member of multiple on-demand services
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@stuartdredge @michael_french apple tv, sky, qrocity all have similar, but large, catalogues day & date with DVD or earlier
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@stuartdredge @michael_french prices are very good too – way cheaper than cinema and similar to blockbuster et al.
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@milessi @michael_french but yes, agree. I just sense Hollywood is where music biz was 5yrs ago in terms of ‘sue/shutdown’ being priority
	stuartdredge July 28, 2011

“	@milessi @michael_french with the studios figuring out how to squeeze more money out next time round when licensing (also: Spotify)
	stuartdredge July 28, 2011

“	@milessi @michael_french i think games industry is ahead of Hollywood though, in terms of balancing piracy-fighting with biz innovation
	stuartdredge July 28, 2011

“	@stuartdredge @michael_french whereas I think they want to protect their distribution models so that they can still produce quality content
	milessi July 28, 2011

“	@stuartdredge @michael_french much in the same way that many retailers insist on some form of copy protection for games historically
	milessi July 28, 2011

Related posts:

1. Disney buys Playdom, but will its IPs work in social games?
2. Why suing your rivals makes good business sense
3. Why creatives and business types MUST mix

It was triggered by a quote from Peter Vesterbacka of Rovio saying console games are dying at SXSW.

It probably won’t surprise regular readers that I am more in the Yes camp than the No camp, although what I really I believe is that the games industry is fragmenting into three, leaving little room for the middle-tier of console games makers.

But surprisingly in the No camp was Michael Pachter of Wedbush Morgan with this choice quote:

“It’s like McDonald’s saying nobody will ever eat at a steakhouse again because McDonald’s cheeseburgers are so successful. McDonald’s and Rovio provide phenomenal value for the money, but fast food is fast food, whether real food or a video game.”

Coming from a financial analyst, I find this baffling.

The fundamental economics of a McDonalds and a steakhouse are the same. They each need to pay rent for a good location, hire cooking and waiting staff and buy ingredients.

Sure, the amount McDonalds pays is much less, and the amount it charges is much less. But the cashflow statements and working capital requirements will look reasonably similar.

The economics of digital games are fundamentally different from those of physical games

Actually, it’s less about economics and more about risk/reward profile.

For a physical console game, the bet that you need to take is humungous. You need to develop a good AAA console game (minimum $5 million, $50 million for Modern Warfare 2, with higher budgets rumoured for some forthcoming games). You need to pay Sony or Microsoft a royalty to put a couple of million units into retail in the first month ($7 per unit x 2 million units = $14 million). You need to pay for manufacturing, warehousing and distribution. Having stumped up tens of millions of dollars, you get one shot at getting people to buy the game.

So you spend the same amount again on marketing.

So now you’re probably into triple-digit millions spent on your game. And the opening weekend (the opening month if we’re being generous) will make or break your game. A poor showing will mean no re-orders, retailers pulling your games off the shelf, and rapid price falls. Worse, you may have to buy back stock that hasn’t sold to keep your retailing partners sweet.

For a digital distribution product, the maths is very different.

If it’s still a product, rather than a service, like a PSN, Xbox Live or paid-for iOS title, there is some similarity. You still need to finish the game entirely before you launch it. You still need to spend marketing money. Chart position is key. You don’t have to pay for manufacturing, distribution, warehousing, which is a massive improvement to cashflow. You only pay platform royalties on games you sell, not stock you hope to sell, and you have no risk of unsold returns.

For service-based games it gets even better. You don’t need to complete 100% of development. Less than half is normal. You don’t need massive launch marketing. (I think it’s better to keep initial marketing spend low, so you don’t have a leaky bucket problem). You can test the water for your great new idea with much less working capital and much less fear of failure. (Not because failure is less likely, but because the consequences are less severe).

Why core games are not a steakhouse

The analogy breaks down because core games are not a single steakhouse. They are humongous, capital-intensive monsters. It’s like trying to compete with McDonalds by building a global network of thousands of steakhouse franchises before you even know if customers like your format.

No sensible investor would take that bet. They’d want to wait until a single steakhouse, in a single city, was successful and then roll it out globally.

The reason why console games are in so much trouble is not because the audience has disappeared, but that capital intensity is rising while audience numbers are barely growing, if not shrinking. The risk/reward calculation is getting worse and worse.

For some publishers and developers, it will go so badly wrong that they will go bust. For others, it will be fine for a while, although every time a core gamer decides to spend some time or money on a mobile, social or browser-based game, he or she is shrinking the market for core games.

But will it be good enough to justify Microsoft, Sony or some other corporation to invest $5 billion in a new AAA console platform?

Maybe one more. After that, I’m not so sure.

Related posts:

1. Video games and riots