Found a news article (via Reddit) with a refreshingly straight-forward headline: Newzoo: North American gamers spend an average of $325 annually The Reddit conversation focused mostly on how inexpensive gaming is as a hobby in dollars-per-hour terms, compared to going to a bar/movie ($20-$80) or even a concert/sporting event ($150-$800+). You know, traditional talking points.

After actually reading the article itself though, that wasn’t what this report is about:

The motivations behind player spending in these regions also differ. 34% of North American players spend money to unlock exclusive content, while 29% do so on personalisation/character customization. […]

The report also found that there’s diversity in player spending patterns between regions. In North America, 27% of players invest in content packs, power-ups, and in-game currencies, 24% buy subscriptions, and 23% purchase battle passes.

What’s conspicuously missing is “percentage spent buying the game.” At least, I assume unlocking exclusive content does not count. And actually, all those percentages are kind of weird. Is character customization not also exclusive content? Are content packs not battle passes? Who knows.

Regardless, the through line is clear:

According to the findings, the West games market is seeing slowing “payer growth,” with a 1.1% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) in North America and 3.1% CAGR in Europe between 2023 and 2027. As such, Newzoo and Tebex recommend studios “shift from acquiring new players to maximizing value from existing ones.”

There’s a tangled web of chicken vs egg speculation about why player growth has slowed. Market saturation? Higher prices and too much “maximizing value” squeezing people out? Shaky economic future? The rise of lifestyle/live-service/forever games like Fortnite, Roblox, etc? (Time) Competition from short-form video content?

Funnily enough, most of these points were covered back in January in the Hopes of the Game Industry. And the answer is… Yes. All of those things, simultaneously. There have been tremendous layoffs in the games industry this year, including high-profile sequels and nearly-complete games thrown in the trash. We mourn the loss of what could have been, but the suits see how only ~12% of gaming hours are spent playing new games. Why risk $100m+ and eight years building a game when you can “maximize value” out of established ones? And if you don’t have any of those games, just buy’em up.

Again, it could be an interesting debate about which happened first. Did escalating prices for new games send players back into the arms of familiar classics? Or did the introduction of microtransactions start making games stickier, as a means of assuaging sunk costs?

True answers, if any exist, are academic at this point. Developers are following the money and it’s hard to blame them. Well, aside from being increasingly incapable of making fun games even after 4-8 years and tens millions of dollars and are now choosing to erode your consumer surplus instead.

You can certainly blame them for that.