The game industry experiences a second crash, what causes it and how does it get fixed?

[Specter Von Baren]

So as a sort of thought experiment, lets say tomorrow the game industry experiences a crash. I want to know where you think such a crash would come from, why would it happen, what would be the ramifications of it and could the industry correct itself to recover from it and if so how?

And I'm not saying this would be the same kind of crash that hit in 1983 (Though it could be), I'm wondering where you yourself think it would come from.

Maybe it comes from people no longer putting up with microtransactions?

Maybe it comes from there just being too many games to pick from and so not enough games are getting bought?

Maybe it comes from companies increasing the price of base games to match the increasing costs of making them which leads to those games not being bought?

Maybe some sort of new restriction on the internet causes downloadable games to be so restricted that people can't or won't buy them?

It could be anything, what do you think it would be?

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

It's not going to happen because the industry is too big and the gamer community is too broad. Microtransactions are so overblown by the vocal minority of the gamer community. Plus, games use basic behavioral conditioning that's worked on humans forever. What's the chances of only gamers basically becoming immune to such things while every other industry continues on just fine with the same tactics? I don't see there being too many games to choose from because AAA publishers are releasing fewer and fewer games. I also very much doubt video games are making less money, I bet the profit margins are much bigger than they used to be if you look at the financial reports. Something like an internet restriction would probably never pass because many other industries are far more dependent on the internet than gaming and even if it did, only really PC gaming would heavily be hit by that.

To me, gaming has sorta crashed already from creative perspective. Just about every AAA game release is so homogeneous with every other game, it's really hard to get excited about really any releases. It's the indie and mid-tiers that are sustaining the creative aspect of gaming for me so if there was a crash, everyone would just switch to playing stuff like Divinity Original Sin over Bethesda's RPGs or say Shadow Tactics over Hitman or Fortnite/PUBG over COD/Battlefield (oh wait, that kinda already happened). The gaming demographic is far too spread out and broad for a real crash to happen because even if say the gamers that grew up in the 80s/90s (that were like the entire market at that time) got sick of the current gaming landscape and basically gave up games, you have a bunch of much younger gamers that will still find games fun and fresh and they'll sustain the AAA industry at least.

 

[CaitSeith]

Define game industry crash, because the 1983 was restricted to U.S. console gaming only, and yet people treat it like the fall of the whole industry.

 

[Saelune]

I suppose if Valve went bankrupt for some weird reason, that would fuck over a lot of the industry. Steam really has a stranglehold on PC gaming short of Blizzard who do their own thing and Nintendo who don't bother with PC.

 

[Trunkage]

I suppose if Valve went bankrupt for some weird reason, that would fuck over a lot of the industry. Steam really has a stranglehold on PC gaming short of Blizzard who do their own thing and Nintendo who don't bother with PC.

I think the bigger problem there would be the digital rights. Because we don't own any games we bought. Steam does.


Also, I suspect, it would be beneficial profit wise to every company not Valve since they take about 30% of each sale. And the do not much at all for such a big payout.

 

[Neurotic Void Melody]

Either a world war sparked by dwindling energy resources, a comet making a hasty landing on our dear habitable rock, Alaska's permafrost suffering a meltdown and choking us all to death for our own good, an overweight narcissistic with a toupee firing all his overcompensatory toys in a tantrum at everyone who laughed at him, a 'Children of Men' scenario where the young give up with the whole 'getting born' schtick, a solar flare, a cult doomsday prophecy turning out to be a realsie, the avengers not saving us from alien threats for once, the fucking sea, cataclysmic gravitational anomaly, everyone suicides because plants, ""millennials"" or just good old global warming reaching its' inevitable conclusion I think would do it.

Some greedy companies releasing subpar products and fiddling with dodgy business practices certainly wouldn't. Rockstar only needs to release another game and every single person on this planet including the indigenous tribes of the Andaman islands would jump right back in again. There are so many other industries with big players doing a lot worse yet still having no problems making their buck with little a dent, no matter how much I boycott them with a permanent concerned frown.

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

Well there is a lot of external reasons wh the videogame industry may crash. Most new game releases target predominantly Western consumers, and inflation, CPI, record low interest rates, increasing land prices and reduced job security has basically meant every millenial like myself, and post-millenial as is the new generations simply has to have multiple revenue streams to enjoy an idea of being without work before they're 50 years old.

Decide to have a kid or get a mortgage and you're basically working into your 70s or later.

So the savings pool alone arguably will affect total retail growth of the setor eventually.

There is also the problem with the mk. I human eyeball and brain. In that it is literally pointless having anything above 4K and a 180 hz refresh rate. Only in times of accelerated blood circulation and increased blood O2 sat will the brain actually appreciate that level of definition. And even then, do people legitimately want to play games at that level of persistent physiological agitation for an extended period of time? People can point to things like VR, but that shit will still be making huge segments of people feel sick and cause visuospatial effects (problems) after you remove your headset.

Hell, even the psychosomatic effects of people like me that tried out first generation headsets will likely talk themselves into feeling things akin to migraines and vertigo simply because of prior experience ... and simply just won't go near the technology. I know for a fact that anytime that I do find myself in a position where someone talks me into wearing a VR headset, the second I feel queasy or nausea ... regardless of the true soure of it, imagined or not ... I'm going to blame the headset.

That sounds incredibly petty, and in a way it is ... but no game is worth a fucking migraine. Even if the headset is technically not to blame ... still not worth me going all exposure therapy with one to get over it. Migraines are awful. It's up to two days, or even more, without the capacity to eat, sleep, keep down water, and hiding from any source of light. I had to go on a drip once in the middle of summer due to vomiting up water during a Sydney heatwave ... just no. No one needs that shit, and sumatriptan only works 50% of the time.

To say that my experience with VR permanently turned me off VR is an understatement. And I can't imagine I'm the only one.

So we're already reaching that point where graphics can hypothetically be as good as they can possibly be and now it's merely an issue of coding and art direction, rather than technical limitations, to graphical fidelity. Of course that says nothing about environmental interactivity, etc ... so improvements cold be made in delievering ever more resource intensive game engines...

In some ways this is good ... because technology is always getting cheaper ... but in some ways it's bad because you're going to run into that tech wall sooner rather than later.

---------------

Alright so let's break it down into possible reasons why you might have a videogame crash.

1: Economic downturn.

So let's start with the basics. Economic downturn eats into people's savings that they already don't have. So this might impel more game developers to further invest into what is known as the 'games as a service model'. Reduced prodution of AAA titles in favour of ever greater individual game content released over greater periods of time.

2: Videogames glut.

Now this one is potentially more esoteric. There is practically an infinite amount of gameplay that you can get for peanuts. Combine this with a protracted economic downturn people might simply buy those... I mean you canc pick up NWN diamond edition with like 200+ hours of content, not including user generated content, for like $5? And It plays on anything?

I know for a fact that I would save money not buying videogames I barely don't play ...

This is the key problem with electronic assets ... unlike a car or motorcycle where you will always need to pay some level of premium price on individual componentry through wear and tear, videogames have a ridiculous depreciation rate and a 20 year old game will still work as if a new release.

3: Who says the videogame industry hasn't already crashed?

This is a thought experiment, but consider if you will the fact that AAA publishers need to take ever greater gambles producing their games than small and medium sized producers of content that often, with suitably innovative products with innovative mechanics, simply do not have the same overheads?

I personally have invested more time recently with HoI 4 ( or moreso its UGC) than any recent AAA purchase beyond Monster Hunter on the Switch ... and that's a reboot. I'm pretty monetized myself ... but I simply don't pay top dollar for games because I don't consider myself an idiot.

I know I can buy those games cheaper, and honestly why wouldn't I just wait?

 

[sXeth]

The obvious culprit wouldn't be any particular dev or publisher falling in, but rather a platform collapse.

PC is the obvious target there. If Steam shuts down next week for some unforeseen reason, the main name brand in the mainstream for PC games is gone, and thousands/millions of customers are immediately burned on some or all of their library becoming useless. If they decay slowly (Arguably already there) and competitors rise up to fill in the voids first, its avoided, but if they go quick its going to be a huge impact.

The consoles are a bit more of a tossup. Its unlikely they would abandon platform-holder status to simply become hardware purveyors. And equally unlikely that all three will jump off a cliff simultaneously with some poorly considered notion (Streaming games well before most consumers can begin to manage it would be the current looming cliff). They'd be more vulnerable then PC to a big AAA company going under, but it'd take a lot to really sink the entire lot in one go.

The other big case would be mass unionization. And thats not a screaming "Rarrgh Unions are greedy leeches". But a large scale labour renegotiation and shift in structuring could obviously have a detrimental effect for a noticeable period where we see games slow down drastically.

 

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

The crash would come from legal regulations. Lootboxes and the like finally being labeled gambling, companies being taken to court and forced to pay hundreds of millions in damages and fines, and either relegating lootboxes to 21+ games or simply ending them entirely.

Imagine what would happen to EA if they couldn't sell a single FIFA pack or if premium currency was suddenly outlawed?

 

[Canadamus Prime]

If it does crash again I hope it would be as a result of the legalities of Loot Boxes and such and results in the collapse of the major Publishers, EA, Activision, Ubisoft etc.

 

[gorfias]

For me, it crashes due to so much to play, a glut from which the industry cannot recover, at least for some time. If I don't die before beating my current pile of shame, I'm living forever. And yet, I want Spiderman for PS4. And Red Dead Redemption 2 looks like a must buy. Can't help myself.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

Want to point out 1983 was the second crash. First crash was 1977.

 

[gorfias]

@Johnny Novgorod:
I'd not heard of the 1977 crash before! Just looked it up. States PONG type games were being sold at a loss. There is an argument of over saturation vs. desire for new tech. One argued that people were used to buying appliances that lasted 20 years: that hunger for new tech had nothing to do with the crash. I think it might be both. Toward the end of the PS3 era, I wasn't interested in the sales pitch, "pushes the envelope for what the PS3 can do" as that had been done before as the tech had been around for so long. New tech is required to set new benchmarks. Real advances do impact my buying. But if the tech over stays its welcome? The glut is more real as they lose a selling point. Not the only one. For instance, Zelda BOTW, does not offer new envelope pushing graphics. It's just a great game. But it is something.