QUOTE | “Holy fuck, it’s got harder.” - Developer Cliff Harris, who just launched Gratutitous Space Battles 2 on Steam, talking about the big difference between releasing a game in 2013 and releasing a game today.
Elsewhere in the business of video games this past week ...
QUOTE | “The opportunity to create a $1 billion annual mobile game franchise is real... We are in a market where the largest game franchise in the world is no longer on console, but rather on a mobile device.” - Kabam CEO Kevin Chou, talking in a blog post about why the company is doing fewer games and trying to make each bigger.
QUOTE | “I really wonder who the hell has time to do that.” - Industry consultant and former indie studio head Vlad Micu, talking along with other indies about the difficulty of doing social media while still trying to create games.
QUOTE | “The way we look at it is we take a niche, hardcore approach to things in terms of us valuing it, and we try to translate that into something the mainstream could appreciate.” - Torn Banner founder and president Steve Piggott, explaining how the studio picks ideas for new games.
QUOTE | “We should have new exclusive IP at E3. I’m trying to make this E3 more about 1st party than past E3s.” - Xbox boss Phil Spencer, tweeting about how E3 this year will have a different focus than last year for Microsoft.
QUOTE | “[Streaming has] impacted us, I think, throughout the entire company; even how we market the game.” - Blizzard senior manager of eSports Kim Phan, talking about the increasing importance of eSports to Blizzard.
STAT | $91.5 billion – Amount of total revenue worldwide expected from games in 2015, according to research firm Newzoo; this represents a 9.4% growth over 2014, with China ($22.2 billion) overtaking the US ($22 billion) in total game revenues.
QUOTE | “The largest at-scale consumer market in tech right now is games... So the business models, the volume, the scale, and therefore the cold hard cash, is coming from games and certainly entertainment-related activities.” - Former Microsoft and Sony exec Phil Harrison, talking about his new startup company that’s doing something related to games.
STAT | 20% – Amount that sales of the Xbox One declined in the last quarter versus the same quarter last year, according to Microsoft’s latest earnings report; the company shipped 1.6 million consoles this year versus 2 million consoles last year in the same quarter.
QUOTE | “The funny thing is it felt like I was bringing the violence conversation to the table because I have 20 years of scars and I’m from the game industry.” - Mark DeLoura, former senior advisor at the White House, talking about how the government’s interest in games has shifted to how they can help society, not how they can harm it.
QUOTE | “Oculus is very much in the development stage so it’s early to be talking about large shipment volumes.” - Facebook CFO David Wehner, explaining that Facebook’s projected operating expenses for the year don’t reflect a large amount for producing Oculus Rift VR headsets.
QUOTE | “I feel like I’m almost in danger of becoming an old-timer in the industry, so I’m excited to go visit some studios that are a little bit younger in the pipeline.” - Rob Pardo, former chief creative officer for Blizzard, talking about his upcoming role for Unity going around the world talking to developers.