QUOTE | “You need the hacker, the designer and the huckster to start your game company. Somebody’s got to be the huckster.” - Tim Train, CEO of Big Huge Games, talking about what it takes to make a successful game company.
QUOTE | “I joined THQ, and THQ goes broke. I join Kojima, and Kojima leaves Konami. I have decided, in order not to destroy anyone else’s life, I have decided I will never again get involved in video games. Otherwise, I’ll join someone and his house will explode, or something.” - Film director Guillermo Del Toro, talking about why he’s giving up working on games.
QUOTE | “Console is a blue ocean for MOBAs. The overall growth of the genre [on PC] is starting to slow.” - Todd Harris of Hi-Rez Studios, talking about why he feels Smite’s eSports presence and Xbox One launch can close the gap on market leaders.
STAT | 142% – Amount that Take-Two’s sales rose last quarter compared to the same quarter last year, to $275.3 million; this was due to the release of the PC version of GTA V, which has now sold more than 54 million copies across all versions.
QUOTE | “A comparison of the year-over-year console software sales suggests that the 8th generation is performing better than the 7th generation – provided you exclude the Nintendo consoles.” - Patrick Walker, VP of insights at EEDAR, talking about how core console software sales are higher than ever.
QUOTE | “We don’t actually yet know what the full arc of the story and the player experience is going to be – we write the game and build the narrative as we go.” - Fulbright’s Steve Gaynor, talking about the intricacies of building their new game Tacoma.
STAT | 12% – Amount digital game sales in the US rose last month (to $1.03 billion) compared to the same month last year, according to SuperData; most of the growth came from PC and mobile, which combined were 60% of the total.
STAT | 17% – Amount that video game accessories sales in retail stores grew last month over the same month the previous year, according to NPD; this was attributed to strong sales of point and subscription cards, while software sales were flat and hardware rose only 2%.
STAT | $20 million – Amount of revenue that Hearthstone is generating per month for Blizzard, according to research firm SuperData; the game has 9 million players on mobile and 8 million on PC.
QUOTE | “Nothing gets widespread attention until it starts bringing in big money. So I guess we need more visibility at the intersection of Women and Big Money.” - Game designer Whitney Hills, talking about the challenges women in the games industry face.
STAT | 5 million – Number of copies sold so far of Techalnd’s Dying Light zombie game; not surprisingly, the developer is considering a sequel while they work on more DLC for the game.
STAT | 345,000 – Number of visitors that attended this year’s Gamescom consumer game show in Cologne, Germany, setting an attendance record; the show had 806 exhibitors and 33,200 professional visitors.
Top image from Shustterstock