$65B Spent on Gaming, Fastest Growing Entertainment Sector - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 20 May 2013 / 12,354 Views
Microsoft's Aaron Greenberg spoke on Major Nelson's podcast about the video game industry as a whole and how well it is performing when compared to other entertainment industries.
Gamers spent $65 billion on video games in 2012, with consoles leading the industry. $28 billion have been spent on console gaming, which is 42 percent of the total sales. The PC sector just edges out the Mobile / Tablet sector with $12 billion in sales, compared to $10 billion. Handheld gaming, which includes the 3DS and PlayStation Vita accounts, accounts for $8 billion in gaming sales. The Social / Browser sector has caught up with handhelds at $8 billion.
The home console sales have grown consistently since the 5th generation, PlayStation 1 and Nintendo 64. There were 150 million home consoles sold in the 5th generation, while sales grew 30 percent to 200 million in the 6th generation. The 6th generation includes the PlayStation 2, Xbox and GameCube. Console sales skyrocketed in the 7th generation with 300 million units sold to date. The 7th generation includes the Wii, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. The 7th generation is on track to double the sales of the 6th generation.
Microsoft has also released their projections for the 8th generation which includes the next Xbox, PlayStation 4 and Wii U. The 8th generation is expected to grow 28 percent from the 7th generation, to 385 million consoles sold.
As a whole the video game industry is on track to become the biggest entertainment sector. It is currently growing at 7 percent per year which is higher than any other entertainment sector. TV subscriptions are growing at 6.8 percent per year, TV ads by 4.6 percent, Radio by 3.2 percent, Music by 1.9 percent, and film by 1.7 percent. The Newspaper, Magazine and Book industries have been showing a slight decline, though less than one percent.
The video game industry has surpassed the film industry when it comes to blockbusters. Call of Duty II: Black Ops II reached $650 million in sales in just five days, while the Avengers film made $373 million in 10 days. More recently Iron Man 3 produced $285 million in sales in its first 10 days. In the US, the Home Console market has reached the US Box Office market in 2012 with $11 billion in sales each.
Other figures include more than one billion people playing games online worldwide and video game software sales have made $12.1 billion in profit.
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i thought the gaming industry was dying. lol
To think, we've had hmm.. 3 threads within as many weeks about a potential video game crash only to find out the opposite? Crazy.
No, there is a gaming crash coming. People on the internet told me.
And the last time I checked there was all this talk that piracy was killing the industry.
Well its had a huge impact on PC gaming. The concern wasn't really with consoles.
And yet we are seeing companies post losses left and right; mid level companies closing every other week; and are hearing about year over year drops of 25% or more each month since 2011 (or something like that) for NA.
Either the video game industry is the most grossly mismanaged industry the world has ever seen or something isn't adding up here.
Most businesses fail within five years of their inception--video game industry is no different.
