Game news PS5, Nintendo Switch, Xbox: the video game industry is facing its biggest slowdown in 30 years
We know that the world of video games, and its business, is made up of more or less active periods. Before the release of new machines, there are often transition phases. But this year seems very different from the previous ones…
Game Over?
Like several economic sectors which have been showing sluggish results for several months, video games are currently in a worrying downward phase. Like the decline in sales on smartphones and tablets, consoles are currently experiencing a huge slowdown. In an industry which, according to the Ft.com site, weighs the sum of 200 billion dollars, this decline is far from insignificant. Thus, according to analyzes and other business specialists, video games, as we know them, are facing a slowdown never seen in… 30 yearsthat is to say before the golden period of the first PlayStation of the name.
The reason ? For several years, technological evolution and the advent of new consoles have allowed the industry to maintain a certain dynamic. Unfortunately, for some time now, this growth driven by mobile games and new machines has reached its limits and all manufacturers seem to be waiting. Sony has revised its PlayStation 5 sales forecast downwards, there is more and more talk of a delay of the new Nintendo console (expected this year, it would not be on sale before 2025) and Microsoft seems more or less seek the path to follow for the future. We are therefore very far from the enthusiasm generated by video games during the sad pandemic period that the world went through a few years ago. And the rebound envisaged, after the post-Covid-19 slowdown, by players in the sector did not take place…
Although there is no shortage of projects and great video game surprises, video games currently seem to be in a fog, a bit as if the players in the sector, but also the players themselves, are struggling to get excited. Lack of originality, lack of renewal, lack of interest? This is what we sometimes feel when listening to and reading certain fan communities. And what about the video game companies which are in the process of multiplying social plans? The analysis firm Ampere Analysis confirms that the era of growth is much slower. Until when ?
The future of video games
According to the Ft.com site, sales of new game consoles have clearly not lived up to investors’ expectations and this reality has been combined with the dizzying decline in smartphone sales. All these factors mean that video games, in 2024, are on a downward slope. This explains the various statements, such as that of Sony stating that the firm expects a gradual decline in sales of the PS5 from the next fiscal year. To be very clear, the entire industry, from gamers to studios, is waiting for a new boost through the arrival of new machines, but only at a certain stage. Indeed, according to Gareth Sutcliffe of Enders Analysis, “ consoles have proven that they are not a model of growth for games – having reached a very clear number of sales, they plateau. » Do these confessions signal the end of consoles? It’s a discourse that has been coming back for several years, but indisputably, video games, if we are to believe those involved, must reinvent themselves. How ? Here is all the question. The financial stakes, due to the explosion of production budgets, are colossal and a very large studio can find itself in trouble after two or three failures.
While Disney has invested 1.5 billion dollars in Epic Games, Mickey’s boss is convinced that the future lies, in addition to cinema and television, in video games. He reminds us that gamers spend as much time on their games as they do in the cinema or in front of a television screen and that it is impossible to miss such an opportunity. Thus, and if we except Nintendo which should remain faithful to its line of conduct, video games are expected to undergo significant changes in the months and years to come. And you, what are your feelings about the evolution of video games? Are you nostalgic for a certain era or, on the contrary, do you have a lot of hope for the future of video games?