Would the end of the Covid-19 pandemic have gotten the better of the popularity of the concept of metaverse, an expression designating the future of the Internet, where users would be immersed in a virtual world for all types of activity (work, games , sport) ? In any case, this is the conviction of John Hanke, the boss of the American studio Niantic: “I think it was a by-product of the lockdowns, but since then life has returned to normal. We prefer to go back to the office, to meet directly rather than on [l’application de visioconférence] Zoom. It was a mistaken vision to think that we were going to spend our time in a 3D world. »
The collapse of the share price of Meta (parent company of Facebook), which dreams of championing the metaverse, is the symbol of this disillusion: the action has lost more than 50% of its value in 2022, and the frequentation of its virtual universe, Horizon Worlds, is well below Mark Zuckerberg’s forecasts, with 200,000 users recorded in October, far from the 500,000 initially hoped for at the end of 2022.
However, many players are still showing their interest in virtual reality. “This is clearly the future of video gamesestimated Charles-Louis Planade, financial analyst at Midcap Partners. Although it remains a niche market, it continues to grow strongly. » In 2023, we expect to see Sony and Apple each introduce a new virtual reality headset.
Savings plan
However, for Mr. Hanke, “the future belongs more to augmented reality”, which allows, through a device (smartphone, glasses), to make virtual elements appear in real space. Niantic has had its biggest success with mobile gaming based on this technology. Pokemon Go. Seven years after its launch, in 2016, it surpassed $6 billion. revenue (5.5 billion euros). A success that the company has not been able to replicate with its other games. She now hopes that success will smile on her more with her new title launched in January, NBA All Worldwhich will try to seduce basketball fans.
In Mr. Hanke’s eyes, while augmented reality is catching on with the general public, it still lacks a truly compelling model of augmented reality glasses. Niantic is also collaborating with the electronic components giant Qualcomm to lay the foundations for this new product, which other manufacturers could seize.
In the meantime, the company is not immune to the turbulence that the video game sector is going through. In July 2022, it lifted the veil on a savings plan involving the dismissal of 8% of its workforce and the cessation of several game projects. On Friday, January 20, Microsoft in turn announced the imminent closure of its social virtual reality platform AltspaceVR.