Reggie Fils-Aime is what’s known as a ‘character’ in the games industry, the type that’s always two seconds away from another quotable remark. This time, speaking to Geoff Keighley on GameTrailers TV, he’s claiming that cheaply made mobile games are “one of the biggest risks today” in terms of the games industry.
Reggie’s argument is that disposable content, like Angry Birds, is priming consumers to expect more for less – the end result being that gamers will expect to pay less for top level, AAA handheld content.
“Angry Birds,” claimed Reggie, “is a great piece of experience, but that is one compared to thousands of other pieces of content that for one or two dollars I think create a mentality for the consumer that a piece of gaming content should only be $2.”
What do you guys think? It’s an interesting point. On the one hand cheap digital content has allowed independent developers to be successful via the self publishing route, but larger distributors will struggle to compete eventually. Will this result in less premium content being developed?
It’s a possibility. Personally I’ve been a huge fan of these so-called ‘disposable’ gaming experiences, but will this be to the detriment the games industry in the long term? I’d argue it might create sustainable growth on some level…
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