“The game industry needs to get laid and chill already.” — Indie developer Robert Yang talking during GDC about the game industry’s problems with sexual content and the inconsistent policies of networks like Twitch.
Elsewhere in the business of gaming this week…
QUOTE | “How will Microsoft Xbox compete with PlayStation VR in the near term? Without a response, we would expect Sony to utterly dominate the rest of the console cycle.” — Macquarie Securities analyst Ben Schachter commenting on the impact that Sony’s PlayStation VR will have on the VR battle and the long-term console war this generation.
QUOTE | “Imagine if you strapped a DS to your face, it’s like that or imagine if the virtual boy didn’t suck… I would bet Nintendo is working on one.” — Game designer and Carnegie Mellon professor Jesse Schell outlining 40 predictions for VR/AR during a crowded GDC session; he believes that Nintendo will have a dedicated VR gaming device in the near future.
QUOTE | “The men on the team have the experience and track record to be the best person for the job, because we’ve been given the chance to prove ourselves.” — Fullbright founder Steve Gaynor (Gone Home) on the implications of opening doors for people in the game industry, to allow them to prove themselves, especially women who often aren’t given the same opportunities.
QUOTE | “We know there are going to be a lot of successes, but the likelihood is that there are also going to be a lot of failures.” — Oculus founder Palmer Luckey talking during GDC about the excitement that VR is bringing to the industry but also telling developers to temper their expectations.
QUOTE | “It really almost shocked me, and it was a realisation that this game gave me a sense of a new media perspective, meaning games as an art form can exist.” — Rez creator Tetsuya Mizuguchi looks back on the creation of his seminal synaesthesia shooter during a GDC talk.
STAT | 200 million — The number of units that the Pokemon franchise has sold during its lifetime; if you add in spin-offs, the franchise has sold around 279 million units.
QUOTE | “We learned the hard way that a key to our success is ensuring the atmosphere is decent at work so people can be happy, motivated and creative.” — Drinkbox (Guacamelee) co-founder/producer Graham Smith talking along with designer Chris McQuinn during a GDC talk on their company’s 10 biggest fuck-ups.
STAT | $US330 ($434) million — The revenues generated in the first five days on the market for Ubisoft’s The Division, which the company said was the best first week performance ever for a new IP.
QUOTE | “I’m going to talk about the 65-year-old version of me. He is seriously frustrated with the games that are being marketed.” — Miami University professor Bob De Schutter talking during GDC about ageism in games and how the industry needs to wake up to the fact that there will be lots of older gamers soon who will need content that’s interesting to them.
QUOTE | “Can we please make sure that mobile VR won’t suck?” — SuperData’s Joost van Dreunen writing about the effect that bad VR on mobile phones could have on VR in general since many people’s first experience with VR will come via a smartphone.
Top image via Shutterstock Photo, and is close enough
Comments
12 responses to “This Week In The Business: The Game Industry Needs To Get Laid”
So its about VR, porn and making money…. the fact we can only have ugly girls in VR because its correct….. and we are not allowed skimpy thin girls showing their skin….
good time to be a gamer, but I can tell what side of the fence im sitting….
The older gamers comment is interesting. Im hitting 40 soon. A friend of mine just hit 55 and he’s a hardcore gamer *still*. His wife and he are already shopping around to ‘over 50’s’ retirement places and asking about broadband availability etc due to his gaming habits etc. As he said, he’ll be gaming til the day he dies. Not just your ‘old persons games’, dudes into COD, Ark and all that. So I can definitely see a growing market of older gamers coming in.
Quite true. The generation that grew up along with the first generation consoles are reaching into their retirement age already and most of them that were into games are still gaming up to now.
It is just the beginning of these age groups and more will join in and developers need to be aware of this market. We can’t be playing hardcore games the entire life.
I can’t wait to hear “FOUR SCORE AND SEVEN YEARS AGO I BANGED YOUR MOTHER!” :O
I know a guy in his eighties who’s still playing battlefield.
From the real thing to the virtual thing :O
Something like that…
He remarked once that the Chinese were cheating fucks in Korea… and they’re still cheating fucks today.
HAHAHAHAHAHA.
Just imagining the korean war… someone gets shot behind a wall…
“WAAAAAAAAAAALL HAAAAAAAAAAACK!”
Yeah, I turned 40 last year and I’m not planning on stopping any time soon.
Figured this is relevant here. With Gawker having to potentially pay out $115 million to Hulk Hogan, what the heck is going to happen to Kotaku and the other sites? Kotaku and Jalopnik are daily visits for me. 🙁
Kotaku in Australia is a part of Allure media, and not Gawker.
They licence the name and receive articles from the US and other Kotaku affiliates.
Kotaku in the US is actually profitable, so if Gawker has to pay that much money (their annual profit is around 30 million) they’ll either sell of the profitable arms of their business, or arrange a payment plan.
Jalopnik I have no idea about.
Ahhh okay. Thanks for the info, bud. Yeah, hopefully the good properties will find a new home if it comes to that. It sucks that so many great sites are owned by a gossip blog.