The Games Industry Essay

The video games industry involves the design, development, marketing and sales of video games. Thousands of people across the world are employed in the industry and there is a wide variety of jobs available which I am going to be talking about, along with many other topics, in this essay.

The games industry first began in 1971, when an arcade game named Computer Space was released by Nutting Associates however, it did not prove very popular as people found it too complicated to grasp quickly. The first commercially successful game was the arcade game Pong, which was released in the November of 1972 by Atari, Inc. Pong was a two-player tennis game which had a very simple concept involving hitting the ball back and forth across the screen using the paddle and the person playing could either go against the computer or another person.  The graphics were also basic and they consisted of two sticks for the paddle style tennis rackets and a square for the ball; the screen was black with everything else was white and the players scores were shown at the top of the screen. Despite its simplicity, it was still hugely popular as it was something people had never seen before and it sold to about 12,000 arcade units. In 1975, Atari released a home edition of Pong which proved even more popular and sold 150,000 units. The game itself was a key milestone for the games industry because it was a representation of how successful the industry could be and it resulted in the format for Pong being copied by many other companies.

The first home video game console was called The Magnavox Odyssey and it was released in August, 1972 by a man named Ralph H. Baer. Ralph had the idea in 1951 but he was instructed by his bosses to work on a different project however, this did not put him off and in 1966, he re-visited the idea and developed it and by 1968, he had completed a working prototype (sample/model). This prototype was known as the Brown Box and it was a major milestone for the game industry because it was from this point onwards that it really developed and it is thanks to Baer that the industry is what it is today. He quoted when receiving the Game Developers Choice Pioneer Award in 2008: “Had I listened to all those people… who were telling me to stop the nonsense or making comments like ‘are you still screwing around with that stuff’ we might not all be here today”. I agree with what he has said because today, the game industry is huge and it is making billions each year. For example, in 2013, the worldwide revenue was $70.4 billion and it 2014, it was $75.2 billion. It is constantly increasing and in 2015, it is predicted to be $80.5 billion so from these statistics, we can see that it is increasing by about $5 billion each year. I looked at some more video game statistics online and I discovered that the game industry made twice the amount of money than the film industry did in 2013 (the film industry made $35.9 billion) which shocked me as I did not expect the difference to be so large and like the game industry, the film industry is still extremely strong and in high demand from a very wide variety of audiences.

There are thousands of people worldwide who are employed in the game industry and in the UK, there were 19 thousand employed individuals in 2013 which is a reasonably large increase compared to in 2011, when there were 13 thousand employed individuals. There are many different job sectors within the games industry and these include: game designers, game developers, game publishers and game testers. Game designers create the rules, goals and challenges within a game that will meet its desired audience’s expectations; they must apply design and aesthetics for different purposes including entertainment and education. Game developers have the task of creating the game and it is split into individual tasks such as: programmers, artists, musicians and writers. Game publishers are responsible for funding and managing the development of games and they additionally have to take control of the marketing, sales and manufacturing of the game. Game testers have to test a variety of games in order to make sure they are of a high quality so they have to look for issues of the game, e.g. bugs, and recent studies show that game testing is both financially and emotionally unrewarding.

There are a variety of game genres within the industry including: action, action-adventure, adventure, simulation, sports, survival-horror and shooter. Every game will have its own individual narrative and representations depending on its genre, here are a few examples: action-adventure is a hybrid genre which combines both problem-solving and reflexes to appeal to a broader audience compared to pure action or pure adventure games. An example of an action-adventure game is Grand Theft Auto V, published by Rockstar Games and set in the fictional state of San Andreas and based around crime. The player must complete a series of heists, swapping between three protagonists- Michael, Franklin and Trevor. The game is classified as an 18 due to violence, profanity, sex and offensive remarks however, it attracts people below this age due to word-of-mouth. I personally think the game attracts males aged 15-25 as they will be able to relate to the characters and they will be used to the conventions of violent games so can purely use the game for entertainment. I do not think Rockstar intended for the game to attract females because there are only negative representations of women either as strippers and prostitutes or as housewives which may put a female audience off. Survival-horror games make strong use of horror themes which aim to scare the audience and provide them with a thrilling experience and they focus on the survival of the character. An example of a survival-horror game is The Last of Us, published by Sony Computer Entertainment. The narrative is set in a post-apocalyptic world and the player controls the male protagonist, Joel who leads the female protagonist, Ellie across the US to protect her from hostile humans and zombies. I believe the target audience is both males and females aged 12-25 as they are likely to understand the narrative and both genders will have a protagonist to relate to. However, I still feel there is a negative representation of females and age in this game because both protagonists are young, which portrays younger people as stronger and more capable than older people. Joel leads Ellie which is a representation of male dominance and it presents the idea that woman need to rely on men and that they are incapable of doing anything for themselves.

This video sums up The Last Of Us really well as it gives us an insight into the narrative and into the main protagonists. Even in this short clip, we can still see a slightly negative representation of woman as is a number of times in which Joel is carrying Ellie, so it protecting her therefore is bringing across the idea that females need someone to look after them.

Audiences are one of the most important things producers have to consider when designing games because they will have to live up to their expectations in order to be successful when it comes to sales and marketing. I looked at some audience statistics online and this is what I discovered. The amount of female gamers is increasing and in 2014, 47% of gamers in the US were women and this has risen from 2012 in which it was 42%. I believe the game industry needs to take more notice of this because currently, there are not enough female protagonists for women to relate to and it is even quite rare to be able to play as a female character. I also discovered that the older generation are playing more and more games and currently, 29% of gamers are over the age of 50. Here are some very interesting statistics I found about the average UK gamer: the average age is 35, most are male and play for almost three hours a day, they have fights with their partner over their gaming hobby twice a week and 15% say they have broken up with their partner over the amount of time spent gaming.

In conclusion, the game industry is clearly a massive success which will continue to grow and develop, especially with a wider variety of audiences showing an interest in different games. It is incredible to see how it has grown since 1971 regarding both technology and the game concepts and the statistics I have found out are both informative and shocking.