Kliuless? Gaming Industry Insights #52
Hi, my name is Kenny Liu, and each week I compile a gaming industry insights newsletter that I publish broadly. Opinions are mine.
See more or subscribe at: https://tinyletter.com/kliuless
Beachheads and Obstacles
- Stratechery: Beachheads and Obstacles
- "What Amazon and Facebook do have in common — and perhaps this is why both seem to look back at their very successful smartphone eras with regret — is that Apple and Google are their biggest obstacles to success, and it’s because of their smartphone platforms
- Amazon to its great credit — and perhaps because the company did not have a smartphone to rely on — found a beachhead in the home, the one place where your phone may not be with you. Now it is trying to not only saturate the home but also extend beyond it, both through on-body accessories and also an expanding number of deals with automakers
- Facebook, meanwhile, is searching for a beachhead of its own in virtual reality. That, the company believes, will give it the track to augmented reality, and by extension, usefulness in the real world
- Amazon’s challenge is Google: Android phones are already everywhere, and Google is catching up in the home more quickly and more effectively than Amazon is pushing outside of it. Google also has a much stronger position when it comes to the sort of Internet services that provide the rough grist of intelligence of virtual assistants: emails, calendars, and maps
- Facebook, meanwhile, is ultimately challenging Apple: augmented reality is going to start at the high end with an integrated solution, and Apple has considerably more experience building physical products for the real world, and a major lead in chip design and miniaturization, not to mention consumer trust. Moreover, while there is obviously technical overlap when it comes to creating virtual reality and augmented reality headsets, the product experience is fundamentally distinct"
Revenue Strategy
- Free-to-play PUBG arrives in Europe next week
- Rocket League is binning loot boxes in exchange for 'blueprints'
- PlayStation Now cuts price in half, adds time limited "marquee games"
- Counter-Strike: GO lets players in France reveal loot box contents ahead of purchase
- Fortnite U.S. July revenues down 52% year-over-year
Design
- Quantic Foundry: What motivates gamers?
- Riot launches free game design curriculum called URF Academy Online
- How Untitled Goose Game adapted Debussy for its dynamic soundtrack
- Opinion: Difficulty is about trust and communication, not ‘hard’ vs. ‘easy’
Cross-Platform / Multi-Platform
- PUBG adds crossplay for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One
- Valve shares tips for designing touch screen controls for PC games
Mobile
- Call of Duty: Mobile debuts as free-to-play game on Android and iOS
- Snapchat’s latest mobile game is Subway Surfers Airtime from Sybo Games
- How PUBG MOBILE’s Lower Specs Make for a Titanic Total Addressable Market
- On average, it costs $35.42 to get a mobile gamer to make first in-app purchase
- AppsFlyer Performance Index: report card on performance of mobile media sources
XR: AR / MR / VR
- Verizon acquires Jaunt XR’s software and technology
- Minecraft Earth "couldn't have been made two years ago"
Tech / Entertainment
- Logitech acquires streaming software maker Streamlabs for $89mm
- Snapchat Highlights Its New and Returning Snap Originals
- Related: Snapchat extends video ads to 3 minutes, adds new features, Goal-Based Bidding
- New Yorker: How TikTok Holds Our Attention
- Related: TikTok has censorship guidelines even outside China
- Dating app maker Match sued by FTC for fraud
- Sandvine on global internet traffic by application
Overtime
- New Yorker: Four Years in Startups
- Which are the most commonly used game engines?
- Ubisoft announces free coding game Rabbids Coding
- Tencent acquires minority stake in Conan Exiles developer, Funcom
- New MMO studio from CCP and Remedy vets will use cloud gaming
- How Sid Meier Almost Made Civilization a Real-Time Strategy Game
- Bloomberg: White House Weighs Limits on U.S. Portfolio Flows Into China
See more or subscribe at: https://tinyletter.com/kliuless
LinkedIn: @kliuless