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US video game sales have record quarter as consumers stay at home

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Re: US video game sales have record quarter as consumers stay at home

#111

Post by runevault »

ls612 wrote: post #86
ArtWomb wrote: post #3

I'd argue it's not just lockdown. This has been an epic release year: Animal Crossing, Half Life Alyx, Doom Eternal, Gears Tactics, Valorent, Sea of Thieves. And on and on. Paper Mario: Origami King trailer looks like so much fun there is no reason to leave the house this summer ;)

And the second half of the year is stacked too with CP2077, Valhalla, Godfall, and a Hollow Knight sequel at least. And there’s going to be more big titles announced at the E3 substitute events in the next month or so. And the next gen consoles will launch in the fall.

Since you mentioned Hollow Knight: Silksong, it's also worth keeping an eye on Axiom Verge 2, as AV was another excellent roguelite (HK was better but AV was still very good to great)

Re: US video game sales have record quarter as consumers stay at home

#112

Post by ekianjo »

ArtWomb wrote: post #3

I'd argue it's not just lockdown. This has been an epic release year: Animal Crossing, Half Life Alyx, Doom Eternal, Gears Tactics, Valorent, Sea of Thieves. And on and on. Paper Mario: Origami King trailer looks like so much fun there is no reason to leave the house this summer ;)

No ffvii remake in your list?

Re: US video game sales have record quarter as consumers stay at home

#113

Post by astura »

oarabbus_ wrote: post #91
astura wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Additionally pretty much all of my friends have been super hyped for a few other recent releases: Streets of Rage 4 and FFVII Remake. One friend even mentioned he hasn't been nearly this excited about video games since childhood. There's a few new releases I'd like to get, but I'm too busy with the games I already have, so I'm holding off. Lockdown has increased video game consumption beyond newer releases, the price…

Streets of Rage 4 got me back into gaming after a couple years away from it. It's still not SOR2, but one of the best sequels ever.

I don't play beat-em-ups, but I heard good things about the River City Ransom sequel/spin-off River City Girls that came out a few months back.

Re: US video game sales have record quarter as consumers stay at home

#114

Post by city41 »

vkou wrote: post #105
duxup wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's funny it took them this long to add something like that. Most companies when they introduce a platform do try to push it with some of their own high profile content. Valve not so much until recently.

The whole reason Steam exists is because Valve pushed it with high-profile content, over a decade ago - initially Half-Life multiplayer (To a ton of community backlash), followed by Half-Life 2, as Steam exclusives. It's only been the past several years that Valve has completely stopped making games, and started working on other things.

I would guess it took quite a shift for the Valve of today to make Alyx. I barely even think of them as a game dev anymore.

Re: US video game sales have record quarter as consumers stay at home

#115

Post by pgt »

ArtWomb wrote: post #3

I'd argue it's not just lockdown. This has been an epic release year: Animal Crossing, Half Life Alyx, Doom Eternal, Gears Tactics, Valorent, Sea of Thieves. And on and on. Paper Mario: Origami King trailer looks like so much fun there is no reason to leave the house this summer ;)

No, it's the lockdown.

I haven't played games in 10 years. But during lockdown here in South Africa, the only way to stay in touch with my friends 20km away is to have a fat chat on Discord and play some games.

Re: US video game sales have record quarter as consumers stay at home

#116

Post by s_y_n_t_a_x »

ArtWomb wrote: post #3

I'd argue it's not just lockdown. This has been an epic release year: Animal Crossing, Half Life Alyx, Doom Eternal, Gears Tactics, Valorent, Sea of Thieves. And on and on. Paper Mario: Origami King trailer looks like so much fun there is no reason to leave the house this summer ;)

As a Gears fan, Gears Tactics is a money grab.

Gears 5 was CoDified, still happily playing Gears 4 though.

MCC for PC just came out. Can't believe I can play Halo 2 again!

Re: US video game sales have record quarter as consumers stay at home

#117

Post by karatestomp »

komali2 wrote: post #106
karatestomp wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Poster must be a PC gamer who doesn't use the Microsoft store (like most PC users who'd identify as gamers, probably?). It hit Steam this year, was on XBone and MS Store in 2018. Personally, I'd forgotten there was a MS store until I looked this up just now.

And lord was it annoying as fuck to get off Microsoft store. It was something like a 50gb download and it could get version desync, the only way to get around was (in my experience) was to completely wipe it and reinstall. But completely wiping was ALSO super hard to do, because it was saved in like... $APPdata or some weird hidden folder. All this on top of the fact that my c:/ drive is tiny and I want to install my…

I'm glad I've avoided it so far. I already have three stores I use and that's at least one too many, but Epic won't stop showering me with free games (I've bought one and have a library of... 30ish? Maybe more?) so I keep them around for now.

Re: US video game sales have record quarter as consumers stay at home

#118

Post by kosei »

ArtWomb wrote: post #3

I'd argue it's not just lockdown. This has been an epic release year: Animal Crossing, Half Life Alyx, Doom Eternal, Gears Tactics, Valorent, Sea of Thieves. And on and on. Paper Mario: Origami King trailer looks like so much fun there is no reason to leave the house this summer ;)

As someone who works in the video games industry, I can guarantee it is the lockdown. Stay at home orders align really closely with significant lifts in new players, increased hours played, and many other core metrics across the industry. And many games have seen significant lifts in their existing live service performance (not just new games).

Re: US video game sales have record quarter as consumers stay at home

#119

Post by puranjay »

ArtWomb wrote: post #3

I'd argue it's not just lockdown. This has been an epic release year: Animal Crossing, Half Life Alyx, Doom Eternal, Gears Tactics, Valorent, Sea of Thieves. And on and on. Paper Mario: Origami King trailer looks like so much fun there is no reason to leave the house this summer ;)

I don't think it's just that. People are just buying more. I run a smallish hobby site and monetize it with Amazon affiliate links. I've had Black Friday-tier sales all of April and May.

I suspect Amazon's numbers for this quarter are going to surprise a lot of people

Re: US video game sales have record quarter as consumers stay at home

#120

Post by gbear605 »

reaperducer wrote: post #100
ArtWomb wrote: post #3

I'd argue it's not just lockdown. This has been an epic release year: Animal Crossing, Half Life Alyx, Doom Eternal, Gears Tactics, Valorent, Sea of Thieves. And on and on. Paper Mario: Origami King trailer looks like so much fun there is no reason to leave the house this summer ;)

I'd argue it's not just lockdown I saw a news article a couple of weeks ago that in my city, Xboxes, Switches and PlayStations are very hard to come by. I don't think people are dropping hundreds of dollars mid-cycle to buy new machines for the games. To a much lesser extent, I have done this, too. My local used video game store started doing free home delivery, and I picked up a half-dozen Atari 2600 carts that were…

I know that Switches were sold out even before the lockdowns thanks to Animal Crossing.
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