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Could a video game crash ever happen again?
Topic Started: Apr 21 2012, 07:01 PM (1,605 Views)
Poptart Monkey113
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I'm asking a simple question. Could it be possible for the video game market to ever crash again, just like in 1983? How could it crash or even would it?
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Justin.A
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I do not think it is a question of if but rather when.
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RatchetAndClank
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Justin.A
Apr 21 2012, 07:28 PM
I do not think it is a question of if but rather when.
12/21/2012
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TheHBF
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It is possible. What caused it in 1984 is that market was too over saturated with video games. Although its not the case at the present yet, you can see that we have different consoles with pretty much the same games, there's not a lot of exclusives. If anything, the crash will be the result of consumers having enough of not getting 100% from the developers. Too many DLCs, sequels, the used games market becoming limited and all that.
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Poptart Monkey113
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TheHBF
Apr 21 2012, 08:00 PM
It is possible. What caused it in 1984 is that market was too over saturated with video games. Although its not the case at the present yet, you can see that we have different consoles with pretty much the same games, there's not a lot of exclusives. If anything, the crash will be the result of consumers having enough of not getting 100% from the developers. Too many DLCs, sequels, the used games market becoming limited and all that.
Yeah, I understand where your coming from. Just too many games and not enough people buying them. Also with the rise of the ipad and the $1 games, this may crash the console industry. Whats the point of paying $60 on a new game when you can get fun out of a dollar game? I think we won't ever have a crash again nowadays, there's just too many gamers. But that doesn't leave that possibility out there of a crash.
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TheHBF
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Poptart Monkey113
Apr 21 2012, 08:29 PM
TheHBF
Apr 21 2012, 08:00 PM
It is possible. What caused it in 1984 is that market was too over saturated with video games. Although its not the case at the present yet, you can see that we have different consoles with pretty much the same games, there's not a lot of exclusives. If anything, the crash will be the result of consumers having enough of not getting 100% from the developers. Too many DLCs, sequels, the used games market becoming limited and all that.
Yeah, I understand where your coming from. Just too many games and not enough people buying them. Also with the rise of the ipad and the $1 games, this may crash the console industry. Whats the point of paying $60 on a new game when you can get fun out of a dollar game? I think we won't ever have a crash again nowadays, there's just too many gamers. But that doesn't leave that possibility out there of a crash.
That too. This community is underestimating the power of the $1 tablet games. These tablet companies have proved that their machine is capable of hosting great quality games. The app ecosystem als has another advantage, and that is their prices will always be cheaper. In the app ecosystem, they don't need to produce discs and pay manufacturers and all that. All they need to do is upload their creation on the app store and they will be there forever. More people are embracing this. I for example have found myself playing with iOS games simply because I just don't find spending $60 on a game ideal anymore. I'm a believer that the app economy will eventually take over the gaming industry.
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Kobrakai
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Personally, I don't think we'll see another crash. The crash of '83 happened when both companies and consumers didn't know how to approach the technology. With the level of importance marketing has on gaming now, I think companies such as Sony and Microsoft could predict a crash years in advance, then adapt their plans to accommodate. If DLC wasn't working out in favour of the company, it wouldn't exist. So long as consumers buy, DLC will be released...when it starts costing the company, plans will change.

Saying that, I don't have a degree in marketing, so I could be proved wrong haha.
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kuroi
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I think the momentum for cheap app games is still moving them forward, but it will slow eventually. Unless you have a killer app like Angry Birds, it's hard to operate at a $.99 rate because apple takes about %30 of your sales right off the top. I think as we move forward more games will start to normalize around the $3-$5 range, and those that wander to the cheaper end of the spectrum will stay in the $1-$3 range with micro transactions. The strange reason of why these cheap apps/games are doing such a great job is because they don't have these large budgets like the big guys have. They have smaller teams with fewer costs and they can pump out titles more regularly. The big guys have so much more overhead due to the massive teams they support, advertising, more substance, etc. They're both successful in their own right, but it seems they pull off proportionate numbers.

Honestly, though, I can see app store sales decreasing in the next few years if companies like Rovio don't start innovating. There's only so far you can milk a franchise without completely changing it up.

That being said, I do want there to be another video game crash, but for entirely selfish reasons. I'm tired of the direction big companies are taking games. Terrible endings, DLC endings, stop gap DLC endings to promote a sequel, on disc DLC, day 1 DLC, online pass. All of these things aren't good (in my opinion) for business and eventually people will realize this and they will stop buying games. Hopefully the companies will realize what a mistakes they're making and prevent a crash. If not, maybe the entire industry can die and rise from the ashes once again.
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thejobloshow
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Crashes come after a massive speculative bubble and that's just not what's happening with the video games industry at the moment since it's been pretty much on the slow decline since the GFC.

I don't think there'll be a massive crash in this sector; I just think things will be stagnant. More risk averse titles, less experimentation, cash grabs - you're seeing this with the massive changes in Capcom and the announcement of New Super Bros. 2 by Nintendo.

People are playing it safe.
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browland1
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The markets are cyclical, so I can see a decline at some point, but I think it will also depend on how the game companies approach the next generation of consoles. If all this talk of locking out used games and introducing prohibitive technology comes to fruition, then I see a decline happening, but I don't think we'll see a complete market crash like we saw in 1983. That happened at a time when gaming was not popular and market saturation killed it off, which is a contrast to today where the gaming industry pulls more money than Hollywood. So no, I don't see it happening to that degree, but I can see popularity waning if the game companies continue to focus on money-grubbing as opposed to giving gamers a good and affordable experienc.e
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lol_pc
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Short answer, no I don't.

The industry has become so large, a very large percentage of the human population plays video games, for most people it might not be the $60 experience, for most it might be cell phone games, for others it might be a small indie game on Steam and for some it might just be MMOs. There's video games for every budget, developers tailoring to each of those markets, you didn't have that back then, all you had was arcades and home consoles. So I couldn't imagine a total crash of the industry like in '83, some parts of the industry might suffer a crash, but many parts of the industry are almost seperate entities, the retail developers aren't exactly in the same market as mobile developers.

The gaming industry is much more complicated than it was in those days, so to reĆ­terate, I don't see a similar crash occuring any time soon.
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norborb
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I am doubtful of a full on crash, but I do see a "crunch". Right now gaming is so popular with more people than just the dedicated enthusiasts, we are really the minority now. However I think for many of these new gamers the hype and fad of gaming to them will eventually blow over and they will lose interest. This will leave a huge vacuum of revenue source the industry was depending on. The long time enthusiasts will stick around(at least I plan to) and a complete crash will be avoided, but things will change
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DaftCody
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If the used game market is eliminated and the prices for new games stay the same I believe we would have a very major problem.
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The Fat Detective
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I think so, but it won't be the same as the last crash.

If the current platform companies do decide to make their consoles to refuse to play pre owned games I think that could bring us dangerously close to a video game crash. Especially if they switch to digital distribrution at the same time and hike the prices up. Consumers might lose patience with them or not bother upgrading their consoles anymore. This would be particularly bad because of these built in features. If Sony and MS pump money into this technology and people don't go for it, it could be big trouble for the industry. All the major retailers will lose profits and could disappear and if they do survive they are not going to want to do business with them again or at the very least lose confidence in them. Plus if gamers just stick with last gen Sony/MS will find themselves with massive losses and little revenue as most of the purchases will be pre owned games.

It could be a bad situation if not timed right and if not accepted by the consumers. Which is why it probably will not happen in the near future. Well not that rapidly anyway.
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JohntheGameCollector
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I think it could happen. I think there would be an decrease in sales for Microsoft if they really went through with making their new console unable to play used games because a lot of gamers are 15 (like me) and who can really afford to pay 60 dollars for every game, not me thats for sure. But this is an interesting topic to talk about. I doubt a full on crash would actually happen, but I loved to see a total meltdown of those stupid facebook games. :D
Edited by JohntheGameCollector, May 8 2012, 05:08 AM.
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OMEGAlomania
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I don't see an industry wide crash happening, but I do see individual companies having trouble. For example (like mentioned above) I will NOT be buying a next gen Sony or Microsoft console if they can't play used/borrowed games. And I already refuse to buy games for full price that developers/publishers intend to milk to death with DLC. Hopefully the average game will stand up and refuse to purchase things like this before it is far too late. (And I kinda hope EA and Activision go under, but thats just me.)
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Vidmusc
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Not really. BUT I believe it will only happen in certain a genre. That genre being the First-Person Shooter genre. The market is becoming over-saturated with Call of Duty, Battlefield, Halo, and all of their knock-offs, something that needs to be changed soon. But other than that no I really don't think that that the gaming market will crash once again.
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