The video game industry is on its way to a real boom. According to PwC, this industry is expected to exceed $300 billion (excluding esports) by 2026. The sector, which has practically doubled its turnover since 2017, is driven by mobile games, the so-called social and casual games. Analysts predict that social and mobile together will generate a whopping $242.7 billion of the $321.1 billion in total video game revenue by 2026.
Netflix has also realized the potential of video games and has decided to provide a catalog of video games on its platform, in order to increase the loyalty of its subscribers.
This initiative has been highly appreciated by users of the streaming platform. Recently, Netflix signed an agreement with Take Two Interactive Software (a US video game producer and distributor) and launched GTA Trilogy Definitive Edition, which is the most downloaded game on Google Play and Apple App Store. At the moment, since the launch of the video game section of the Netflix subscription, the company has reached 86 titles in its catalog.
This strategy should be seen in an expansion perspective that aims to capture the attention of gamers in a context that is rapidly changing.
Fusion of video games and streaming: the results of a German study
A recent study conducted in Germany by the consulting firm Simon-Kucher, on the integration of gaming offerings into video streaming platforms, has shown that this combination is seen as a winner. The study was aimed at a sample of individuals aged 18 and over.
43% of users between the ages of 18 and 39 said they were interested in merging streaming and subscription, while one in four users over the age of 40 said they were interested in this type of offer.
The study also showed how the aforementioned combination can be an incentive to sign up to the platform. In fact, 30% of 18- to 30-year-olds and 16% of users over 40 show a greater predisposition to take out a subscription if the streaming platform they have chosen to watch incorporates a gaming option. Even younger users would also pay a small premium to benefit from video games on video streaming platforms.
However, there is one part of the study that deserves attention, which is what we might call “quality”. In fact, 46% of users between 18 and 39 years old and 34% of those over 40 fear that the integration of gaming into video streaming platforms will end up having negative repercussions on the quality of the films and TV series offered. In addition, the study shows that, while considering the union between video games and streaming very interesting, the public tends to look first and foremost at which platform that offer is located, rather than at the offer itself.
Streaming and gambling: the rise of Twitch, controversy and regularization
Online gambling, and in particular the online casino industry, has also understood the potential of streaming. In this case, we are talking about the diffusion, with related controversy, that gambling has had on Twitch. In recent years, there has been a real boom in this sector on the platform.
Recently, Twitch announced that it will “prohibit the streaming of gambling content from sites that are not licensed in the United States or other jurisdictions that provide sufficient consumer protection.” The clampdown became necessary following the controversy generated by the actions of some creators. One of them, Silker, pseudonym of Abraham Mohamed, deceived famous and not-so-famous people in 2022, pocketing over $200,000 to fund his addiction to online betting.
However, the Jackpot Casino section remains one of the most followed on the platform and, for this reason, Twitch has no intention of closing it, but only of regularizing it. According to Twitch Tracker, a site that monitors the platform’s data, to date the Jackpot Casino category is the seventeenth most watched overall with 4.74 million hours and is the eighteenth in terms of number of users (28,400,000).
Twitch has also announced that it will continue to allow streaming from sites that focus on sports betting, fantasy sports, and poker regardless of license status. The decision is bound to cause discussion, but it serves to underline how gambling streaming is a resource that Amazon’s platform does not intend to give up.