Changing Video Games Forever
My friend and colleague Morty sent me an email this morning with a link to a NY Times piece on video games. The article talks about Electronic Arts (EA) and their IP around the Battlefield franchise.
“I’ve always envied the movie industry when they put a film out in the cinema, then they go to retail with a different business model and then to pay television and then free TV,” he said. “They have the same content reaching different audiences with different models, and we could never figure out a way to do that. Now with higher broadband penetration, we can use the technology to reach a broader audience.”
This is a step in the right direction for EA because they recognize they have to make a few moves to dethrone Activision, especially after they merged with Blizzard (World of Warcraft, etc). I’ve spoken a lot about in-game ads, virtual item sales, subscriptions, and other incremental ways to generate revenue and the game publishers who are going to win in the future are the ones who are able to successfully transition their business model.
A few players who are going to help the game publishers benefit from this change in traditional business model are PlaySpan, LiveGamer, GameWager, and IGA Worldwide. With broadband penetration, the world is the oyster for new opportunities to monetize games.