ioi said:
"Thats revenue...not profit. Platform holders get a sizeable % from that revenue. Apple, Facebook and Google all take their share." Platform holders get 30-40%, much less than retail margins are so this works in favour of mobile games vs retail games in terms of the amount of revenue they actually end up seeing as profit. "Secondly, most mobile game franchises have a very limited lifespan. In 1 or 2 years time people would have moved on from Candy Crush and their publisher might have the same fate as Zynga who are struggling at the moment." Few retail games have a two year lifespan - most have a couple of months of activity then drop away so I don't see how this is any different? League of Legends also makes good money but not as much as Candy Crush which could gross more than $1.5b dollars in 2014 alone (to add to about $800m in 2013). These kinds of numbers are unprecidented. I know the thread has taken a different turn to which it was originally intended but I think for the best. Comparing numbers of downloads / installs / retail purchases becomes hard cross-platform with drastically different price points so at that point the only real way of doing a comparison is via total revenues that each game makes and the fact that a game like Candy Crush is making as much money in a year as GTA V (and far more in profit) is of huge significance for the industry. |
"Platform holders get 30-40%, much less than retail margins are so this works in favour of mobile games vs retail games in terms of the amount of revenue they actually end up seeing as profit."
This only applies to retail games though and you assumed I was speaking about retail games when i wasnt...Some games like LoL, Dota 2, Hearthstone etc. are relatively free from platform costs and have the potential to be bigger than Candy Crush in the long term. Personally i dont see retail games as the main competition here to mobile games but rather popular PC games.
"Few retail games have a two year lifespan - most have a couple of months of activity then drop away so I don't see how this is any different?"
Again the assumption here is that you thought my comment applied specifically to retail it didnt. Looking at games like Dota 2 and LoL and you will see that these games have an ever increasing active player base over VERY long periods. This is very different to Candy Crush and retail :)
"League of Legends also makes good money but not as much as Candy Crush which could gross more than $1.5b dollars in 2014 alone (to add to about $800m in 2013). These kinds of numbers are unprecidented."
Since we both agree that Candy Crush has a limited lifespan..LoL will probably come out on top if we compare the two for lifetime revenue when all is said and done. And I think LoL has a very good track record of sustainability and growth. Same with Dota 2 and I see Hearthstone (this will end up on mobile though, not sure how Blizzard plans to release it) having similar kind of success as well as a few other PC games.
Again my response was about the raw numbers that Kirby used in the OP. And my detailed response was for Outlawauron's comment:
"and yet it makes more than just about every other video game. Quite a business model."
And since we are comparing lifetime sales, I would say thats a very difficult thing to prove and hence my response.
