It's bigger than ever but it has also stagnated/declined from COVID and in a capitalist world, stagnation is not acceptable, decline definitely isn't acceptable either, so while gaming is "bigger" than say 2013, it has stagnated so investors are less inclined to invest into a market which isn't growing, plus a huge chunk of people are playing the same blackhole games.

In this world, endless growth is the only thing which is acceptable.

“Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.”

Metrics like that and yet losses like those.

Anyways, gl hf to all new games trying to attract younger demos (not that there are that many anymore).

[image or embed]

— Mat Piscatella (@matpiscatella.bsky.social) 1 May 2025 at 13:57

Lol, charging more for a console selling like it's on it's last legs is the biggest joke I've ever seen.

Xbox is increasing prices globally. This is due to Trump's tariffs and the global macroeconomic environment. Here's why 🧵:

1. Xbox consoles are manufactured in China, and subject to a 145% tariff when entering the US. Some Xbox games are manufactured in Mexico.

2. The global price increases are to soften the actual price increase in the US, which is Xbox's largest market, as well as due to currency fluctuations.

3. Packaged games are increasing from $70 to $80 for this same reason (and partially because of Mexico, although physical is minimal sales wise)

4. I need to stress what you're seeing here is just the beginning. Sony will be impacted by the same tariffs, and we've already seen them raise prices elsewhere to offset the impact. Many others too.

5. Nintendo did not raise prices as it's manufacturing in Vietnam, but could if tariffs increase.

Yes, this will lead to internal re-evaluations for companies which will ultimately lead to increased prices, game delays, game cancellations, layoffs and more.

Even if the tariffs are reversed today, this is already taking place.

Daniel Ahmad — Bluesky

Shout out to all the sales planners, demand planners, finance analysts, retail merchandisers and ops folks across the games industry.

I wish you all the best with your crazy math, multitab scenario workbooks, dart boards, crystal balls and whatever the hell else you'll have to break out this year.

— Mat Piscatella (@matpiscatella.bsky.social) 1 May 2025 at 15:50

Hollow Knight: Silksong will be playable in September 2025...

...at an Australian museum

➡️ www.ign.com/articles/hol...

[image or embed]

— Shinobi602 (@shinobi602.bsky.social) 1 May 2025 at 15:13

Yeah, I'm ignoring Exta from now on

Yeah I guess I mean more the gaming industry that I knew is imploding in favor of this:

Necessary Watching.

Hey.

This is an outstanding synopsis of what's going on.

Alanah absolutely nails the issues, drivers and what's next.

Must watch, imo.

[image or embed]

— Mat Piscatella (@matpiscatella.bsky.social) 30 April 2025 at 21:23

Parris: "Alanah nails it and more folks need to start paying attention, the gaming industry is not doing great" — Bluesky

She has been speaking to a lot of investors, industry experts, etc.

• Drop after COVID, a lot of investors projected continued growth.
• Growth flattened, missed projections, shareholders don't get returns.
• People pull out when profits aren't profitable enough.
• Stock market loves live service games due to potential revenue.
• Stagnation is seen as a tremendous failure.
• Games are declining now in a way not proportional with surrounding industries.
• Market is considered "mature" according to stock brokers - Little room for growth.
• Less gamers % wise today than before, average weekly playtime is up, it's the casuals who have been lost.
• Competition now includes TikTok, videogames aren't just competing with videogames.
• Too much entertainment to consume, only so many hours in the day.
• TiKTok is up by 35m hours, that's only one app.
• World spends 12bn hours on social media apps in one day.
• Games industry is losing the fight against social media apps like TikTok.
• Netflix, TikTok, Xbox, PlayStation, etc. All competing with each other.
• Funding is down 77% for the videogame industry.
• Money being funnelled into stuff like AI instead, clients being told to pull money out of gaming and instead into AI.
• Indies have also significantly hurt by this, there is no more funding for indie games either, if they are receiving money it's often exploitative deals. Many indie developers are considering getting bank loans over publishing deals because publishers are shitty right now.
• People funding videogames don't care about videogames and will hop to the next industry.
• Investors only care about extreme growth.
• Gaming is significantly underperforming on the stock market and only got lucky during COVID.
• Gaming has ran out of fancy gimmicks.
• Not enough new gamers.
• Alanah thinks Xbox's "This is an Xbox" campaign makes a ton of sense, it's about the stock market. They're trying to get more people playing videogames, it's in line with the current reality of the state of the games industry.
• Blackhole game monopolies eating the industry up.

I do recommend watching it though rather than just reading my bullet points, Lol.

We’re making some exciting updates to the Epic Games Store to provide an even better deal for developers, starting in June. 

0% Store Fee For First $1,000,000 in Revenue Per App Per Year
Starting in June 2025, for any Epic Games Store payments we process, developers will pay a 0% revenue share on their first $1,000,000 in revenue per app per year, and then our regular 88%/12% revenue share when they earn more than that.

Epic Games Store Webshops
In June 2025, we are releasing a new feature enabling developers to launch their own webshops hosted by the Epic Games Store. These webshops can offer players out-of-app purchases, as a more cost-effective alternative to in-app purchases, where Apple, Google, and others charge exorbitant fees. With new legal rulings in place, developers will be able to send players from games to make digital purchases from webshops on any platform that allows it, including iOS in the European Union and United States.

As an extra bonus, players spending in Epic Webshops will also accrue 5% Epic Rewards on all their purchases.

This is all my nieces and nephews, Lol. Combined with what Alanah said about TikTok.

My nieces and nephews all have Xbox, Switch, etc. But spend like 60% of their time scrolling on TikTok for hours (I hate TikTok, Lmao), but it is obviously extremely addictive, of course that massively hurts the videogame industry, back in my day I didn't have something like TikTok so instead spent hours playing different videogames but it's absolutely correct that TikTok is just as much competition to videogames today than videogames are to each other, along with Netflix and stuff.

Then when they finally get their heads out of TikTok, what do they play? The blackhole games, Lmao. They wouldn't know half the games I play, they largely spend most of their time in Fortnite or Minecraft. This is the challenge the industry has nowadays, I mean, people like me and you, of course we play a variety of videogames but we're a dying breed and the new generation is more interested in their mobile phones, TikTok and if they are into console hardware a lot of them are still only playing 1-2 videogames a year, which tend to be the blackhole games.

My niece even prefers to play Roblox on their phone than their Xbox.

Epic preparing to lose even more billions of $ with Tencent's backing.

But in all seriousness, Epic does have pretty damn generous terms for developers, it's just that nobody wants to use their store, Lol.

But waving the store fee for the first $1m in revenue, I don't see why you wouldn't port to the EGS under those terms, Lol.