As a whole videogames should be recession proof.

That doesn't mean however that said money won't shift.

In otherwords hurting sony etc.

After all if you need more escapism... you need more games.

It may even hurt all new consoles as people decide to buy cheaper used games.

I think a recession can do both really. I think with a responsible person, they'll choose paying bills over buying games... and then there are the irresponsible people like me who would buy the latest greatest new release instead of buying dinner.

Yeah, nothing like taking out your anger on stock losses by killing people in an online match of COD4 in my book.

Books, Videogames, Television, Movies and Music are (generally) pretty recession proof because people need entertainment and these are relatively inexpensive forms of entertainment. For $2500 per year the average household can (easily) cover all of there expenses from these forms of entertainment, whereas an individual can burn through this money in a couple months if they go out alot, and a family can spend that much in one week on a vacation.

Well PS3 sales are up YOY at the same price

so imho....the industry IS recession proof

Videogames are entertainment, and crisis is good for those industries, it's well known. For example here in France, there's never been as many people in the theaters than during World War 2, and all kinds of entertainment saw big increases in sales during the war.

While I agree that a bad economy is good for the entertainment industry, WWII is kind of a bad example because theatres were also the only widely used form of visual news too.  Theatres all across the world played war footage on the big screen before television became the visual medium... so theatres stayed pretty packed.  Not to say that people didn't use it as a diversion as well, it just wasn't the primary reason.

A better example would have been the great depression ...

In a lot of ways the 1930s were considered the golden age for movies even though a large portion of the world couldn't find a job and was worried if they were going to eat tomorow.

Right, now that is a good example.  So were the miserable economic 80s, which of course cemented the video game industry as the entertainment medium of choice for the under 18 crowd... and of course it only has become a bigger part of our lives every year since.

People when hit by recession see theur purchasing power decrease, therefore instead of going to the cinema or something as often, they ll stay indoors and play consoles so i think yes the gaming industry is very resistive to economic recession but if its a recession caused by the gaming market in the 1st place ie in the early 80's ob itll crumble

The entertainment value for stay @ home people during bad times is true. Still, the vg biz is not in the clear. Factor 5, Midway, Cheyenne Mountain, etc, etc are examples of this...