Young Americans Are Spending a Whole Lot Less On Video Games This Year (gamespot.com) 66
An anonymous reader quotes a report from GameSpot: Perhaps responding to economic uncertainty and narrowing job prospects, young people in the United States are significantly cutting back on spending on video games compared to this time last year. While 18- to 24-year-olds aren't buying as much across a range of different categories, losses are concentrated in games. New data published by market research firm Circana and reported by The Wall Street Journal suggests that young adults spent nearly 25% less on video game products in a four-week span in April than in the same timeframe last year. Other categories also dramatic drops: Accessories (down 18%), technology (down 14%), and furniture (down 12%).
All categories combined, the 18-24 age group spent around 13% less than last year. This decrease is not reflected among older cohorts, whose spending has been mostly stable year-over-year. The WSJ report suggests that the economic context could be driving young adults to pull back; a tighter labor market, increased economic uncertainty, and student-loan payments restarting all may be contributing to an environment hostile to the spending habits of 18- to 24-year-olds in particular.
All categories combined, the 18-24 age group spent around 13% less than last year. This decrease is not reflected among older cohorts, whose spending has been mostly stable year-over-year. The WSJ report suggests that the economic context could be driving young adults to pull back; a tighter labor market, increased economic uncertainty, and student-loan payments restarting all may be contributing to an environment hostile to the spending habits of 18- to 24-year-olds in particular.
Money (Score:5, Insightful)
1) Games are expensive
2) Games are digital, so you can no longer play it then sell it on Craigslist.
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Games are expensive and digital so you can't club together with your friends and share one copy between you.
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A trend I've noticed, especially with the PS5:
1) Games are expensive
2) Games are digital, so you can no longer play it then sell it on Craigslist.
You may be missing something hidden in the data. The question was one of total expenditure in the field of video games. In many cases the cost of a title is neither relevant or significant. Lots of studios don't make significant money selling games, they make money selling bullshit afterwards with microtransactions. There's also the question of the type of game (TFA actually notes that the actual expenditure on games varies greatly with game type).
To give you one example: My own. I have spent far less year
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I bought GTA V on release day for the 360, for $60. I also bought it for the PS4, for another $60. Then I bought it again for the PS5, this time it was like $40. So all in I've spent around $160 on this game. And I've played it for hours over the past decade plus. Same for GTA SA, GTA 4, multiple Zelda and Mario games. They're all $60 or so, maybe more in the future. But I get hundreds of hours of entertainment from that, at a minimum.
There's very few publishers that I will buy a game on release day from, b
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what an absolute joke. you are so incredibly off-base here.
In what way? Take a game and divide it by hours of entertainment it provides and then compare it other activities in a cost per hour basis. You'll find gaming is cheaper than literally anything you need to go somewhere to do, and cheaper than most other media forms you have at home. Certainly several orders of magnitude cheaper than buying a music CD or a bluray, and also cheaper than paying a streaming service.
The absolute joke here is your ability to do math.
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And an AC can't form a coherent argument, nothing new there. Maybe what you wrote wasn't worth reading?
Re: Money (Score:1)
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Try shopping on Steam, games are so cheap there I end up buying more than I can play.
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Games are most certainly too expensive,
Games represent one of the cheapest forms of entertainment money can buy.
and you are a fuckwit
Why? Got a citation to back that up? Or do you use that as a term of endearment for everyone who says something right which you think is wrong?
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i'd say this is a factor. people still plays but has become more selective. there is a huge offer of good games to have a good time, many viable online with friends and some really cheap, so there is less motivation to pay the sometimes exorbitant launch day prices for the newest titles. also, new aaa titles have had a consistent trend of stagnating innovation and being a hit and miss, with some spectacular flops, so if money is any consideration it makes much sense not to rush to get the newest shiny at an
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I've been gaming since the early 80's and games are so much cheaper now than they used to be. I remember spending $39.95-59.95 in the late 80's/early 90's, which would be over $100 now adjusted for inflation. And these weren't huge releases, just run-of-the-mill games.
Re: Money (Score:2)
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I paid $72 USD for Super Double Dragon in 1992. The most I ever paid for a game before or since.
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in the late 80s some playstation titles could be around that mark, a few could even double that, specially cartridges.
then again, that was media or hardware which had to be designed, manufactured, packaged, stockpiled and distributed, which means extra investment and risk, and could be resold so would retain value. gamers today pay the equivalent or more for a mere download at virtually zero cost that can't be transfered and whose continued availability may not even be guaranteed, not to mention some inane
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yes they might be a bit off.
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Dude, my claim isn't over some unknowable information lost to time; you can look at old game catalogues and gaming magazines and they have the prices right there.
Here's SSI's 1984 catalogue:
https://archive.org/details/Re... [archive.org]
Look at the price list for EA and all its companies from 1987:
https://archive.org/details/Re... [archive.org]
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not just expensive, egregiously so, this is exactly what classism and economic discrimination looks like
these aren't games, these are engines of exploitation
Re: Money (Score:2)
Just like how computers are the tool of the bourgeoisie.
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when the masses can't ever be owners, then they will be only tenants, welcome to corporatocracy
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A trend I've noticed, especially with the PS5:
1) Games are expensive
2) Games are digital, so you can no longer play it then sell it on Craigslist.
I'm a member of the glorious PCGMR.
1. Games have never been so cheap. I mean I picked up Stalker2, Schedule 1 and Aviassembly off the steam sales for £50. Might go back for Space Marine 2.
2. Games have been digital for ages. The fact the PC doesn't depend on a healthy used game market to sell new games is one of the reasons they're cheaper.
It's just that consoles are becoming expensive, or more accurately, console users are now figuring out they're expensive. Consoles have always been expensiv
Attention based economy (Score:1)
The amount of "Pretty good" stuff which is free or insignificant in price to even the homeless is so large that you could literally never get through all of it even in any one media, such as books, games, or movies. The barrier to entry for creating almost any form of content? If you can read this post you have passed it. So why spend money? Polish? Have we not yet learned to HATE polish?
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My mom says there's a lot of white people in Poland.
2nd this (Score:5, Insightful)
I have a small collection of gaming devices and I've been collecting games for them for years.
I simply stopped buying games at some point because now the collection of actual good games is so fucking vast I'll never get through it.
Do i pay $60 for something that might suck or not be finished when I can simply open up a beloved classic that I never got around to?
Anything newer than ps3 is gonna have nice graphics and if people like the game a lot chances are I can make it almost photorealistic. Just playing new content from the skyrim modding community alone could keep a person pretty busy.
To make a case in perfect 20/20 hindsight: It's 2008 and Haze is coming out for $60 and the ads look sick as hell. Do you tell your past self to buy Haze or quake 2, postal 2, and fallout 1&2 bundle for the same amount of money?
People have had a long time to learn that lesson. I typically don't even watch tv programs until they'e at least 2 or 3 seasons in or better yet, completely over so I don't get lost'd and GoT'd.
TV series deleted from streaming platforms (Score:2)
I typically don't even watch tv programs until they'e at least 2 or 3 seasons in or better yet, completely over so I don't get lost'd and GoT'd.
Unless the studio wants a tax break and the series gets Willow'd [wikipedia.org].
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>when I can simply open up a beloved classic that I never got around to?
How do you know it's a beloved classic for you if you've never got around to it? You could think it sucks instead of being a "beloved classic".
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I'm no behaviorist, but "I saw some of it and loved what I saw." seems like a common human experience to me.
Kind of sounds like the exact thing advertising is designed to manipulate you into feeling.
Or... (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe there are just less games worth paying for.
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I do not think that is true! The gaming industry is cranking games good. And the indies are being as cutting edge as ever.
There are more good games out there than I will have time to play in my life.
I don't think game quality is the problem here!
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Maybe. But it's also likely that we're no longer in COVID. People are getting out and doing things other than sitting at home. That behavior certainly wasn't instant and instead took a couple years to change.
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Maybe there are just less games worth paying for.
I think soon, games will be one of the things Americans, young or otherwise can only dream about having the money for.
I mean dreaming between avoiding the ICE patrols.
Uh, the 18-24 demo (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Uh, the 18-24 demo (Score:5, Insightful)
Have you actually met any young person lately?
They use smartphones and they do not know what "bittorrent" is.
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Have you actually met any young person lately?
Well, I just got done working at a university, and I think there were a couple...
I was constantly stepping over $300 e-scooters that were left in the middle of the sidewalk because the batteries died and the owners 'didn't feel like dealing' (besides, if they decide they want another, they'll order one from amazon using the credit card their parents pay off). Use whatever other example that pleases you
The 18-24 demo tend to spend money in dumb, frivolous, impulsive ways, and isn't an accurate example of s
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makes more sense. The older staff could be more IT-technically skilled than younger people
Re: Uh, the 18-24 demo (Score:1)
Duh - waiting for the Switch 2 (Score:4, Insightful)
They were saving up their limited funds for a Switch 2. Note that older gamers with a more reliable income aren't represented. Also - a four week period doesn't represent a trend. Come back when you have 12 months of data and we'll talk.
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That could be it. I pretty much haven't bought a game since christmass because I was waiting for the switch2. Now I am busy so I haven't bought one yet. (Are they still in shortage?)
Though I am not in the 18-24 demo.
economic policy impact (Score:2)
Trump's tariff shenanigans put a bunch of construction costs in flux, stalled projects, and earned me a reduction in pay and furloughs. Gee golly gosh yes I didn't spend money on video games and a bunch of other shit this year.
If my employment ever levels out I'll look into getting a Switch 2, but if the price goes up due to more 'economic policies' I won't be getting that, either. Oh and it's not like there's an American Switch 2 I can move on to.
Amazing Insight (Score:3)
Elastic demand is, in fact, elastic.
I'm not a gamer, but... (Score:2)
...from what I've read, today's games suck
They have little originality, but plenty of ways to spend money
They require subscriptions or continuous connection to a server
Some are even loaded with political statements
Game developers do whatever they can to make older games unplayable
The enshittification continues
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Not Surprised (Score:1)
Good or bad thing (Score:1)
No shit (Score:2)
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The sheer arrogance (Score:2)
All of their monitoring and information gathering can only show them what it likely... and yet here they are, claiming lack of sales as actual losses. Pure insanity. Why the fuck do we let these guys tell us what to do?