Looks like Gamaustra is now taking a stab at it:
Some of my favorite quotes:
“That is, you have companies like Electronic Arts, Activision, and Ubisoft sinking immense resources into games like Battlefield 3, Mass Effect 3, Call of Duty: Black Ops II, Skylanders, and Assassin’s Creed III and chasing the high-margin consumers.”
Good. I hope the gaming industry dies as it keeps fleeing to the higher-end customers. I haven’t and won’t buy a single game they listed.
Another gem:
“These are the consumers willing to buy two or three new releases in a relatively short period, not the ones who, I suspect, were previously buying Just Dance or Brain Training.”
What does he mean “previously” buying? I just checked, and Just Dance 4 is the top selling game on Amazon right now across all platforms. Even the Kinect version is selling well. In fact, a new Zumba Fitness game on Wii is selling well too. Hooray for stereotypes about “casual” gamers not buying games. Female gamers are still buying games, as we can see.
Anyway, the article goes on to talk about Christensen (I know you’ll enjoy that part), but check out the comments. Somebody called out the author by noting what you said – disruption deals with profitability, and free to play doesn’t fit that mold.
Christensen has talked about disruption and the game industry, but he did so from the context of the Wii disrupting console gaming. They want to cite Christensen. They want to say disruption is hitting the game industry. But they NEVER mention the Wii.
Another famous industry disruption would be the NES hitting the computer games industry. Ask Trip Hawkins. I think he is still pissed off over that.
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