Move over, Hollywood. Step aside, frozen pizza industry. Video games are the big earner on the block, a forecast report from technology advisory firm Gartner Inc suggests. Gartner says video games will pull in $74 billion this year alone and are projected to rake in a staggering $115 billion a year by 2015, thanks in large part to mobile gaming.
“As the popularity of smartphones and tablets continues to expand, gaming will remain a key component in the use of these devices,” said principal research analyst Tuong Nguyen. “Mobile games are the most downloaded application category across most application stores. For this reason, mobile gaming will continue to thrive as more consumers expand their use of new and innovative portable connected devices.” Because of this, Gartner surmises that 2011 will see stronger sales of software than hardware (with online revenue coming in third), a pretty ballsy call considering Sony will launch its PlayStation Vita later this year and that in 2011, we saw the launch of the iPad 2, Nintendo’s 3DS, some Android tablets and the Xperia Play.
If you’d like to flip through the full report yourself (and have some extra money to do so), then give Gartner’s site a gander via the source link below.
Report: Game industry worth $74 billion in 2011 originally appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 05 Jul 2011 23:05:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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