The Video Game Industry

When was it started? 

The video games industry started as back as the early 1950's when academics began designing simple games, and artificial intelligence programs as part of their computer science research. Most video games didn't reach mainstream popularity until 70s/80s. As of 2015, there are eight generations of video game consoles, with the latest generation including Nintendo's "Wii U" , Microsoft's "Xbox One" , and Sony's "PlayStation 4". 

 By Who? Where? 

Ralph Baer was the creator of the multibillion-dollar gaming industry and majority of every virtual developer/publisher points to him as the moment the industry was born. Baer first had the idea for a gaming system centered around the home TV in 1951, but the idea lacked support from his bosses at Sanders. 15 years later, the idea was still with him, and by Oct. 20, 1966, he had created a working prototype, called The Brown Box. In 1972, Sanders partnered with Magnavox to bring that Brown Box to people's homes under the name Odyssey. The Odyssey paved the way for companies like Atari, Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft.

The Oddyssey

How big is it? How many people does it employ?

The video game industry of today is one of the fastest-growing fields in the entertainment industry. It employs more than 146,000 people,and according to the Entertainment Software Association, and Gartner there is a prediction that the market will top $111 billion by 2015. 

Narratives, Representations & Audience

Within video games there are many different narratives

 “Story in a game is like story in a porn movie: it’s expected to be there, but it’s not that important.” - John Carmack, who is the founder of ID Software and creator of Doom and Quake. The idea of narrative within video games makes it much more enticing and realistic for those who play the game, it gives a sense of escapism as they are satisfied with the idea of completing a 'quest'. For most video games the narrative is a protagonist who is the player themselves/hero who ends up taking on a quest which defeats the villains. This narrative is followed by video games such as The Last of Us, GTA, Assassins Creed

Women in GTA

In video games much like the rest of the media industry women (unless it is a video game targeted at women) the men are seen as much more dominant and have the leading role which is shown in The Last of Us which has one male player who is leading the female. In games like GTA women are often sexualized and seen as objects to lust after rather than having important roles. 

Gamers often are divided into two categories: core and casual. A core gamer typically plays 20 hours per week and has purchased at least four games in the past six months. Casual gamers play half as often, core gamers make up over 25% of the gaming industry. In the UK the rate of women playing videogames has increased to 52% from the 49% it previously was, this is showing in a change of audience as typically most video games are targeted and male players for example FIFA containing no female players whatsoever may now start to include females. The average gamer is 31 years old, and 71 percent are age 18 or older. Nearly half (48 percent) of gamers are female and women over the age of 18 represent a significantly greater portion of the game-playing population (36 percent) than boys age 18 or younger (17 percent)

What were the key milestones for the industry?

In 2013, the industry sold 160 million games and generated more than $21 billion in revenue, another key milestone is the creation of 3D Graphics