Microsoft, Activision Blizzard and the future of gaming
The shift towards subscriptions and streaming complicates a giant merger
The highest-grossing film of the year so far, “Top Gun: Maverick”, took $1bn in its first month. The biggest game, “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II”, took the same amount in just ten days. Spurred on by the pandemic, which saw video-game spending increase by nearly a quarter in 2020, the games industry will be worth more than $170bn this year in worldwide revenues, about five times as much as the global box office.
This article appeared in the Business section of the print edition under the headline “Game on or game over?”
From the December 3rd 2022 edition
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