14 DAY TRIAL // Gamers and videogame industry analysts might be a bit depressed when looking at the rather disappointing NPD Group numbers for May and at the slump in sales that the worldwide economic downturn has sparked all over the world but it seems that videogames are still important and are getting even more so as time goes by.
PricewaterhouseCoopers has released a report saying that between now and 2013, videogames will be growing, as a medium, faster than any other media that has been tracked by the firm.
The revenue derived from sales of videogames, not counting hardware platforms, in North America is set to grow by 5.8% during each year until 2013, when it is expected to hit no less than 21.6 billion dollars.
The firm is saying that the revenue generated by PC gaming will be on the decline while that drawn from consoles, portable devices and downloadable games is set to rise. It's not clear whether the downloadable segment only takes into account gaming consoles or whether the PC market is also taken into consideration.
During the same period, the company has announced that it expects a growth of revenue by 5.5% from TV subscription and of only 3.3% for the revenue that studios are getting from the film industry. All other media tracked by PricewaterhouseCoopers, like books, magazines, newspaper publishing and radio, are expected to see steep declines in the same period.
One of the main reasons of the shift in importance is that people who have grown up with videogames as an important element in their lives will be entering adulthood and spending more on videogames. The report also mentions that in-game advertisements are set to grow significantly from 886 million dollars estimated for this year to no less than 1.4 billion in 2010.