In the past, most game publishers would release a game and then go on to make another one in the future. Thanks to online gaming, this has changed because games have a longer lifespan thanks to DLC and bigger player populations. Ubisoft has now revealed in a new report the economic benefits of delivering more “live services”.
A user on Reset Era shared a report that Ubisoft released looking at the way the company has profited off live services in gaming. It seems as if the game publisher is earning way more money by expanding the lifespan of one particular game than just releasing many different video games over time.
To cut a long story short, this report suggests selling expansions and other online content to players earns them more money than just releasing a one and done single player game experience. This is why we’ve seen lots of updates to games like Rainbow Six Siege, Ghost Recon Wildlands and The Division just to name a few. The constant updates keeps the player population high and dedicated fans will still pay money for new content.
A graph even showed that “live services” in games helps them earn more money in its second year. Before, most revenue earned by a game would have ended in the first year of its release. Now video games can still be profitable many years after they have come out.
This is one of the reasons why EA cancelled Visceral Games’ Star Wars title because EA wanted to profit from it for more than just one year. It’s controversial although, you cannot deny this is how game publishers earn money these days. Activision said it earned lots of revenue in microtransactions alone last year!
