Turns out when you understand the ins and outs of two or three different architectures, you tend to make better games.
they don't get paid enough for that, market has become bigger and bigger but the working conditions and wages itself become even more shit over time. they could easily do it if companies would be willing to spend the money, but they don't so you're left with the B or even C-tier devs, naïve college kids and activists.
besides, slop sells anyway, it's not like "gamers" and especially console gamers have any standards, so who cares. otherwise they would never get away with cinematic sub-24fps@900p...
Generations are dead, only because they were killed. There was always a 'need' to upgrade, either from getting the new tech or playing exclusive games on new hardware. That no longer exists so the need is gone.
there was a need as long there was an obvious technical progression. the only advancement the current consoles have is faster storage (which pc had for years and previously was intentionally gimped on playstation, which makes that "feature" kinda ironic) and "4k" which is anything but. graphically fidelity has stagnated if not outright regressed. even nvidia has to sell gimmick features and upscaling to PC players now that pure power has hit high diminishing returns.
Phones were split in the report and are often seperated out. I disagree with this point though because Facebook, Youtube and Iphone all launched in 2004. By 2010, adding your twitter and facebook to your COD and Xbox live account was a thing that a lot of people did. Smart phones were just as popular in 2010 than they are now.
I don't know anyone who games on phones, I know plenty who gamble, the rest just scroll tiktok or coom over instagram thots. I do remember candy crush taking the world by storm.
the wii came out in 2006, the first iphone in 2007. after that the market had to establish itself and the games had to be developed, angry birds came out in 2009, candy crush in 2012.
wikipedia didn't have the numbers, according to
this rovio made $306 million in revenue from angry birds in 2012 (not sure if that includes merch and licensing, which in 2011 was 30%).
for comparison, candry crush made around $633,000 per day ($230 million per year) (
source). wikipedia says that's US apple store alone, but either I'm blind or they mixed the numbers up.
either way that's half a billion dollars, for 2 games, over 10 years ago.
I don't know who plays on phones either, but unless they fake the numbers (unlikely since lot of the companies are public, the SCC would have a field day) people do spend a mindboggling amount of money on phones which is all considered "gaming" these days.
that account linking shit was mainly so you could shill "your" brand to your friends via social media, there's a whole aspect to "gamify" everything, like suits thinking making your friends and family jealous with your high/gamerscore is gonna lead to more "engagement" and other shit, or at least increases brand awareness. same reason ps4 has the silly "share" button so you can instantly send your cool #playstationmoments to everyone who doesn't give a shit.
Hardware sells the software, except the industry is desperately trying to kill hardware. They're finding out that fucking around is going to cost them.
not anymore, or at least they think they can work around it. hardware always has the issue that it was often a loss leader and has a high cost the customer has to be willing to spend. everybody has phones (cue diablo dev), so it's easy to get them to download some games to play on the shitter or the commute. for consoles (or in general) it's one of the reasons they try streaming so hard, because it nullifies the hurdle of the initial purchase. basically everyone with a tv and internet can now become a customer, not just the people willing to spend several hundred bucks on hardware first. control and ownership is another aspect that gives companies a stiffy, but people figured that out fast enough already.
The report is specifically for US. I don't doubt your assessment is correct, but looking at a purely American POV, console gaming is fucked. The picture is even more dire in Europe.
to a degree, that's why xbox is scrambling to turn it into a service and sony sees the numbers aren't there in the future but doesn't know how to catch up (they don't have the catalogue to put on pc, nor can they monetize it like psn via walled garden).
there will always be a place for consoles due to simplicity, easy of access etc. (unless gaben tears them a new one with steam machines), but the golden days are over. there's also the corona bubble way too many retards in charge thought it's gonna go on forever, MBAs and it's ilk like to jerk themselves raw over projections (fun fact, the cost of trooning out is estimated to be 150k, then they assumed 1.4 million troons, you can do that math, that's the number they're salivating over. this has nothing to do with consoles, but it shows the mindset of those people).
anyway console market is shifting, companies feel the pinch. but that's mainly a console thing, pc and mobile are gonna be fine (without a solar flare or something nuking us back to the middle ages or the depression making it prohibitive, but people need their entertainment).
