NewZoo: Playtime Analysis (Total playtime grew 6% YoY, PlayStation shows remarkable growth while PC & Xbox remain steady)
- Thread starter cormack12
- Start date
SweetTooth
Banned
Impressive growth for Playstation
HerjansEagleFeeder
Member
What are the key takeaways from the key takeaways?
Little Chicken
Banned
Remarkable steadiness 
PauloRoberto
Member
Since Ms wants to focus on Xbox and PC at the same time and neither of them is show growth, MS cannot growth any market, only stall them or, in case of xbox, make it smaller... one can only hope MS start to handle mortgages...
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semiconscious
Member
mo' playas! mo' fun!...
nowhat
Member
Playstation is massive. And growing.
mckmas8808
Mckmaster uses MasterCard to buy Slave drives
Tiago Rodrigues
Member
But i heard people were moving to PC? How are people with Playstation consoles playing more in them? Did Gaf lie to me?
spons
Gold Member
It's Newzoo, a bunch of analysts pulling data out of their asses and presenting them as facts. You can't get this type of market data without literally being the sellers of these products, and Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo, they ain't sharing shit with them.
yurinka
Member
We were told PS was doomed because of Sony PC ports and Sony GaaS titles...
Newzoo and IDC are the two main leading game market analyst firms, who have as source and clients the main platform holders and publishers of the market, who often quote Newzoo and IDC data and graphs in their fiscal reports.
The circles aren't random, they include the numbers that are the main cause of the analysis/recap they make in that slide.
The -10, 1 and 21 with the same height as mentioned in the title of their graph is the percentual YoY change. They have the size they have and are the correct numbers.
As seen in Sony's fiscal reports or in gaming market reports like this one it was fake news. Since they started the recent expansion of their PC business back in 2019/2020, PlayStation's active userbase has been growing, not decreasing.
Bullshit.
Newzoo and IDC are the two main leading game market analyst firms, who have as source and clients the main platform holders and publishers of the market, who often quote Newzoo and IDC data and graphs in their fiscal reports.
In the industry, paid games are normally called "premium games", "paid games" or in this context when they are differentiating them explicitly from F2P (a.k.a. freemium or free to play), "P2P" or "pay to play".
The circles aren't random, they include the numbers that are the main cause of the analysis/recap they make in that slide.
The -10, 1 and 21 with the same height as mentioned in the title of their graph is the percentual YoY change. They have the size they have and are the correct numbers.
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Zacfoldor
Member
Steady is a funny way of saying stagnant.
Boy Newzoo has had some bad news for the PC crowd lately. I'll never forget PC gamers only like older f2p titles while console gamers like slate releases.
Not exactly healthy for the industry PC gamers. Get off the older f2p titles and get with current slate releases like console and games will stop skipping your platforms and delivering dumpster style ports.
Nothing you can do will fix UE though. PC is just gonna have to wait that one out a few years.
Boy Newzoo has had some bad news for the PC crowd lately. I'll never forget PC gamers only like older f2p titles while console gamers like slate releases.
Not exactly healthy for the industry PC gamers. Get off the older f2p titles and get with current slate releases like console and games will stop skipping your platforms and delivering dumpster style ports.
Nothing you can do will fix UE though. PC is just gonna have to wait that one out a few years.
RetroGamingUK
Member
No more growth on Xbox from here on out, it's dead.
spons
Gold Member
That's fine. You can believe them - I don't. I'd like to see where they source all this information from and if they can't or won't provide that, I'm putting them in the dunce corner together with VGChartz.
RetroGamingUK
Member
Not surprising.
Last gen PC benefited from having the addition of having pretty much all the Xbox games (often on day of release). That's where a lot of the growth came from as Xbox declined.
Now it doesn't have that over PlayStation.
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mckmas8808
Mckmaster uses MasterCard to buy Slave drives
And wait until GTA6 drops!
Horseganador
Member
It seems these metrics are of no interest; they don't fit with the narrative that consoles are dying that they want to sell.
Skifi28
Member
Remarkable steadiness
Kerotan
Member
Another boost for playstation will come holiday 2026 when call of duty goes next gen only. Unbelievable this fall ps4/Xbox players will still be able to buy the new cod.
But come 2026 and MW4 the PS5 will be place for console bros to be. There will be a further migration of Xbox codbros to playstation.
But come 2026 and MW4 the PS5 will be place for console bros to be. There will be a further migration of Xbox codbros to playstation.
mckmas8808
Mckmaster uses MasterCard to buy Slave drives
Interesting....didn't know this.
Tiago Rodrigues
Member
Except...Sony themselves have shown us people are indeed playing more on PS consoles. Their MAU is bigger than ever and the time they spend playing is bigger as well. I could swear i've seen that data on their quarter data.
RetroGamingUK
Member
Not to mention GTA6 this year.
LavitzSlambert
Member
Exactly. As always, the most important yet rarely focused on part of these studies is the data set and methodology for each metric used. Is it actually representative of the end users? To get real insights you need to be closer to the source data, which a company like Newzoo will not be able to do without significant inside information and/or spending to get that quality data.
With that said, some of these conclusions and data points seem reliable enough with their explained methodology. Thing is, this can really only back conclusions supported by existing narratives. I don't really see any helpful trend prediction because they are aggregating total hours played in the past. Maybe they sell some projections, but again, doesn't seem like that would be too helpful considering the qualitative aspects of games and the industry.
yurinka
Member
What? Some people say "PS haz no gamez!", talk about as mismanagement and say Hermen has to be fired. Sure, as if stuff like GTA6, Marathon, Yotei, Death Stranding 2 and so on wouldn't going to sell a shit.
Yes, according to Sony's fiscal reports the PS MAU and player spend keeps growing and are the biggest one on PlayStation's history.
Newzoo has clients like Sony, Microsoft, Activision Blizzard, Bandai Namco, Capcom, Ubisoft, Team 17, Paradox, Wargaming, CCP, Nacon, Funcom, Focus, Virtuos, Google, Nvidia, ESL and so on plus the national game publisher/developers associations from countries like USA, UK, Spain and many other ones.
If their methodology and estimates wouldn't be reliable they wouldn't have these clients, some of which even quote the Newzoo's (or IDC's) data and estimates in their yearly reports.
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ChorizoPicozo
Member
i guess they didn't account for the exponential growth of cloud gaming
Maybe as a console but there is hope with the This is an Xbox scheme if they find the right games to grab some untapped markets .
It's a weird market though because you have to get people who don't really care about Consoles to buy a controller & pay for a gaming subscription
I believe games like Just Dance that use your smartphone as a controller will have to be the Trojan Horse.
GTA is big enough that it could make people aware of the fact they don't need a console to play games on their TV but it would have to be a big deal made with Rockstar for something like that to happen.
BennyBlanco
aka IMurRIVAL69
Then explain this? Biggest game of the year so far sold best on PC in the UNITED STATES.
bitbydeath
Member
BennyBlanco
aka IMurRIVAL69
Yeah I emphasized that because it's so unexpected. In other markets like Asia where PC absolutely dominates it was to be expected but not in the US.
bitbydeath
Member
Asia isn't a huge market for gaming aside from Japan and consoles are much bigger in Japan than PC, and then we have the rest of the world too.
BennyBlanco
aka IMurRIVAL69
China is the #1 market, genius. And South Korea is in the top 5 as well, both countries PC dominates.
That doesn't mean PC is growing, simply a shift of a particular game's audience from one platform to another, and/or the same PC players buying more that game. Certainly doesn't point to people leavinģ console as a whole to play on PC.
What does it mean PC dominates? Those countries have people playing the same bunch of.F2P GaaS garbage. That's dominating a particular market segment, but asians are not buying single player games in a ratio close to what they sell to western audiences on PC.
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BennyBlanco
aka IMurRIVAL69
Whoa! Who could've guessed the most popular games on PSN are also f2p GaaS. Consoles are barely a thing in China. Wukong just sold 25M+ mostly in China and the huge majority was PC sales even worldwide. It's retarded to say PC isn't a healthy market as
Zacfoldor
said. But he has said himself that he's salty about Sony PC ports because he can no longer engage in list wars, so I will give him some leeway for his bitter tears.
Ah the "Wukong anomaly". Why can't you name any other game selling gangbusters in Asia on PC? Or is it just a couple of outliers? Publishers can't keep their business afloat depending on the asian market, you know? If it takes a totally Chinese game to be successful in that market then it's going to be very difficult to make money the "traditional way" there. Let's see if other asian or rather Chinese single player games can light up Steam on the back of chinese players
Whoa! Who could've guessed the most popular games on PSN are also f2p GaaS. Consoles are barely a thing in China. Wukong just sold 25M+ mostly in China and the huge majority was PC sales even worldwide. It's retarded to say PC isn't a healthy market as
But he has said himself that he's salty about Sony PC ports because he can no longer engage in list wars, so I will give him some leeway for his bitter tears.
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BennyBlanco
aka IMurRIVAL69
What do you think all those Chinese gamers are doing with those PCs capable of running Wukong which is one of the most demanding games on the market? Playing browser games? MH is also very popular in China. Again, to say PC market isnt healthy is just stupid, and just more salty Sony fanboy nonsense from here.
mckmas8808
Mckmaster uses MasterCard to buy Slave drives
Maybe as a console but there is hope with the This is an Xbox scheme if they find the right games to grab some untapped markets .
It's a weird market though because you have to get people who don't really care about Consoles to buy a controller & pay for a gaming subscription
I believe games like Just Dance that use your smartphone as a controller will have to be the Trojan Horse.
GTA is big enough that it could make people aware of the fact they don't need a console to play games on their TV but it would have to be a big deal made with Rockstar for something like that to happen.
I don't even though $1 Billion would be enough for Rockstar to put GTA6 on GamePass.
Zathalus
Member
Newzoo is claiming playtime on PC went down in 2024 and number of games played on Steam is less than the peaks of Covid.
Wonder what Steam actually stated about 2024? Oh wait, they did clue us in:
steamcommunity.com
"2024 was a year of growth for the Steam platform. In December of 2024, we crossed 39 million peak concurrent users for the very first time (and while we were drafting this post, the platform crossed 40 million). Steam has nearly doubled in peak concurrent users since March of 2020, when online platforms saw big spikes in activity due to Covid-19 quarantine."
"On that note, we also wanted to use this Year In Review to talk about the opportunity for new products. 2024 was the Steam platform's best year ever in terms of customers buying newly released games."
"New Release revenue per year has increased almost exactly 10x since 2014.
In 2024, more than 500 new titles exceeded $250,000 in New Release revenue (up 27% from 2023).
In 2024, more than 200 new titles exceeded $1 million in New Release revenue (up 15% from 2023)."
Wonder what Steam actually stated about 2024? Oh wait, they did clue us in:
Steam :: Steamworks Development :: Steam Year In Review 2024
At the end of every year, our team looks back at the features we shipped and the problems we solved. We summarize that work for the developers and publishers of PC games.
"2024 was a year of growth for the Steam platform. In December of 2024, we crossed 39 million peak concurrent users for the very first time (and while we were drafting this post, the platform crossed 40 million). Steam has nearly doubled in peak concurrent users since March of 2020, when online platforms saw big spikes in activity due to Covid-19 quarantine."
"On that note, we also wanted to use this Year In Review to talk about the opportunity for new products. 2024 was the Steam platform's best year ever in terms of customers buying newly released games."
"New Release revenue per year has increased almost exactly 10x since 2014.
In 2024, more than 500 new titles exceeded $250,000 in New Release revenue (up 27% from 2023).
In 2024, more than 200 new titles exceeded $1 million in New Release revenue (up 15% from 2023)."
PC market is healthy. It just isn't growing. Console market is stagnant as well but just bit better.
Chinese bought Wukong to support their people. I wonder if the government bought most of those copies themselves to create a narrative
. But the users probably bought the game even if they run it like crap.
bitbydeath
Member
They don't buy these types of games though.
You may as well compare the mobile market.
Actually I'm thinking more of them letting you buy GTA6 & play it directly on your TV as long as you have Gamepass.
mayham2199
Member
My guess is steam doesn't mean the same thing as pc gaming. I can turn on my pc and play games without ever opening steam.Newzoo is claiming playtime on PC went down in 2024 and number of games played on Steam is less than the peaks of Covid.
Wonder what Steam actually stated about 2024? Oh wait, they did clue us in:
Steam :: Steamworks Development :: Steam Year In Review 2024
At the end of every year, our team looks back at the features we shipped and the problems we solved. We summarize that work for the developers and publishers of PC games.
"2024 was a year of growth for the Steam platform. In December of 2024, we crossed 39 million peak concurrent users for the very first time (and while we were drafting this post, the platform crossed 40 million). Steam has nearly doubled in peak concurrent users since March of 2020, when online platforms saw big spikes in activity due to Covid-19 quarantine."
"On that note, we also wanted to use this Year In Review to talk about the opportunity for new products. 2024 was the Steam platform's best year ever in terms of customers buying newly released games."
"New Release revenue per year has increased almost exactly 10x since 2014.
In 2024, more than 500 new titles exceeded $250,000 in New Release revenue (up 27% from 2023).
In 2024, more than 200 new titles exceeded $1 million in New Release revenue (up 15% from 2023)."
Zathalus
Member
Sure, but the overwhelming majority of what would be considered premium or new slate releases sell on Steam. Besides they claim number of games played on Steam (not PC as a whole) is down compared to 2020, which contradicts Valve themselves.
Felessan
Member
They for sure don't want to look at slide that shows that number of console players grows faster percentage wise than number of PC players
One example prove nothing
PC AAA games are very concentrated as can be seen in yearly top grossing. It basically 2-3 most sound releases of the year and then sales fall off the cliff
Like typical #10 for an year is less than 1 mil copies
1. Steam is only about 20-25% of PC market, the majority of PC market are off Steam (LoL, Fortnite, Genshin&co, WoW etc)
2. Playtime is a different thing to both number of players and games played.