Today the ESA announced that Rick Perry, Governor of Texas, will be giving the keynote speech at this year’s E3 expo. Some of you might be asking “why him?” Well Governor Perry has done a lot for the gaming industry. Perry sees gaming as an opportunity to help the Texas economy grow, and has goes so far as to support the industry by providing financial incentives to game development companies.
To be honest I am not too familiar with Governor Perry’s stances on other issues; I live in Ohio. From what I have herd, though, he sounds like he has the right idea about videogames and the role they will play in the future of entertainment.
Read: Texas Governor Rick Perry keynoting E3.
A poll finds that 60% of consumers believe the US government should directly regulate the sale of “violent” videogames. Fifty-one percent want the government to regulate game content, according to a poll by New York based PR firm Hill & Knowlton.
In other news, 51% of Americans have never heard of the First Amendment.
The Entertainment Software Association released a statement criticizing both the findings, and the timing of the statement during the Christmas shopping season.
Hill & Knowlton’s decision to release these findings was both unprofessional and unethical and its timing is questionable. We understand that parents have concerns about mature content getting into the hands of children and we are working to help make sure that does not happen. Continued…
Alex Yue contributed this news item.
The Entertainment Software Association has released a report discussing the growth of the videogame industry—and things are looking good.
According to the ESA, videogames are a major factor in the United States economy. This is easy to see when you consider that the games industry employs 24,000 people in the United States. The average salary of these employees was $92,300 in 2006. The demand for videogames has been growing at an annual rate of 17% a year.
Videogame sales for this year are predicted to top $18 billion, andaccording to the ESA’s chief executive officer, Michael Gallagher, “These companies and their colleagues across the nation are making entertainment software one of the fastest growing industries in the United States.”
What does this mean for the average gamer? Well, one can only assume that videogames will become more widely accepted and garner more attention from the mainstream media. It also means that college campuses can expect a jump in the number of people majoring in computer science and graphic design.
Read: New Report Shows Just How Fast Video Game Industry Is Growing
The videogames industry grew four times as much as the overall U.S. economy, according to a report by the Entertainment Software Association.
The American video game industry grew 17% from 2003 to 2006, while the general growth of the economy was 4%. Retail sales of games totaled $7.0 billion in 2005, and sales of games for both PCs and consoles grew from 74.1 million units in 1996 to over 250 million units in 2006. Continued…
Granted, nobody genuinely believed that E for All would be able to fill the shoes of the event it was designed to replace, the late lamented Electronic Entertainment Expo.
But surely IDG World Expo, the organizers of E for All, could have done better than this. E3 filled both main halls of the Los Angeles Convention Center plus Kentia Hall downstairs. E for All fills two-thirds of one hall. E3 had hundreds of booths, from every major publisher and console manufacturer, all the big chip makers, and from gaming companies around the world. E for All has dozens of booths from mostly domestic companies. EA, Intel and Nintendo are here, but there’s not much else.
Furthermore, E for All is expensive for the average gamer. Sure, I’m a member of the press, so I get in for free and receive a complimentary lunch of egg salad on a croissant. Joe Gamer has to cough up $50 for a Thur/Fri ticket, $75 for a Sat/Sun ticket, or $90 for a four-day (Jesus, what would you do here for four days?). Compare this with the comparably-sized (but better attended) DigitalLife: $12 to get in (free if you’re Jessica Alba). Continued…
