Supply and Demand, Ethics and Profit
In my last blog about the history of gaming, I had briefly touched on how video games adapt so quickly to a changing market using a combination of technological and ideological innovations to appeal to as many people as possible. However, while we can look at video games from the perspective of being changed by the demands of a changing market, it has not gone unnoticed how many video games, particularly ones by indie developers, have set the stage for new demands to evolve. In my last blog, I also very briefly mentioned Minecraft. To me, this is a perfect example of how video games, particularly indie ones, can deviate from a current trend and build something new in a way that creates an enormous demand for new games of its type. Though the game released in 2009, the hype surrounding the game exploded around 3–4 years later. If you look at an app store or game listings, there is no shortage of games that attempted (with mixed results) to emulate the stylistic and gameplay features that made it so popular, primarily among young boys. I do not intend to make Minecraft the focus of this conversation, but I do wish to demonstrate that video games have more autonomy for change than one may think.
While initially this idea of video games driving their own market may be a good thing, this also opens the doors for some sleazy practices. Joshua Brustein and Eben Novy-Williams have exposed and explained very serious gambling practices coming from video games in their article, “Virtual Weapons Are Turning Teen Gamers Into Serious Gamblers.” “For CS:GO, the introduction of skins [decorative guns] led to a thriving gambling market. People buy skins for cash, then use the skins to place online bets on pro CS:GO matches. Because there’s a liquid market to convert each gun or knife back into cash, laying a bet in skins is essentially the same as betting with real money” (Brustein and Novy-Williams, p. 5). According to the article, $2.3 billion was wagered in bets for the esports tournament of 2015, Valve raking in $567 million from the game alone, disregarding the money they make from skins betting, a practice they have done nothing to condone. This isn’t the first time Valve has indulged in shady practices: multiple times poorly made AAA titles have been highly graded and pushed to the front page of Steam by the developers paying Valve off, meanwhile indie games are left in the dust. Efforts to label this behavior as gambling through the law have been entirely unsuccessful. The point here is that video games are able to drive the market through specific behaviors that are beneficial to the game makers. Another example is The Sims, who have recently opted to have less and less included in the base game in order to get customers to buy the numerous expansion packs at a whopping $20-$30 each.
Advertisement is a method that video game companies use to work with the market to encourage a specific demographic; one in which the producer believes would make up the largest degree of customers and thus the most continued success of the game. In class, the panel of presenters showed us early Atari advertisements that were meant to appeal to parents, at that time the largest demographic because of buying gifts for their children. As time has gone on, the market has broadened to include adults and, more recently, women. According to the Pew Research Center, women now make up 50% of gamers, and black and Hispanic people identify themselves as gamers almost twice as often as white people do. However, gaming advertisements seem to have chosen to stay comfortable by appealing to their original fanbase: young white men. The research article entitled “What Does a Gamer Look Like? Video Games, Advertising, and Diversity” by Shira Jes, Nathaniel Evans and Joyya Baines outlines the issue with many advertisements, particularly on TV: the type of marketing that is taking place does not represent the actual demographics of the people playing these games, thus perpetuating the myth. The research showed that most mothers in these ads, if they are represented, are usually distracting or disapproving forces, and many girlfriends are sexualized. Minorities and women were found to be present in many, but not in “gaming” roles. While the Nintendo Wii advertisements were shown to be more inclusive, I would suggest this is because the Wii was publicized as the “family friendly” console. In addition, the vast majority of main characters within a game were white men. This presents an issue: if marketers do not know who the gaming demographic is, only their target audience, ultimately they will fail to get the distribution to be as widespread as it could be. This shows they are setting a trend that is customary, appealing to our cultural perceptions of what a gamer is, instead of stepping into the “vast unknown” that, in my opinion, would only boost sales.
Oftentimes the quest for profit can backfire. It can backfire from a moral and economic standpoint depending on the demographic they target and the type of marketing they choose. However, I would argue that game developers and marketers are ultimately in charge of the changing tides of supply and demand. While they can choose to appeal to the current market, I believe that since video games are so reactive, they can set the stage for what the world of products and consumers looks like. This can be for better or worse; while Minecraft has allowed thousands of players to explore the depths of their creativity, skins betting on CS:GO has encouraged illegal behavior and addiction in young men, particularly young men who have the poor impulse control often attributed to youth. There is an endless amount of ways, though, to set the stage to the advantage of both producers and consumers. Whether producers choose to do solely what is advantageous to them or be mindful of the ethics of consumerism remains to be seen, but I believe the consumer is getting smarter. With increased connectivity comes the increased ability to see though facades, thus enabling a healthier relationship between those who make the games and those who purchase them.
