Gamers are buying and playing less. That is a great thang.

Tl;DR (since most gamers are not the most literate people):

• Sales are down 11% but are still above pre-pandemic levels
• Not only are gamers buying less hardware and software but are spending less time on their consoles

This is a great. The only way to get the attention of greedy amoral corporations is to hit them in the pocketbook. Nothing captures their full attention span more effectively than declining revenue. This will have less effect on Microsoft since their gaming division is a nice to have but a much bigger effect on Sony since gaming is vital to their overall bottom line.

The only way to effect meaningful change in the industry is for gamers to buy and play less. Will it stick? Will gamers expand their pathetic lives beyond pushing plastic buttons to make something move on a computer screen? We will see.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/the-video-game-industry-has-a-covid-hangover-114457600.html

Agree this is great finally people are voting with their wallet. There's never been a time where the gaming industry has been this greedy. I know it will never happen but I would love a crash it's been a long time coming.

I personally have been going through all of the games I picked up on sale over the last couple of years finally. I have my go to mainstay games but I've more than a few in my library I haven't touched yet. Also so far there isn't anything new or upcoming that's really peaked my interest without a steep discount. The prices of a lot of dlcs and expansions are also more than I'm willing to pay right now.

Great, now we can stop wasting our lives

You'd think all those smart finance people would have seen the trend caused by COVID and been like "Yo, we better put an asterisk here and extrapolate for where we were going, because this isn't going to last forever" but now they their profits spiked that is their new normal and that is what they are expecting moving forward.

It's like, if you grew 5% each year on average for the last ten years, but then COVID hit and you grew 15% for two years, maybe you should have thought it'd crash and plan for it.

I'm very worried that once people stop purchasing and playing as many games they are going to crack down with IP control and promote more DLC, lootboxes, etc.

I wouldn't say buy less games in general, I would say:

• buy more small-scale developer games and indie games.
• don't buy DLC, lootboxes, and vanity stuff.
• stop playing "free to play"
• don't buy every iteration of a franchise, i.e. maybe skip COD this year.

Vote/influence with your wallets, folks.

I dont think this has anything to do with "gamers voting with their wallet"... you're giving gamers way to much credit... they have been abused by greed for years now and continued to support their practices, I dont see them having a change of heart all of a sudden.

I think gamers are spending less because of three factors: inflation, a bloated market and gaming services like gamepass. All three connected. Inflation and prices rising made many people go after the cheaper option: gamepasses like PS+, GP, etc. No need to buy games if a subscription lets them play them for way cheaper. Also the fact the market is being flooded with games from left and right the average person cant keep up with so many game releases so gamepasses are the better option. Just my 2 cents on the matter

You are right actually and I admit I'm mostly wrong there's only a few gamers that actually vote with their wallets. There's more corporate fanboys that will buy anything that these companies will throw at them.

Recession impending.

The fact of the matter is gaming can become an expensive past time, and when I can play a multiplayer game for free without the added cost of LIVE I'm going to. Microsoft Rewards has been the MVP for me the last few months, helping me save up some cash for in-game purchases I don't really need but can benefit from now and then.

Microsoft Rewards is a decent program. Answer some trivia, surf the web, etc..., and before you know it you have funds.

Gaming-wise it felt like a slow year up until the past few weeks.

Why is it good that gamers aren't buying more games?

I've bought about as many games as I always have which isn't that many. I never went for lootboxes, microtransactions or any of that stuff.

All I play are single player games with the exception of Duke Nukem Forever, Overwatch and Starcraft. When they started charging you to play online after the PS3 I stopped playing consoles online.

I do spend less time gaming now then I did when I was younger. But I have bought more in the past and now just wait for a sale and avoid season passes and DLC.

This only means that now that people are not stuck at home due to covid they'll spend the little money they have elsewhere.