GCAP 2010: Keynote - Gaming shifts and challenges

Mike Bantick
Thursday, 14 October 2010 14:10

Opinion and Analysis

Game Connect Asia Pacific 2010 has kicked off with a keynote from Eedar CEO Greg Short espousing the positive future for a local video game industry that was starting to believe its reputation as being recession resistant was beginning to waver.

In the sunny climes of South East Queensland's Gold Coast Game Connect Asia Pacific 2010 has opened up for two days of local video-game developers coming together to exchange views on Australia's biggest entertainment industry.

New Game Developers Association of Australia (GDAA) CEO, Antony Reed kicked proceedings off lamenting 2009 as a step backward for the industry, but with a bright eye turned towards 2010.  

Former Olympian and Commonwealth Games gold medallist, and now Mayor of the Gold Coast region welcomed delegates to the conference, and in somewhat of a bewildered way, was amazed at the numbers surrounding the video-game industry, particularly given the Gold Coasts close affiliation with the film industry.

Greg Short CEO and founder of Eedar, a company that aggregates and analyses all manner of data related to the video-game industry, was on hand to give the conference opening keynote.

Short began with some amazing facts about the industry.  The last five years revenue return for the Madden NFL franchise would have earned enough to buy 10 million tickets to the AFL Grand Final, enough to fill the Melbourne Cricket Ground for the next 105 finals.

Similarly, revenue from the first 48 hours on sale would have been enough to pay for the Sydney harbour tunnel construction project: AU$554 million.  The Video Game business is a big business.

With the Australian dollar nudging parity with the US, Short was quick to point out how consumers have a case to argue with game publishers, with games costing twice as much at retail as those in the States.

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