We continue our coverage of the impact of Coronavirus on digital marketing, tech, software development, and different business industries. According to the authoritative sources and trusted statistics people all across the world showed record time spent on the online videogames and on the game marketplace apps like Steam.
Video streaming has also seen a bump, up 12 percent during peak usage hours.
We will showcase Top 3 online multiplayer games to demonstrate confidence in this industry. And it will also help you stay informed as to what games have occupied the minds of gamers for the last years, what to expect from gaming industry in the future, how quarantine have boosted game sales and game development, and why virtual entertainment distributed digitally will dominate online marketplace in the times to come after the quarantine.
The following 3 games best represent the stage of online video game industry as of beginning of 2020. Minecraft, Half Life 3, and Fortnite were the most well covered and played games of 2019.
Minecraft
Minecraft is not just an ordinary game. Games as such come once in a decade. It has millions if players from every corner of the planet. Millions of dedicated fans, whole communities, festivals, franchises have come out of this majestic video game.
The essence of Minecraft’s popularity is open world with no borders that can be explored, conquered, and redesigned by every player. In Minecraft universe the number of various multiple scenarios that may occur is only limited by player’s imagination. It is not surprising that more, not less, new users tried Minecraft in the last 3 months. That, of course, because of the overall #stay at home quarantine lifestyle of ours. Still, playing Minecraft might very well be among the best ways to spend time during the pandemic.
Minecraft is not a new game. But it experiences a great surge in popularity. It may be because geek culture and gaming community become more and more popular. Mainstream culture have embraced video games as part of modern mass culture.
The popularity of Minecraft demonstrates the magic attraction users all around the world experience towards well crafted digital experience that may distract players from quarantine reality. The lesson is to serve users with exquisite experience and the illusion of alternate reality with its own meaning. Minecraft is exactly such video game.
Half Life 3 – Alyx
Unlike Fortnite and Minecraft, HL3 Alyx is not an online multiplayer game. This is a third installment in the long-build cult trilogy Half Life. It is a sci-fi shooter built on Source video engine. HL 1 and 2 were released 2 decades ago. They have become revolutionary games at the time and made the Valve (its creator) a prominent industry figure. Half Life made exclusively in VR continues the story where it has ended 20 years in the previous parts of the series.
Aimed specifically at the owners of private VR headsets, HL3 pioneers a future of high-end gaming, using the latest high tech software and hardware achievements. If you own a pair of VR headsets, there’s much pleasure to get from playing HL3. There’s also much business wisdom to learn if you’re into VR business opportunities.
Fortnite
Fortnite gained impressive prominence in 2019. Annual tournaments in this massive MMORPG occur every summer since 2017. Like Minecraft, it grants players absolute freedom in devising their characters and exploring the world. Online multiplayers around the worlds counts hundreds thousands of active users.
Fortnite is an industry in itself now that generates millions of dollars in revenues. Players, advertisers, video streamers, game producers, developers, and designers have a product that does not experience any decline in tiimes of Coronavirus. On the contrary, as gamers have more free time, Fortnite and other multiplayer games show steady increase in user growth. I myself started to play more while sitting at home because it is a great way to spend time. Try it yourself. And believe it when I say that gaming like streaming and delivery industries will only improve in the seond half of 2020.
GAME could help stop coronavirus
The University of Washington has created a Coronavirus-inspired protein folding game that lets players contribute to research into creating antiviral medicines that may help see off COVID-19.
Conclusion
So, staying at home may be more pleasant with online multiplayer games. Coronavirus pandemic and the following quarantine, as you can see, positively affect online entertainment industries because they provide interesting and meaningful time to spend in the long weekend hours at your desk.
Many games are fun to play, educative to explore, and even allow for socializing. In our next article we will talk about Discord and Twitch, chat and video streaming platforms designed because of gamers and for gamers. They are also the types of software products critically needed in time of our increased usage of internet.
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