Economic Evaluation of Business Models in Video Gaming Industry from Publisher Perspective

摘要

Against the background of rising development costs for video games, it is becoming increasingly important for game developers and publishers to assess, which business model (a) best fits the newly developed video game and (b) promises the highest financial returns. In this respect, the advantages and disadvantages of the various business models of video games must also be examined and evaluated within the framework of game development. Here, the business models (a) free to play, (b) pay to play, and (c) buy to play are explained and compared from the publisher perspective. The comparison was made on the basis of a self-developed evaluation system. In this system, free to play business model achieves the best ranking value, although this model does not guarantee fixed financial returns for the game developers. In this respect, it should be examined whether and to what extent this business model can assert itself on the video game market.