Revenue from massively multiplayer online (MMO) and multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) games will accelerate to $43 billion by 2021, accounting for over a third of global games industry revenue.
This is according to a new report from Juniper Research, Future Games Market: MMO & MOBA 2017-2021, which found MMO games such as World of Warcraft, and MOBA games such as DoTA 2 will account for almost 25% of the digital games industry this year, pushed by the free-to-play (F2P) model.
While MMO games continue to dominate the PC games industry, MOBA games will become a crucial driver for the e-sports market, which will reach $3.5 billion by 2021, notes the report.
Research author Lauren Foye says: "MOBA games have evolved from user-made campaigns to a staple of the e-sports industry, with considerable investment by games developers and publishers. Investment is driven by the fact that, in some cases, e-sports viewership surpasses many popular sports."
The research further found console and mobile devices offer great scope for future growth, with these platforms having been underutilised until now, particularly in Western markets.
"Opportunity across these platforms would be distinct for MMO and MOBA games, with emerging technology and business model innovation acting to increase traction. The accessibility of virtual reality (VR) on these platforms was cited as a key future driver for 'open-world' style MMO games. With MOBA less suited to VR, F2P and 'Let's Play' games would be key for publishers in replicating Asian success in occidental markets," notes Juniper.
Earlier this year, SA became one of the 15 countries to receive free-to-play HTML5 games that can be played and shared instantly with BBM users across iOS and Android devices. The introduction followed a partnership between Creative Media Works and Softgames, a producer and distributor of HTML5 instant play, online games to power BBM Games, with a collection of over 400 competitive, casual and free-to-play HTML5 games.
According to Johann Von Backstr"om, from the Digital Gaming League Management Company, e-sports is a growing industry in SA, with local e-sports companies on the rise. "Gaming has seen phenomenal growth over the past few years as players become ever more engaged. We already have more than four million gamers in SA. By professionalising the sport and developing new players, we can look forward to seeing more local talent compete on the same footing as international teams."
Mlondi Mashinini, co-founder of Global Assembly Marketing eSports, an e-sports consultancy and digital brand agency, says e-sports has, until 2016, largely been an underground movement in SA.
Having said that, he notes, PwC benchmarks the South African gaming industry at over R2.6 billion, estimating it will reach R3.6 billion by 2019.
"While millions of gamers across the country buy games every month and fill up local servers every night competing against their online adversaries, for the most part, they have remained a market segment which is largely unidentified nor targeted by South African business," Mashinini concludes.
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