作者：Brandon Sheffield

Ngmoco总经理Ben Cousins（游戏邦注：之前在EA DICE、Sony和Lionhead任职）向来都不忌言自己对手机领域或免费增值模式的推崇。他是EA免费模式游戏《战地英雄》背后的推动力量，如今则是Ngmoco瑞典工作室AAA 级iOS游戏的主导角色。

Ben Cousins from tuaw.com

在台北GDC大会上，Cousins发表主题演讲，分享他对于游戏行业未来5-10年的5个发展趋势预测。最有趣的是，Cousins还概述为什么他觉得免费增值模式和移动平台未来将取代掌机平台，及如何进行取代。

他表示，“说到移动平台，我所指的是操作系统，而非设备。我觉得这些操作系统将逐步出现在其他类型的设备中，而非仅仅是手机和平板电脑。我觉得未来手机游戏也许不再是移动模式，我们需要重新进行定义。”

趋势1：移动平台取代掌机

他表示，“手机游戏有望取代掌机游戏。我指的是市场份额急剧下滑，毫无挽回余地。”

出现这种情况有两种途径——用户由掌机平台转移至新设备；或者市场扩展至你的覆盖面之外。后一情况的具体范例就是社交游戏领域的出现，其覆盖范围超越传统掌机游戏。日本的两家社交和手机游戏公司Gree和DeNA所创造的收益超越整个掌机软件领域。

他表示，“你的销量出现相对下滑，因为新产品或新产品类型入驻市场，显著扩大市场，以致你的市场份额出现缩水。”Android和iOS平台迅猛发展，他表示，“据调查结果显示，这些设备至少有一半被用作游戏设备。”

就安装基础而言，Xbox 360超过6000万，但iOS设备即使扣掉一半（游戏邦注：因为并非所有用户都会在该设备上玩游戏）依然有1.6亿的用户。自应用商店问世以来，传统盒装游戏收益稳步下滑。他表示，“传统游戏公司转型成在线游戏公司的成本相当高。不改变公司，直接创办新公司会更好。”

Cousins以专门硬件设备的没落举例称；蓝光播放器、便携式摄像机、GPS、mp3播放器、傻瓜相机，甚至是电视的销量都出现下滑。移动设备满足所有这些需求，包括体验游戏在内。“我们相信掌机将是下个销量会出现显著下滑的硬件设备。”

他补充表示，“我觉待到下代掌机问世时，移动平台的游戏收益和市场份额将超越掌机平台。我认为微软、索尼和任天堂都无法创建出超越下代掌机的专门硬件设备。此外，我觉得EA之类的传统游戏公司将被既有数字公司收购，或是完全消失。”

趋势2：移动平台将取代PC浏览器

Cousins表示，“我觉得作为浏览器游戏平台，Facebook越来越缺乏可行性。这是因为Facebook逐步变成移动平台。”例如，在印度，30%的Facebook用户只采用移动平台——他们只通过移动平台访问网站。

再来就是Facebook和Zynga之间的紧密关系。Cousins这样表示：在平台开放以前，Facebook每年通过Facebook credits获得5.5亿美元收益——其中有3.75亿来自Zynga。Zynga占据12%的Facebook收益，每年在Facebook广告中投入7000万美元。Zynga签署协议承诺只在游戏中采用Facebook账户，作为回报Facebook同意协助Zynga实现几款游戏的增长率目标。

他表示，Facebook是一大希望，“但我觉得Zynga和Facebook之间的特殊关系会让行业中的其他竞争者难以立足。”但这是最理想的浏览器游戏平台，所以他觉得，对浏览器游戏而言，Facebook将不再是可行平台，用户将转移到移动平台。

他表示，“我觉得依靠PC浏览器游戏创收的公司需要转投移动平台，否则多半会以失败收场。”但他还认为，MMO和FPS之类的硬核游戏将继续留在PC平台，因为移动平台无法满足它们的需求。

趋势3：免费增值模式主导全球市场

他表示（游戏邦注：鉴于DeNA和GREE的市场主导地位），“仅若干年前，掌机是日本的主导平台，但如今我们发现手机平台占据越来越大份额。”他表示，在亚洲，免费增值模式是王道。但在西方世界，情况并非如此。西方世界的主要收益来源依然不是免费增值模式。他表示，就连EA都承认免费模式将成为必然，EA积极进军数字领域，但这只让公司实现收支平衡，没有带来繁荣发展势头。

Cousins认为，在不久的将来，西方世界的免费增值模式创收将超越全价盒装和数字商品。

趋势4：3D图像成为商品

之前的行业主要围绕专有3D。专有纹理、自己的3D引擎。当时没有真正的中间设备。固定商业模式意味着图像存在差异化。他表示，“业内有许多无力支付授权费的小型工作室，他们不得不研发自己的技术。”这成本很高，风险很大，导致许多游戏项目最终被取消。

他表示，“新世界更加商品化。”Epic UDK和Unity之类的产品将3D图像的后端变得简单化。他表示，“你的艺术资产也可以充当商品，”，鉴于Unity资产商店的问世和外包商的大量涌现。Cousins认为，未来5-10年，“多数高创收游戏将基于第三方引擎制作而成，采用预先制作的3D资产。”

趋势5：亚洲再次崛起

他表示，在游戏领域发展的初期阶段，“西方游戏开发公司都来自亚洲。他们创造出全球最杰出的游戏作品。”

但到2000年，西方品牌开始占据主导地位。他补充表示，“作为西方玩家，我们将注意力转移亚洲，转投西方国家开发的硬件和软件产品。”但如今亚洲公司广泛投资西方公司（游戏邦注：例如腾讯投资Riot和Epic）。目前就市场价值而言，只有动视超越Nexon、Gree和DeNA。

据他预测，“未来在市值排名前5的大型游戏公司中，亚洲公司将占据4个席位。我认为亚洲公司将收购更多的大型西方公司，例如动视、EA或Take-Two。”（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Ngmoco’s Cousins predicts the death of consoles within 5-10 years

by Brandon Sheffield

Ben Cousins, general manager of Ngmoco, formerly of EA DICE, Sony, and Lionhead, has not been shy about his support of the mobile space, or of freemium. He was the driving force behind EA’s free to play Battlefield Heroes, and now Ngmoco’s Swedish studio’s triple-A iOS title.

At GDC Taipei, Cousins gave a keynote that shared his projections for the five big trends in the game industry across the next 5-10 years. Most interestingly, Cousins outlined how and why he believes freemium and mobile will effectively kill game consoles.

“When I’m talking about mobile, I’m talking about the operating system, not the device,” he clarifies. “I believe these operating systems will start to appear in other classes of devices, other than just mobile phones and tablets. In the future I think mobile gaming maybe won’t be so mobile, and we may need a new definition for them.”

Trend 1: Mobile kills console

“There’s a potential for mobile gaming to kill console gaming,” he began. “I’m talking about a significant reduction of market share with no chance of return.”

There are two ways this can happen — either people can move from consoles to a new device, or the market can expand without you. An example of the latter might be the social game space, which as exploded beyond the reach of traditional consoles. Already in Japan, just two social and mobile game companies, Gree and DeNA, generate more money than the entirety of the console software industry.

“Your sales drop in relative terms because a new product or a new class of product enters the market, and expands the market so much that your marketshare shrinks,” he says. Android and iOS are growing fast, and “Research shows that at least half of these devices are being used as game devices,” he says.

In terms of installed base, the Xbox 360 is over 60 million, but iOS devices, even reduced by half to reflect that not all users play games on them, are owned by 160 million people. And as the average monthly payout since launch of app store has rapidly grown, revenue for the traditional packaged game industry is in a steady decline. “The cost of a traditional game company to transition into an online game company is extremely high,” he notes. It’s better if you “don’t have to transform your business, you just start a new company.”

Cousins cites the decline of dedicated hardware as a precedent; Blu-ray players, camcorders, GPS systems, mp3 players, point and shoot cameras, and even TV sales are down. Mobile devices serve all these needs, and play games, besides. “I believe consoles will be the next hardware to have a major reduction.”

“I believe that sometime during the next console generation, globally, both the revenue and the marketshare for games will be larger in mobile than it is for console,” he added. “I believe Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo won’t produce dedicated hardware past the next generation. … Further, I believe traditional game companies like EA will be purchased by existing digital companies, or close entirely.”

Trend 2: Mobile kills PC browser

“I think Facebook is losing its viability as a browser game platform,” says Cousins. “This is because Facebook is becoming a mobile platform.” In India for instance, 30 percent of Facebook users on mobile only — they’ve only ever accessed it on mobile.

Then there’s Facebook’s close relationship between Zynga. Cousins outlined it like this: Until opening the platform, Facebook got $550 million annually through Facebook credits — $375 million of that was from Zynga. Zynga accounts for 12 percent of Facebook revenue, and spends $70 million annually on ads in Facebook. Zynga has an exclusivity agreement to use Facebook accounts for games, and in return Facebook has agreed to help Zynga hit growth targets for some titles.

Facebook was a great hope, “But I believe that this special relationship between Zynga and Facebook makes it hard for anyone else to compete in this space,” he says. But there’s no better platform for browser games than that, so he feels that Facebook will cease to be a viable platform for browser games, and that audience will migrate to mobile.

“I believe that companies relying on revenue from PC browser games will need to compete to mobile or fail,” he said. But he also believes core-oriented games like MMOs and FPS titles will remain on PC, because mobile can’t yet serve their needs.

Trend 3: Freemium dominates worldwide

“Only a few years ago, the console was the dominant platform in Japan, but now we’re seeing a much bigger transition over to mobile,” he says, noting DeNA and GREE’s market dominance. In Asia, freemium is all, he says. In the western world, it’s not quite the case yet. The dominating revenue in the western world is still non-freemium. Even EA admits that free-to-play is an inevitability, he says, noting that EA’s push to get into the digital space has only allowed the company to break even, not to thrive.

Cousins believes that in the Western world, revenue from freemium will be bigger than that from full priced packaged packaged and digital goods in the very near future.

Trend 4: 3D graphics become a commodity

The old world was proprietary 3D. Proprietary textures, their own 3D engine. There was no real middleware back then. Fixed business models meant differentiation with graphics. “There were a lot of small studios that didn’t find it possible to pay the licensing fees [of existing middleware like Renderware], and were forced to roll their own technology,” he says. This was costly and risky, and caused many games to get canceled.

“The new world is much more commoditized,” he says, with products like Epic’s UDK and Unity, that make the back end of 3D graphics very simple. “Your art assets can come as a commodity as well,” he says, noting Unity’s asset store and the proliferation of outsourcers. In 5-10 years, Cousins thinks that “the majority of top-grossing games worldwide will be developed on 3rd party engines, using significant pre-built commoditized 3D assets.”

Trend 5: Asia rises (again)

In the earlier days of games, “Western game developers, the companies we looked to were all Asian,” he says. “These were the guys making the best games in the world.”

But in the 2000s Western brands became dominant. “As gamers in the western world, we shifted our focus away from Asia, to hardware and software that was developed in the West,” he added. But now Asian companies have made huge investments in Western companies. Like Tencent investing in Riot and Epic. At this point, only Activision is bigger than Nexon, Gree, and DeNA in terms of market cap.

“Four our of five of the world’s biggest gaming companies by market cap will be Asian,” he predicts. “And I believe an Asian company will buy one or more of the big western game companies, like Activision, EA, or Take-Two.”（Source：gamasutra）