Becoming a “living” media partner for your consumers

Nvidia GeForce Now is bleeding games, is it still worth your time and money?

Article | March 8, 2020

Nvidia GeForce Now hit the streets like a month ago, and in what was a surprise to literally no one, it is the best game streaming service on the market right now. It's not without its flaws, though. For starters, it seems like all kinds of developers are suddenly pulling their games from the service, from AAA heavy hitters like Bethesda to Indie developers like Hinterland Studio, which just yanked its game The Long Dark off of the service. Because GeForce Now lets you play games you "own" something I'll get into in a bit its a little discouraging that game developers can basically cut off access to games you've paid money for. This whole thing throws into question whether or not you should invest your time and money into the platform. There are certainly people who think that game streaming is the future of gaming, but when you can't be guaranteed access to the games you have paid for, it's a future that I don't want to be a part of.

The crowd still matters for live sports broadcasting

Article | June 17, 2021

At opposite sides of the globe, two top-flight international football events have kicked off over the last week. In semi-vaccinated Europe the month-long Euro 2020 tournament began on Friday June 11th, with 11 countries hosting the competition across Europe. On Sunday June 13th in Brazil (a country which had now lost nearly half a million lives to COVID-19) the 2021 Copa America kicked off, with the final taking place on July 10th2021. While Euro 2020 is taking place in front of reduced capacity crowds of fans in stadiums, the Copa America is being played behind closed doors with entire participating national delegations required to be vaccinated, and delegations limited to 65 members. Euro 2020’s official motto ‘Live it. For Real’ can be taken as a declaration of intent to host a top-flight mass sporting event as close to pre-pandemic conditions as feasibly possible. The criteria for live spectator participation for UEFA (the event organisers) was key to this. UEFA president Aleksander Čeferin confirmed the importance of live spectators at matches in an interview back in March where he stated "We have several scenarios, but the one guarantee we can make is that the option of playing any Euro 2020 match in an empty stadium is off the table. Every host must guarantee there will be fans at their games."

Ongoing transitions in gaming industry

Article | January 19, 2021

The gaming industry is continuously evolving with current transitions derived from VR/AR, blockchain, 5G and cloud computing. The aim of this transition is to fulfill requirements of gamers such as reducing the cost of gaming, developing more immersive experience, converting tools bought in games as transferable assets, enabling gamers to play graphic intensive games on low cost devices. Currently popular games are on the go to create augmented reality versions to be played on AR headsets with their mobile phones. The google stadia platform(a platform where graphic intensive games run in data centers and gamers can play them via web browsers) has also enabled the gaming industry to eliminate the computing limitations imposed by running games in mobile devices. The only barrier in coupling both technologies to have the best of both worlds is low bandwidth of 4G which will soon be expanded when 5G rolls out in the market. TRANSITIONS IN GAMING INDUSTRY The real time game play is currently not possible for games running in data centers and being rendered on web browsers of a gamer’s device as there is latency in reflecting the character’s action on the press of a button. Such a transition will eliminate the need for highly expensive gaming consoles which has been curbing the growth rate of the gaming industry. One more concern from gamers that’s being a barrier in revenue generation for the gaming industry is that the weapons, power packs, kits and tool kits bought in any game are simply virtual and become useless when they are done with the game. The idea to buy such time bound utility becomes insensible for players. So, now the gaming industry is evaluating the option to register these buyouts in games on blockchain which can later be used as a non tangible asset by players to trade easily. The gaming theory that’s getting popularised these days will eventually leverage the AR and VR technology to transform the education industry. The idea to provide customers with user manuals running in augmented reality that can enable a non trained worker to operate the machine is also booming. Solidworks by 3Dplm is one such tool that’s heading in this direction. The transitions mentioned above are quite exciting and the way gaming industry and mentioned technologies are evolving we can expect to get our hands on such exciting gaming technology soon too at a fraction of current costs.

3 Major Companies Behind the World's Most Valuable Media Franchises

Article | February 26, 2020

The top-grossing movie (Avengers: Endgame) and the top-grossing video game (World of Warcraft) of all time are both part of franchises -- long-running media properties with multiple iterations and derivative works spawned from a core creative concept, like superheroes saving the world, or an orc invasion. Their massive successes were built over years of careful audience cultivation. But Marvel's cinematic universe, and the world of Warcraft, are more outliers than inevitabilities. Sequels are rarely sure things, and many franchise attempts have failed, sometimes even taking entire companies down with them.