Abstract
The video games industry is rapidly becoming one of the fastest growing industries of the twenty-first century, at least if one is to believe the numerous reports from national and international trade organizations such as The Independent Game Developer Association (TIGA), Entertainment Software Association (ESA), European Games Developer Federation (EGDF) and International Game Developers Association (IGDA). However, policy makers, government organizations, economic data reports (UK SIC, 2007) and academics have reached the same conclusion (Beck and Wade, 2004; Mollick and Edery, 2009; Chatfield, 2010) and speak of undiminished growth in the industry. What makes the video games industry and its growth trajectory so fascinating is that it is a fairly young industry. It had its start in the early 1970s, with the spread of the arcade machine and gaming parlours which caught the attention of young and mostly male players (Herz, 1997; Poole, 2000; Kent, 2002; Demaria and Wilson, 2004; Donovan, 2010). Much of the production of games at that time was small scale, and the industry contained only a handful of developers. Today we are looking at an industry that was estimated to be worth around $56 billion in 2010, and is predicted to be worth $82 billion by 2015 (PricewaterhouseCoopers, 2011).
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Zackariasson, P. (2013). The Role of Creativity. In: Hotho, S., McGregor, N. (eds) Changing the Rules of the Game. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137318411_7
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