Spring 2022 20 By Sam Acosta As we venture deeper into 2022, it seems that we may finally be past the final throes of the COVID-19 pandemic. Restaurants and stores are opening back up, people are beginning to gather together again and movies are starting to steadily release again. When it came to the entertainment industry, the pandemic hit hard, as movie studios and theaters struggled to make enough profit to survive. In 2021, the global box office amounted to an estimated $21.4 billion in revenue, which is nearly half of the $41 billion in revenue that was made in 2018 before the pandemic hit. This kind of loss can be seen in almost every facet of the entertainment industry, except for one. In 2021, the video game industry managed to earn a staggering $180 billion in revenue, a substantial increase from the $155 billion earned the previous year. Video games have silently dominated the entertainment industry for years now, having made just under $146 billion compared to the $62.7 billion brought in by both the movie and music industries combined in the first year of the pandemic. “Minecraft” alone, a popular sandbox video game from Mojang Studios, has made over $3.1 billion in sales revenue with an additional $449 million from mobile sales. This greatly outperforms “Avatar,” which is the highest-grossing movie of all time with a total revenue of just over $2.8 billion. Yet, despite this extreme influence, it seems like the video game industry has only just started to receive the credit it deserves. This might be due to certain stigmas surrounding the medium. One stigma that, until recently, seemed to color popular opinion was that video games were for kids only. The idea of an adult playing any kind of video game seemed immature. This idea is slowly phasing out, however, as playing video games has become more and more popular. The Entertainment Software Association released a report last year that stated approximately 67% of American adults play video games, the highest percentage of all time. A large number of factors may carry into this. Video games have been proven to help relieve stress and provide a way to interact socially with other people. There’s also a potential connection between parents and video games. Another report by the ESA stated approximately 57% of parents play some form of video game with their children at least once a week. As generations that grew up with video games are becoming parents, their continued interaction with that kind of entertainment as both a form of engaging with their kids and a Video Games’ Stake in the Entertainment Industry
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