Through the Looking Glass Sharply - The Video Game Industry: Formation, Present State, and Future - page 224

this industry characterized by rapid changes to date, changes are expected
in the future and will continue—some evolutionary, some disruptive, but
always positive.
INDIVIDUAL REFLECTIONS
Casey O'Donnell wrote the fi rst chapter for us. In that chapter, his inter-
ests were primarily in distinguishing video games from other software.
Thus, his focus was in a broader understanding of the industry. He noted
that there is a signifi cant dif erence between what goes into the produc-
tion of a video game and “just software.” The wide array of expertise,
broad social phenomenon that surrounds games and the technological and
political-economic system that surrounds the game industry cannot and
should not be collapsed into the roughshod category of software. The cre-
ative collaborative work that is necessary for the production of games is
important enough to understand on its own accord. He thus sees a need
for renewed cultural, political and economic analysis of the production
process and broader worlds of the video game industry. We think one of
the telling quotes from one of his respondents had him not really knowing
how to describe his work. In that regard, Casey's hope is that a new wave
of research can emerge that transcends the virtual worlds of games, the
play of gamers and the creative productive and intensely laborious worlds
of video game developers. Perhaps the collection of chapters contained in
our topic is a fi rst volley of renewed interest in understanding the broader
phenomenon that is “the video game industry”, which would not only fulfi l
Casey's hope, but lead in general to better understanding of the industry.
In Chapter 2 Mikolaj Dymek has authored a thoughtful piece that really
addresses the transition from a gamer subculture, which he suggests pres-
ently determines game development to a broader audience. It is a simplistic
approach to try to summarize his chapter succinctly, but let us try. From his
observations, “the main obstacle between a gamer subculture and a truly
universal majority mass-culture medium is not constituted solely by new
marketing strategies, distribution mechanisms or new platforms—it is pre-
dominantly about transforming the hardcore subculture that encompasses
the industry, medium and gamers. If, and when, the hardcore subculture
evolves we might fi nally on a global scale see some of the revolutionary
potential of the video game medium—a medium which will push the
boundaries of creative communication and will provide hitherto inconceiv-
able possibilities based on the imitational and interactive properties of the
game medium.” Our observation would be that it is not so much “if”, but
“when”. In an industry with so much to gain, it might be sooner than one
might think.
When we pitched this topic, we promoted the idea of contributing three
chapters—one being the marketing of games in Chapter 3. As we got to the