From the Industrial Revolution to the Digital World, the Evolution of Game Industrialization

Introduction: Maybe everything comes from a puff of smoke

We can enjoy instant messaging and numerous entertainment products without being restricted by physical space. Perhaps everything stems from a plume of smoke.

In the early days, Homo sapiens of a certain ethnic group wanted to spread information and to as many other Homo sapiens as possible. All he needed to do was climb to the highest mountain, pick up a huge fur blanket in his left hand, and a flint in his right hand. After a fire ignited the fur blanket, he began to wave and jump continuously, so that all the friends who were several kilometers away could see the smoke signal.

Thousands of years later, Homo sapiens lost their luxuriant hair, gradually gained a mind, and their behavior became more elegant, but they were still doing similar things. It’s just that they don’t have to find the highest mountain like their ancestors, because with communication satellites and launch pads, these devices are far from the ground far higher than the highest mountain in the world; similarly, they don’t need to rely on smoke anymore. Because of the digital signal, its coverage is far more than a few miles around, but can cover the entire earth.

We humans are good at summing up laws in the long river of history and looking for the relevance of the development of things. Looking back on our life, we can always find a main line to describe the trajectory of our life, even if the process is full of unknowns and randomness. This is especially true for the development path of technology. As described by the nature of technology, new technologies originate from the recombination of existing or old technologies. We can always find a series of events to connect them together.

From the early Homo sapiens who relied on smoke to transmit signals to the modern humans living in the digital world constructed by various communication devices, we have experienced three industrial revolutions that opened up human material space, and we have also experienced the Information Technology Revolution of creating the virtual world of the future. Of course, maybe we are now experiencing other unknown revolutions. Now that material needs are constantly being met, our spiritual needs are constantly being enlarged.

For movies and games, it is not only a work of art that meets the spiritual needs of human beings, but also a craft that capitalizes on profit. So we want to try to find a trace of the industrialization process from the source of industrialization-the great industrial revolution, to help us better understand how the industrialization path of this product that we have high hopes to meet human spiritual needs develops .

I. Inspiration from the logic of industrial revolution: division of labor, specialization and separation of supply and demand

Starting with the first factory in the world

When it comes to the Industrial Revolution, the first thing that comes to our minds are huge factories, roaring machines, and full-loaded assembly lines. This is certainly not the full picture of the industrial revolution, but these characteristics must mean something.

Let us go back to 1721, a stone’s throw from the All Saints Church in Derby, England, on an island in the River Derwent, where the world’s first factory was born — — The Derby Silk Factory of John and Thomas Lombe. It is a rectangular brick house with five stories high. Its façade is a row of large lattice windows. The exterior looks a lot like the upcoming thousands of factories, many of which are still in operation today.

Its interior has all the main characteristics of a modern factory: a large number of laborers use power-driven machinery for collaborative production. In this factory, the power comes from a 23-foot-tall waterwheel. In the same space, equipment that provides external power and many workers work together. This may not be the same as today, but at the time, it represented the beginning of a new world.

The emergence of this factory was not driven by the grand vision of changing the world or benefiting society, but only for secular reasons in pursuit of commercial interests. In the book “Behemoth：A History of the Factory and the Making of the Modern World”, it is described as follows:

Lombe built the factory to profit from a tightly available thread used for warp yarns. When weaving cloth, the transversely interspersed yarns are called “weft yarns” and the ones that cross the weft yarns are called “warps. Since the alternating warp yarns have to be repeatedly pulled up so that the weft yarns can pass through, the warp yarns need to be stronger. In order to weave, we must first skein the filaments spit out from the silkworm. These filaments must be wound on a spool, twisted with other threads, then wound, and then twisted. This process is called “throwing silk.” On the European continent, you can use machines to throw silk. In the UK, people use spinning wheels, so production is too slow to meet the needs of textile workers.

In 1704, a lawyer in Derby built a three-story hydraulic mill to assemble a spinning machine imported from the Netherlands, but it turned out that he could not produce high-quality yarn. The local textile manufacturer Lombe tried it next, sending his half-brother John to northern Italy to learn how to use machines to throw silk there. He violated the Italian law prohibiting the disclosure of the secrets of spinning machinery, brought a few Italian workers back to the UK, and provided Lombe’s company with enough information. They cooperated with a local engineer to build and assemble the factory.

In this way, the world’s first factory was born. We all know what happened after that, the first industrial revolution broke out in Britain.

Inspired by the Industrial Revolution

The British Industrial Revolution began in the 1860s. It began with the technological innovation of the cotton textile industry, with the improvement and widespread use of the Watt steam engine as the hub, and the mechanization of the machine manufacturing industry in the 1830s and 1940s as a sign of basically completion. Through the manufacture and invention of a series of powerful tools and machines to achieve production mechanization, thereby greatly improving labor productivity.

But the driving force behind this revolution is not only driven by technological invention itself, on the contrary, it is mainly driven by the huge market and competition within the market. Adam Smith mentioned in The Wealth of Nations that the creation of national wealth is based on the division of labor, and the degree of division of labor is controlled by the scale of the market. In other words, in order to achieve industrialization that creates large-scale production, a certain market scale is required as a basis.

It was the United Kingdom, not the Netherlands, that detonated the first industrial revolution. The fundamental reason was that the United Kingdom successfully opened up the world’s largest textile market and cotton supply chain in the 18th century under the political and business alliance system. This will inevitably make it profitable to adopt spinning machines and factory systems nationwide.

At the peak of the industrial age, there were two dominant institutions: the company and the market. Inevitably, we need to discuss the relationship between the company, large-scale production and market size, that is, to further understand the relationship between the nature of the enterprise and the industrial revolution. According to Coase’s point of view, the reason for the emergence of enterprises lies in their ability to internalize transaction costs in the market, thereby optimizing market efficiency. The starting point of the industrial revolution is not to integrate the supply and demand sides of the market in order to reduce or avoid market transaction costs. On the contrary, the starting point of the industrial revolution is to separate supply and demand through specialization and division of labor. It is a phenomenon that has transformed from a self-sufficient handcrafted workshop with limited supply capacity to a large-scale quantitative production organization with huge supply capacity.

Furthermore, the industrialization of manufacturing based on specialized division of labor and large-scale machine production has advanced by leaps and bounds. We can use several development stages to reflect the industrialization of the manufacturing industry:

• The first stage, standardized production

As production improves, terms such as interchangeable parts or standardized parts appear in the manufacturing industry. They are the basic features of monopoly industries (including textile machinery, cutting tools and steam engines) in the 19th century.

• The second stage, mass standardized production

Automobile production developed into the first mass production industry. Ford’s mass production concept spread to other automakers and other industries such as furniture and electrical appliances. Mass standardization is the most important manufacturing technology in the entire 20th century.

• The third stage, mass customization
• At this stage, there are more direct connections between customer needs and products, and orders and diverse needs are processed quickly.
• The fourth stage, personalized mass production
• This concept promotes the continuous development of product diversification from customized mass production. Customized mass production refers to the production of products according to customer tastes and needs.
• The fifth stage, digital production

With the development of technology, equipment is gradually realized online, production equipment, control systems, industrial information systems, and industrial Internet applications are interconnected, so as to carry out production, management and coordination in a more efficient manner.

From the perspective of content creative production, for the game industry, the emergence of Middle Platform is just like the interchangeable parts, standardized parts and so on that appeared in the industrial development process of the manufacturing industry. Through more reusable technology platforms to help internal staff better improve the collaboration and production efficiency in the creative process. At the same time, with the development of AI technology, more and more AI toolboxes will be used in the game development process, such as art production, game narration, etc. In addition to bringing higher-quality graphics, it will also bring players more real interaction and provide gamers with a more immersive and personalized gaming experience.

Unlike industrial products, the “scale” of the game industry is not reflected in the number of games developed by a single game company. As a native digital business game, it is not restricted by the physical world space and time, and can be instantly spread to every network terminal in the world. The “scale” process is to reach the game player’s terminal at a lower cost. Then this trend is cloud gaming, which can help players enter the virtual world in a more convenient way.

Today, the market size of the global game market in 2020 has reached US$174.9 billion, and the size of the Chinese game market ($44.08Bn) exceeds that of the United States ($41.38Bn). Although the process of game industrialization in the United States has gradually matured, with the continuous expansion of the domestic market and the continuous improvement of maturity, China will gradually realize the development of game industrialization with Chinese characteristics.

II. The development of the digital world: from movies to games

Movies and games are the products of human imagination. Both of them create more content for the virtual world in the development process, and are absorbing each other’s original content. There are games adapted from Marvel’s IP series such as Captain America and Spider-Man, and there are also movie versions of Assassin’s Creed based on the Assassin’s Creed series. The two bring different entertainment experiences to mankind, and their development paths are also different. So how did the two that continue to fill the digital world develop?

Let’s look at a few sets of data. In order to avoid market fluctuations caused by COVID-19, we selected the revenue of the global entertainment industry in 2019. It can be seen that the global game market revenue ($145.7billion) is twice as much as the combined revenue of the movie and music market ($62.7billion).

In addition, in 2018, Rockstar released Red Dead Redemption 2. This game with the theme of the Western Open World earned more than $725 million in the first three days after its launch, only lagging behind Grand Theft Auto V, which is also made by Rockstar. Both GTA V and Red Dead Redemption 2’s revenue in three days exceeded the revenue of the largest movie theater ever. From this we can see the huge potential of the game market and people’s desire for immersive virtual worlds.

Development process of the film history

The invention of the “projector” and “optical video camera” at the end of the 19th century laid the technical foundation of film. In 1895, the French scientists Lumiere developed the “moving movie machine” and shot the first film “Factory Gate”, which officially opened the curtain of the film era. Subsequently, Vitascope technology and nickel cinemas (entry tickets are 5 cents nickels) appeared, allowing movies to enter civilian homes and the era of silent movies (1908–1927) began.

From 1913 to 1926, silent films matured. With the development of urban industry in the United States and the rapid increase of middle- and lower-class residents, movies have become popular entertainment for urban civilians, mainly in small theaters. The huge profits in the film industry triggered fierce competition among film companies in the market. Edison litigated for patents and established a Motion Picture Patents Company (MPPC, Motion Picture Patents Company) to monopolize the production, distribution and screening of films. In order to get rid of the monopoly, independent filmmakers went to Hollywood, a small town outside Los Angeles, to shoot. On the eve of World War I, American nickel cinemas were replaced by cinemas with better conditions, and the monopoly power of film patent companies gradually collapsed, and the production center was transferred from East Coast cities such as New York and Chicago to Hollywood.

Then, technological breakthroughs ushered in the era of sound film and color film (1927–1930s). In 1927, Warner Bros. released the first sound film “The King of Jazz” by using the Vitaphone system (Vitaphone, a sound film system that uses records to record and reproduce sound). In the following years, low-noise recording technology and optical tape recorders completely solved the problem of noise and non-synchronization of sound and picture. Audio movies completely replaced silent movies. In 1932, the first color film “Vanity Fair” was released, using two-color processing technology to achieve the second technological breakthrough in film history.

With the collapse of the film patent company, Hollywood, a large American film and television center, has gradually risen, undergoing a transition from the classic Hollywood stage (1930s-1960s) to the new Hollywood stage (1960s-1980s).

1) Classic Hollywood stage: from film patent company to big studio system

Hollywood ushered in the prime time of film development in the 1930s and 1940s, with the emergence of eight monopoly films including MGM, Warner Bros., Paramount, 20th Century Fox, Raidenwa, Universal Studios, Columbia, and United Artists Releasing. In the long-term competition, the big studios formed a pattern of “five big and three small” and “each with their own characteristics”, implementing a one-stop business model integrating production, distribution, and screening, and controlled most of the theaters at that time. Since then, Hollywood has become synonymous with American movies.

The big studio system has distinct characteristics:

• First, the cinema has become a large-scale monopoly enterprise. The eight major companies are huge and well-equipped, with numerous giant studios and shooting venues, recruiting art and technical talents, and forming an “independent kingdom” of movies.
• Second, the internal division of labor is meticulous, implementing an industrial production line-style production model, emphasizing collective interests and fine division of labor.
• Third, multi-production genre movies, using formulaic plots (such as heroes saving the beauty, monsters being defeated), stereotyped characters (divided into decent and villain images), and graphical visual images (such as cowboys’ stereotypes, evil Laboratory colored liquids, etc.).
• Fourth, the producer, the owner of the company, has the supreme right to tamper with the script and deploy actors at will.
• Fifth, promote the star system under the demand of commercialization.

The Paramount Act (Antitrust Act) of 1948 forced a breakup of the trust structure of major producers’ monopoly on production, distribution, and projection, and a large number of independent productions began to appear. Since film distribution no longer needs to rely on major producers, the quality of films has become the key to market competition. In the 1950s and 1960s, with the popularization of televisions in homes, theaters were greatly impacted, and the film industry took a series of countermeasures: launching new products such as wide-screen movies and three-dimensional movies, and cooperating with television networks, radio and television platforms, etc. And follow the “baby boom” trend to launch “car theater” and so on. But it still cannot stop the film industry from entering the cold winter.

2) New Hollywood stage: “New Wave” overturned the big studio system

From the end of the 1950s to the beginning of the 60th century, the production model of classic Hollywood commercial films declined to a great extent. Coupled with the introduction of external realism, nationalism, “new wave” and other film cultures and the huge impact of television popularization, Hollywood’s old film production system has been fundamentally shaken. The scale, system, and film theme of the studio have undergone subversive changes, and the independent revolution in the film industry has kicked off.

Compared with the classic period, New Hollywood has the following characteristics:

• First, the studio system is facing great challenges. Innovative independent film companies represented by artists have emerged, and the film industry chain has become more and more complete.
• Second, the themes of the film are gradually diversified, and no single genre is used. It reflects more social issues and political conflicts and has a strong spirit of rebellion, such as “The Godfather” (1972), which integrates gangs and political elements.
• Third, large-scale commercial films appeared, using high cost and high technology, represented by “Cleopatra” (1963), “Jaws” (1975), and “Star Wars” (1977).
• Fourth, from the “star-centered system” to the “producer-centered system,” emphasis is placed on talent training and meticulous division of labor, and the global division of labor mode is adopted in the Post-production.
• Fifth, the industry gradually scales up, forming the new six major film companies — Disney, Warner Bros., Universal Studios, Sony, Paramount, and 20th Century Fox, to expand the international market.

In the 1970s, the rapid development of computers provided unlimited possibilities for film creation, and digital technology began to be used in film production. Industrial Light and Magic (ILM), a pioneer in the digital special effects era, was founded in 1975 by director George Lucas specifically to shoot the special effects sequences in Star Wars and is now the top one special effects production company in the world. Digital technology allows for a faster and easier combination of video, technique, production, and set processes, dramatically shortening the production cycle and saving money on movies, while accomplishing special effects shots that could not be shot in reality. The success of Star Wars marked the maturity of digital technology in film and the beginning of a new era of digital cinema (1980-present).

In the 1990s, digital technology became more widespread in film production, gradually participating in the whole process from previz to post viz, such as Terminator 2 (1991) and Jurassic Park (1993), etc. In the 21st century, film special effects technology has become more and more mature, and technologies such as full digitalization of film creation have been realized, the most classic being the 3D film Avatar (2009), which once set a global box office record of $2.787 billion.

Nowadays, the emergence of new technologies and media has further promoted the transformation of digital movies into new modes such as interactive movies, immersive movies and AR movies. Movies are no longer tied to cinemas, and Internet products have broadened the viewing channels of movies. In the future, with breakthroughs in artificial intelligence and neural network technology, it will bring greater challenges to the movie industry, allowing audiences to enjoy a full range of movie experiences and interactions.

Development process of the game history

The history of video games has evolved through the early laboratory era (1940s-1960s), from the birth of the first game in human history in 1948: the cathode ray tube entertainment device, to the first title that could be called a video game in terms of its rules as well as its operation in 1958: Tennis for Two, to its release in 1962 on the DEC PDP-1 computer called Spacewar! (Spacewar!) game, video games began to come out of the laboratory.

Immediately after that, video games went through the commercialization stage, that is, the golden period of arcade (1970–1980s), this era gave birth to the “first generation of small bees” based on “Spacewar”, the arcade game “Space Invaders” released by Japan’s Taito in 1978, “Pac-Man” released by Namco in 1980 and “Donkey Kong” released by Nintendo in 1981. At the same time, the first video game company in human history, Atari (1972), was born in this period.

The arcade era was followed by the era of home consoles (1980s-2020s), from the first generation to the eighth generation, with game consoles from Atari, Nintendo, Sega, Sony, and Microsoft. With the continuous upgrading of gaming devices and the iteration and improvement of technology in each era, a series of excellent game works such as Super Mario Brothers (1985), The Legend of Zelda (1986), Sonic the Hedgehog (1991), Final Fantasy series, Wii Sports (2006), etc. were born.

In the long run, in addition to the birth of game consoles and works with obvious progressive significance in each era, there was also a brief episode in the development of video game history, namely, the Atari shock that stunned the entire North American market at that time. The game market in the United States “disappeared” from the world.

Perhaps because of this event, it brought a profound reflection to the U.S. game market: the game market needs quality works that can satisfy gamers’ gaming experience, rather than being filled with poor quality games for profit. So from the 1990s, in some game industry conferences in the US (such as CES, CGDC, E3 and other private conferences), some companies started to use the term AAA to describe the size and standard of their own game titles. This comes from the way academic grading is done in the US: A is the highest and F means the lowest, which is where 3A productions come from. Just like the production of major motion pictures, game companies began to set up teams of hundreds of people to work on the development and production of their games, with production cycles as long as 2–3 years.

Squaresoft’s first video game to be produced on a 3A scale was Final Fantasy 7 (1997), which employed a large number of 3D technicians and artists and purchased hundreds of Silicon Graphics workstations during its development. Squaresoft devoted its major resources to the game’s art, music and plot, with a development team of more than 200 people and about $40 million invested in development, with $10 million spent on computer graphics alone. What’s even more amazing is that the game is an innovative blend of orchestral music, gameplay and dynamic cinematography.

While game consoles continue to evolve, PC games are in fact also evolving, and with the continuous improvement of computer hardware performance, PC is gradually becoming an important vehicle for players to experience games. In 2004, Blizzard Entertainment released a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG): World of Warcraft, thus The era of online games was opened.

When the mobile era came, mobile games began to take over the game market at a rapid pace, and this more portable form of entertainment was loved by players. From the early casual games such as Angry Birds, Fruit Ninja and Temple Run, to King’s Glory, Jedi Quest and Original God, which can carry more game elements, mobile games began to break through the boundary in the form of diversified development.

III. Industrial development logic of the game: from Hollywood to game as a service

By reviewing the history of movies and games, we can generally understand some similarities and differences between them in the development process.

• First, both are the product of producers visualizing their ideas and worldviews, and both are committed to providing a more immersive experience for viewers or players in the process of development, mainly reflected in the fact that both games and movies have used more sophisticated technology to improve the quality of graphics, special effects and sound effects in each era.
• Secondly, the main driving force behind the innovation and progress of both comes from the scale of the market and competition, technology is not the end but only the means.
• Finally, unlike film production, the game development process is mainly carried out in the native virtual environment, through a series of modeling tools to create a virtual world, although in some 3A masterpieces will also use live action for motion capture, but the main production process is still dependent on the modeling of the game.

So the Hollywood model of the movie, to a certain extent, led to the development of the game as well as the production of the role of inspiration, especially for the production of 3A games. They use more segmented game technology, toolkits, with the assistant of AI technology to create game worlds. But the difference is that the game is virtual native nature, so it is more important for game makers to enhance the experience of players in the native virtual world, and build their own integrated platform of research and development, testing, and iteration.

In addition to the quality of the game will tend to 3A, need more specialized and detailed technical tools, the form of the game is also changing with the trend of mobile. At the same time, along with the popularity of 5G and the development of cloud games, the Game-as-a-Service (GaaS) model is also gradually accepted by players.

Let’s take the tracks of two major 3A studios as an example.

Ubisoft (Ubisoft)

Ubisoft is one of the leaders in the video game industry, with the group’s main business activities focused on the production, publishing, distribution and operation of video games for consoles, PC, smartphones and tablets, both in physical and digital formats. The digital transformation over the past 10 years has allowed Ubisoft to build a gaming system with a player community at its core, dedicated to creating gaming experiences that enhance the lives and environments of players.

• 1986：Creation of Ubisoft
• 1989–1995：International expansion
• 1996–2001：Internal growth and strategic acquisitions
• 2002–2006：A development strategy for owned franchises
• 2007–2020： A real creator of franchises and acceleration of the digital business

In terms of the development of mobile games, Ubisoft started to develop vigorously in 2016, acquiring Ketchapp, Growtopia, 1492 Studio and Blue Mammoth Games studio which are committed to the development of mobile games, and the proportion of mobile game sales has increased from 5% in FY2018 to 11% in FY2020.

In addition to its handheld games business, Ubisoft has been launching Ubisoft Club (Uplay) — an online (PC and console) and distribution (PC) service platform since 2012. digital bookings have increased from 11.7% to 79% of net revenue between 2013 and 2020.

• In February 2012, games from EA, Warner Bros. and Square Enix hit the Uplay store, and Ubisoft’s digital distribution service will also include 3A titles from other major developers. PC games will also be available on EA’s digital distribution service platform, Origin.
• With more than 50 million players in 2013, Uplay has become an exceptional platform positioned across 10 different platforms, already covering 10 different platforms, rewarding and engaging players primarily through customized deals and content to increase player loyalty.
• In 2014, Ubisoft already had more than 45 million fans on Facebook, with the online distribution and services platform Uplay playing a major role.
• In 2015, Uplay already had more than 70 million users.
• In 2016, Ubisoft continued its digital transformation, which will extend beyond video games and establish its own brand.
• In 2017, the digital business grew at a rapid pace, meeting business targets 2 years ahead of schedule.
• In 2018, with strong digital growth, Ubisoft successfully shifted its business model to focus on a more profitable and recurring business. Player communities and player loyalty increased significantly, while substantially fueling growth in product sales and regular player purchases.
• In 2019, Ubisoft officially launched the Uplay+ service. For a monthly fee of $14.99, users can access Ubisoft’s PC game library and experience over 100 games, including the latest releases and expanded content. The service is also partnered with Amazon Luna and Google Stadia (coming soon) cloud gaming platforms.
• In 2020, Ubisoft digital platforms have a total of 117 million existing console and PC players. The platform is fully integrated with consoles, PCs and various streaming sites and is a key part of the direct relationship with players. Uplay now accounts for 40% of PC digital sales.

In addition to this, there exists another development path regarding Ubisoft: the application of AI technology. Around 2015, Ubisoft established La Forge, an independent R&D lab whose purpose is to build a bridge between academic research and video game innovation. The core R&D technologies are mainly as follows:

(1) Deep Reinforcement Learning: Deep Reinforcement Learning system is used instead of NavMesh technology to learn how to navigate on 3D maps using any navigation function.

A key role of NPCs in the game is navigation, and navigation techniques allow NPCs to move from one point to another on the map. The most popular method of navigating NPCs today is to use a navigation mesh (NavMesh), which is a grid that represents the areas where actions can be taken. However, complex navigation requires characters to have more flexible movement abilities, such as grappling hooks, jetpacks, teleportation, springboards, or continuous jumping, which increases the complexity of the NavMesh and makes it infeasible in many practical scenarios.

In response, Ubisoft used a model-free deep reinforcement learning system to obtain a neural network (below), and then used the movement capability to perform point-to-point navigation on a given map. Through extensive practice, the deep reinforcement learning system has proven to be able to accurately complete navigation actions without the need for manual pointing.

(2) AUTOMATIC MOTION IN-BETWEENING: Bridges the gap between motion capture and hand animation by introducing MOCAP (Motion Capture) techniques into the keyframe animation pipeline. This system reduces expensive capture sessions and reduces the animator’s workload by adding common software interpolation techniques.

(3) Learned Motion Catching: Machine learning is used to dramatically reduce the memory usage of motion matching based animation systems. Motion matching is a simple and powerful way to animate characters without much manual work once the basic settings are in place, and works best when used in conjunction with large amounts of motion capture data. But large amounts of data take up a lot of memory, a problem that is more pronounced as applications increase. Learning Motion Matching can fundamentally tune the motion matching system by using three neural networks, Decompressor, Stepper, and Projector, to employ a rich variety of character motion effects without worrying about negative effects on memory or performance.

Electronic Arts (EA)

Electronic Arts (EA) develops, publishes and sells video games for home consoles, PCs, cell phones and tablets, operating primarily in North America and Europe.

Since 2014, EA management has proposed a “digital transformation” strategy, shifting the company’s revenue core from traditional boxed game sales to digital game sales and in-game services, with services and other revenues accounting for more than 50% of the company’s revenue in the same year. In 2017, EA explained the digital component of live services, which consists of microtransactions, downloadable content, subscriptions, and esports. In fiscal year 2020, the net revenue of digital live services has accounted for 51% of total net revenue.

Downloadable content is typified by Ultimate team, a card set-like game in which players draw cards by way of kryptonite, collect and trade current and former professional players, and build their own teams to win games. The introduction of card draw mechanics and prop fees has revitalized EA’s most important sports product, with Ultimate team accounting for 27%, 28% and 23% of total net revenue in fiscal years 2020, 2019 and 2018, respectively.

The other important real-time service is the subscription service (subscription), referring to and EA Origin (PC) and EA Access (Xbox one). Also in fiscal 2020, EA expanded its subscription offerings by introducing EA Access subscription services to the Sony distribution channel, and is expected to expand Origin Access subscription services to additional distribution channels in fiscal 2021.

EA Origin’s premium membership service supports the experience of more than 100 games, which also includes simultaneous free experiences of EA games. Origin Access premium membership is priced at $15 per month and $100 per year, according to data posted on EA Play. EA Access is a game subscription service for Xbox one that gives players unlimited access to EA’s latest titles and the ability to try out games from their release date or earlier.

In addition, in the development of AI technology EA is also constantly trying to break through, EA’s SEED team is dedicated to the application of artificial intelligence technology in the game to explore and incubate. At present, there have been achievements in the fields of game testing, graphics fault detection, ray tracing, etc. At the same time, Frost Lab has also started collaborative R&D with open AI.

And just a short while ago, EA applied for a patent to develop a new type of artificial intelligence software to help AI imitate human game play. The software could, for developers, improve the efficiency of game programming while helping games take up less space and processing power. For players, it could provide a better matchmaking experience and help reduce all the bugs players might encounter.

On top of that, EA and a team at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver are using reinforcement learning technology, inspired by the way animals learn about positive and negative feedback, to automatically animate humanoid animals. By automating the animation process and other elements of game design and development, artificial intelligence could save game companies millions of dollars while making games more realistic and efficient so that complex games can run on cell phones.

The development paths and transformations of these major manufacturers reflect the rapid changes in the game market. While catching up with the handicap of the game, they are expanding the GaaS model to continue to extend the retention of host and PC players, and continuously developing the application of AI technology in game development to further accelerate the pace of industrialization of European and American games.

Last but not least

At the beginning of the article we refer to the story of a puff of smoke in “HBO’s Strategic Content”, which divides the American television industry into two eras: the era with HBO and the era without HBO. With the help of this smoke, we also see the wisdom of our ancestors, the development of the industrial revolution, and even the trend of industrialization of the entertainment digital world, and expect to see further changes in the gaming industry in the future.

The process of industrialization of European and American games originates from the accumulation of market scale, the inspiration of Hollywood movie development and the historical process of 3Aization of its games, although lacking these nutrients, the standard of game production of domestic manufacturers is also starting towards 3Aization, which is the direction of our continuous efforts of industrialization in the future. In addition, different from the game market environment in Europe and the United States, Chinese game companies are fully developing handheld game production and research and development, but also in the full use of AI data-driven, to enhance the game experience with players. On this path, we will surely gradually realize our own unique path of industrialization.

In the end, technology is never a direct end, but a means for humans to achieve their goals. The main driving force behind the continuous development of the game must also originate from the scale of the market and the competitive environment. The technology and innovation condensed by human wisdom will be applied in different market environments, but the final end will definitely help us to further realize our spiritual pursuit of virtual worlds.

Reference

HBO Strategic Content
The Behemoth: The Factory and the Making of the Modern World
The Great Chinese Industrial Revolution [M]. Beijing: Tsinghua University Press, 2017.
The New Industrial Revolution.
Ubisoft 2013–2020 Financial Results
EA 2014–2020 Financial Report