What happened to the coin-op videogame industry?
I actually wrote a term paper on this topic based around a case study of Midway (the class was called The History of Video Game Design – awesome, I know). Midway built its empire with coin-op success with games like NBA Jam and what-not, but their business dynamics have changed. Some scattered points I remember from interviews I conducted with execs at EA and Midway: -Successful arcade games are generally “couch multiplayer games”, games that are mainly fun to play with your friends in the room so you can beat each other, trash talk, show off, etc. This style of gaming has declined because gaming in general has become a more solitary experience – more people own a new system than did in the earlier days, so there’s less need to gather at one person’s house just because he’s the cool kid on the street who has the system. The console technology spreads as the prices drop (the Neo-Geo was like $700 at release) and social acceptance of gamers grows. -This also means that a (much) bigger sh
