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The year 2015 saw releases of numerous video games as well as a follow-up to Nintendo's portable 3DS console, the New Nintendo 3DS. Top-rated games originally released in 2015 included Madden NFL 16 , NBA 2K16 , NBA Live 16 , WWE 2K16 , Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain , The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt , Bloodborne , Undertale , and Fallout 4 . Sales of video games in 2015 reached $61 billion, according to analysis firm SuperData, an 8% increase from 2014. Of this, the largest sector was in computer game sales and subscription services, accounting for $32 billion. Mobile games revenues were at $25.1 billion, a 10% increase from 2014. Digital sales on consoles made up the remaining $4 billion. [1]
In the United States, the Entertainment Software Association (ESA) and the NPD Group estimated total video game market revenues at $23.5 billion, a 5% increase from 2014. Of this, the total software market was $16.5 billion, [2] with the NPD Group estimating retail sales subset at $13.1 billion. [3] The ESA reported that there were 2,457 companies in the United States involved in developing or publishing video games that directly supported 65,678 workers (37,122 in developing, 28,556 in publishing) with about another 154,000 indirectly supporting the industry, such as through contracting or video game journalism. The total contribution to the US's gross national product from the industry was $11.7 billion. [4]
In the United Kingdom, the total video game market was valued at nearly £4.2 billion, according to figures from Ukie and MCV . The largest segments were in digital software (£1.2 billion) and mobile games (£664 million), while sales of consoles dropped to £689 million. [5]
Metacritic (MC) and GameRankings (GR) are aggregators of video game journalism reviews.
The following were 2015's top ten highest-grossing video games in terms of worldwide revenue (including physical sales, digital purchases, subscriptions, microtransactions, free-to-play and pay-to-play) across all platforms (including mobile, PC and console platforms). Three of the top ten highest-grossing games are published or owned by Tencent, including the top-grossing title League of Legends .
| Rank | Game | Revenue | Publisher(s) | Genre | Platform(s) | Business model | Ref |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | League of Legends | $1,628,000,000 | Riot Games / Tencent | MOBA | PC | Free-to-play | [17] |
| 2 | Monster Strike | $1,557,800,000 | Mixi | Physics | Mobile | Free-to-play | [a] |
| 3 | Clash of Clans | $1,345,000,000 | Supercell (SoftBank Group) | Strategy | Mobile | Free-to-play | [17] |
| 4 | Puzzle & Dragons | $1,290,000,000 | GungHo Online Entertainment (SoftBank Group) | Puzzle | Mobile | Free-to-play | [20] |
| 5 | Crossfire | $1,110,000,000 | Smilegate / Tencent | FPS | PC | Free-to-play | [17] |
| 6 | Dungeon Fighter Online | $1,052,000,000 | Neople (Nexon) / Tencent | Beat 'em up | |||
| 7 | Call of Duty: Black Ops III | $1,000,000,000 | Activision (Activision Blizzard) | FPS | Multi-platform | Buy-to-play | [21] |
| 8 | World of Warcraft | $814,000,000 | Blizzard Entertainment (Activision Blizzard) | MMORPG | PC | Subscription | [17] |
| 9 | Game of War: Fire Age | $799,000,000 | MZ | Strategy | Mobile | Free-to-play | |
| 10 | Fallout 4 | $750,000,000 | Bethesda Softworks (ZeniMax Media) | ARPG | Multi-platform | Buy-to-play | [21] |
| Month | Day(s) | Event |
|---|---|---|
| January | 7 | Zombie Studios, the creator of the Spec Ops series, was shut down. [26] |
| 23–25 | PAX South 2015 held in Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center | |
| 30 | Sega continues reduction of western businesses and focus on digital that began in 2012. [27] | |
| February | 3 | Sony sold Sony Online Entertainment to Columbus Nova. The company was renamed into Daybreak Game Company. [28] |
| Video game critic Joystiq was shut down by AOL. | ||
| 19 | Sega Networks, a subsidiary of Sega, acquired Demiurge Studios. [29] | |
| 20 | tri-Ace, the developer of Star Ocean and Valkyrie Profile , was acquired by Nepro Japan. [30] | |
| 25 | The website version of video game critic Computer and Video Games was merged into GamesRadar+ by Future plc. | |
| March | 2–6 | Game Developers Conference 2015 held in San Francisco, California. |
| 2–6 | Independent Games Festival held in San Francisco, California. | |
| 4 | Electronic Arts shut down the headquarters of Maxis in Emeryville, which has created franchises such as SimCity and Spore . [31] | |
| 6–8 | PAX East 2015 held at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center. | |
| 12–14 | EGX Rezzed 2015 held at the Tobacco Dock, London. | |
| 17 | Nintendo Co. Ltd. announced their affiliation with Japanese mobile game developer DeNA and Nintendo Switch, a new console. [32] | |
| 23 | Raven Software celebrated its 25th anniversary. [33] | |
| April | 1 | Bandai Namco Games was renamed into Bandai Namco Entertainment. [34] |
| 15 | 2K Australia, the developer of Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel was shut down by Take-Two Interactive. [35] | |
| 17 | Phil Harrison, the World Wide Corporate Vice President of Microsoft Studios departed from Microsoft. [36] | |
| 20 | Matthew Armstrong, creator of the Borderlands series, left Gearbox Software. [37] | |
| 27 | Following the cancellation of Silent Hills , Konami delisted itself from the New York Stock Exchange. [38] | |
| 30 | Services of OnLive were discontinued as the asset was acquired by Sony Computer Entertainment. [39] | |
| May | 4 | Spark Unlimited, the developer of Lost Planet 3 and Call of Duty: Finest Hour was shut down. [40] |
| 22 | BioWare celebrated its 20th anniversary. [41] | |
| 26 | Oskari Häkkinen, head of franchise development of Remedy Entertainment, left Remedy. [42] | |
| June | 3 | CEO of Remedy Entertainment, Matias Myllyrinne, departed from the company for Wargaming. [43] |
| 8 | Paul Sams replaced Ru Weerasuriya as Ready at Dawn's CEO. [44] | |
| 9 | Chris Avellone, co-founder of Obsidian Entertainment, departed from the company. [45] | |
| 11 | Housemarque celebrated its 20th anniversary. [46] | |
| 12 | Arc System Works purchased the rights to develop video games for the Double Dragon , River City Ransom , and Super Dodge Ball series from the now-defunct Technos. [47] | |
| 16–18 | E3 2015 held at the Los Angeles Convention Center. [48] | |
| 16 | Square Enix unveiled new studio Tokyo RPG Factory. [49] | |
| 21 | Tale of Tales, the developer of Sunset , was closed down. [50] | |
| 24 | People Can Fly, formerly Epic Games Poland, was split from Epic Games. It became an independent studio and acquired the Bulletstorm IP. [51] | |
| 29 | Disney Infinity publisher Disney Interactive was merged with Disney Consumer Products, the developer of Playmation to form a new division called "Disney Consumer Products and Interactive Media" [52] | |
| 30 | Club Nintendo was discontinued in North America. | |
| July | 4–5 | MineCon has been held at the ExCeL London Exhibition and Conference Centre. |
| 11 | Satoru Iwata, President and CEO of Nintendo, died at age 55. [53] | |
| 13 | Electronic Arts formed new studio called EA Motive. The studio is led by former Ubisoft director Jade Raymond. [54] | |
| 17–19 | SGC 2015 to be held at the Embassy Suites Frisco Hotel & Convention Centre. | |
| 22 | John Smedley stepped down as Daybreak Game Company's President and CEO. [55] | |
| 23–26 | QuakeCon 2015 to be held in Dallas, Texas. | |
| 27 | China's government fully lifts the ban on the sales of video game consoles within the country. [56] | |
| 27 | Razer Inc. acquired all the software assets of Ouya. [57] | |
| 29 | Windows 10 was released. [58] | |
| Yager Development filed for insolvency for its production division Yager Productions GmbH | ||
| August | 5–9 | Gamescom 2015 was held in Cologne, Germany. |
| 21 | Remedy Entertainment celebrated its 20th anniversary. [59] | |
| 26 | Google releases the YouTube Gaming app. [60] [61] | |
| 28–31 | PAX Prime to be held in Seattle, Washington. | |
| September | 2 | 2015 GameStop Expo at The Venetian Las Vegas resort. |
| 14 | Tatsumi Kimishima is appointed president of Nintendo after the death of Satoru Iwata in July 2015. [62] Nintendo EAD and Nintendo SPD was merged, forming Nintendo Entertainment Planning & Development. [63] | |
| 15 | Sony announced that Project Morpheus was renamed into PlayStation VR. [64] | |
| 17–20 | Tokyo Game Show 2015 at the Makuhari Messe in Tokyo. | |
| 24 | Maxis was reassigned to the EA Mobile division of Electronic Arts. [65] | |
| 24–27 | EGX 2015 at the NEC in Birmingham, UK. | |
| 30 | Club Nintendo was discontinued in Europe and Japan. | |
| Twisted Pixel Games was separated from Microsoft Studios and became an independent studio again. [66] | ||
| October | 2 | Microsoft purchased Havok from Intel. [67] |
| 2-4 | EGS was held at Centro Banamex in Mexico City. | |
| 3 | FiraxiCon was held by Firaxis Games at the Baltimore Convention Center in Maryland. [68] | |
| 6 | Ubisoft acquired The Crew's developer Ivory Tower. [69] | |
| 8-12 | Brasil Game Show 2015 held in Expo Center Norte, São Paulo, Brasil. | |
| 11–13 | Firstlook festival 2015 at Jaarbeurs Utrecht in Utrecht, Netherlands. | |
| 13 | Ubisoft acquired Longtail Studios and renamed it to Ubisoft Halifax. [70] | |
| 28 | Paris Games Week in Paris, France. | |
| 29 | Paradox Interactive purchased White Wolf Publishing and all its assets, including World of Darkness and Vampire: The Masquerade from CCP Games. [71] | |
| November | 2 | Activision Blizzard acquired Candy Crush Saga developer King for $5.9 billion. [72] |
| 4 | Konami shuttered its Los Angeles division. [73] | |
| 6–7 | BlizzCon 2015 at Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim, California. | |
| 6 | Activision Blizzard established a new TV and film studio Activision Blizzard Studios. [74] | |
| 2K China closed by Take-Two Interactive. Their next game, Borderlands Online was cancelled. [75] | ||
| NCSoft launched a new mobile division named Iron Tiger. [76] | ||
| 12–15 | G-STAR 2015 in Bexco, Busan, South Korea. | |
| December | 3 | The Game Awards 2015 held in Los Angeles, California. |
| 5–6 | PlayStation Experience 2015 held in San Francisco, California. [77] | |
| 7 | Flying Wild Hog opened a new studio in Kraków, Poland. | |
| 9 | A new development studio was established by Bethesda Game Studios in Montreal. [78] | |
| 10 | Electronic Arts established Competitive Gaming Division, a new division headed by Peter Moore which focuses on ESports. [79] | |
| 11–13 | GaymerX held at the San Jose Marriott Convention Center in San Jose, California. | |
| 12 | Gearbox Software opened new studio in Quebec. [80] | |
| 16 | Crystal Dynamics' studio head Darrell Gallagher left the company. [81] | |
| Kojima Productions was reestablished as an independent studio headed by Hideo Kojima. [82] |
The list of game-related hardware released in 2015 in North America.
| Month | Day | Console |
|---|---|---|
| February | 13 | New Nintendo 3DS |
| April | 29 | Razer Forge TV |
| May | 28 | Nvidia Shield TV |
| November | 10 | Steam Controller |
| Steam Link | ||
| Steam Machine | ||
| 27 | Samsung Gear VR |
Series with new installments in 2015 include Anno , Assassin's Creed , Batman: Arkham , Battlefield , Call of Duty , Disgaea , Dirt , Fallout , Fatal Frame , Five Nights at Freddy's, Forza Motorsport , Guitar Hero , Halo , Heroes of Might and Magic , Hotline Miami , Just Cause , King's Quest , Kirby , Magicka , Mario Party , Mario vs. Donkey Kong , Mario & Luigi , Metal Gear , Minecraft , Mortal Kombat , Need for Speed , OlliOlli , Resident Evil , Rock Band , StarCraft , Star Wars: Battlefront , Tales , The Witcher , Tomb Raider , Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six , Tony Hawk's Pro Skater , Total War, Toy Soldiers , Xenoblade Chronicles , Yakuza and Yoshi .
In addition, 2015 saw the introduction of several new properties, including Bloodborne , Dying Light , Evolve , Life Is Strange , Ori , Rocket League , Splatoon , Undertale , and Until Dawn .
The list of games released in 2015 in North America.
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| Title | Date | Type | Distributor | Franchise | Original game publisher | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dead Rising: Watchtower | March 27, 2015 | Feature film | Crackle | Dead Rising | Capcom | [604] |
| Persona 3 The Movie: No. 3, Falling Down | April 4, 2015 | Anime film | Aniplex | Persona | Atlus | [605] |
| Talking Tom & Friends | April 30, 2015 | CG animated webseries | YouTube | Talking Tom & Friends | Outfit7 | [606] |
| Hoopa and the Clash of Ages | July 18, 2015 | Anime film | Toho | Pokémon | Game Freak | [607] |
| Gamer's Guide to Pretty Much Everything | July 22, 2015 | Television series | Disney XD | — | — | [608] |
| Pixels | July 24, 2015 | Feature film | Sony Pictures | Pixels | — | [609] |
| Game Shakers | September 12, 2015 | Television series | Nickelodeon | — | — | [610] |
| The Lost Arcade | November 14, 2015 | Documentary film | 26 Aries | — | — | [611] |
Numerous video games were released in 2016. New hardware came out as well, albeit largely refreshed and updated versions of consoles in the PlayStation 4 Pro, PlayStation 4 Slim, and Xbox One S. Commercially available virtual reality headsets were released in much greater numbers and at much lower price points than the enthusiast-only virtual reality headsets of earlier generations. Augmented reality also became mainstream with Pokémon Go. Top-rated games originally released in 2016 included Uncharted 4: A Thief's End, Inside, Overwatch, Forza Horizon 3, Madden NFL 17, WWE 2K17, NBA 2K17, Dark Souls III, and Battlefield 1 and Doom 2016. The top five highest-grossing video games of 2016 were League of Legends, Honor of Kings/Arena of Valor, Monster Strike, Clash of Clans, and Dungeon Fighter Online.
2017 saw the release of numerous video games as well as other developments in the video game industry. The Nintendo Switch console was released in 2017, which sold more than 14 million units by the end of the year, exceeding the under-performing Wii U lifetime sales. This has helped to revitalize Nintendo, with the "retro" Super NES Classic Edition console, the refreshed New Nintendo 2DS XL handheld and a strategy for mobile gaming. Microsoft also released the higher-powered Xbox One X targeted for 4K resolutions and virtual reality support.
Numerous video games were released in 2018. Best-selling games included Madden NFL 19, NBA 2K19, NBA Live 19, WWE 2K19, Call of Duty: Black Ops 4, Marvel's Spider-Man, Red Dead Redemption 2, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, Far Cry 5, God of War, Monster Hunter: World, Assassin's Creed Odyssey, Spyro Reignited Trilogy, and Dragon Ball FighterZ. Games highly regarded by video game critics released in 2018 included Red Dead Redemption 2, God of War, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, Marvel's Spider-Man, Forza Horizon 4, Monster Hunter: World, Dead Cells, Return of the Obra Dinn, and Celeste. The year's highest-grossing games included Fortnite, Honor of Kings/Arena of Valor, Dungeon Fighter Online, League of Legends, and Pokémon Go.
Hellraid was a video game in development by Techland. It was scheduled to be released for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in 2015, but has been put on hold since then. A mobile spin-off titled Hellraid: The Escape was published in 2014.
Goat Simulator is an action video game developed and published by Coffee Stain Studios. It was released for Windows in April 2014, and ports for Linux and OS X were released in June 2014. Mobile versions for Android and iOS were released in September 2014. Versions for the Xbox 360 and Xbox One were released in April 2015, and for PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4 in August 2015; these ports were developed by Double Eleven. A Nintendo Switch version containing the game and downloadable content was released in January 2019, and a remastered version for PlayStation 5, Windows, and Xbox Series X/S was released in November 2024.
Life Is Strange is an episodic adventure game developed by Dontnod Entertainment and published by Square Enix. The first installment of the Life Is Strange series, the game was released in five episodes periodically throughout 2015 for PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Windows, Xbox 360, and Xbox One. It was ported to OS X and Linux in 2016, and iOS and Android in 2017 and 2018.
The Electronic Entertainment Expo 2015 was the 21st E3 held. The event took place at the Los Angeles Convention Center in Los Angeles, California. It took place from June 16 to June 18, 2015, with 52,200 total attendees.
Dark Souls is a dark fantasy action role-playing game series developed by FromSoftware and published by Bandai Namco Entertainment. Created by Hidetaka Miyazaki, the series began with the release of Dark Souls (2011) and has seen two sequels, Dark Souls II (2014) and Dark Souls III (2016). It has received critical acclaim, with its high level of difficulty being among its most discussed aspects, while the first Dark Souls is often cited as one of the greatest games of all time. The series had shipped over 37 million copies outside of Japan as of 2024. Other FromSoftware games, including Demon's Souls, Bloodborne, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, and Elden Ring, share several related concepts and led to the creation of the Soulslike subgenre.
In the video game industry during 2019, both Sony and Microsoft announced their intent to reveal their next-generation consoles in 2020, while Nintendo introduced a smaller Nintendo Switch Lite, and Google announced its streaming game platform Stadia. The controversy over loot boxes as a potential gambling route continued into 2019, with some governments like Belgium and the Netherlands banning games with them under their gambling laws, while the United Kingdom acknowledging their current laws prevent enforcing these as if they were games of chance. The first video cards to support real-time ray tracing were put onto the consumer market, including the first set of games that would take advantage of the new technology. The Epic Games Store continued its growth in challenging the largest digital PC game distribution service Steam, leading to concern and debate about Epic Games' methods to seek games for its service. Dota Auto Chess, a community-created mod for Dota 2, introduced a new subgenre of strategy games called auto battlers, which saw several games in the genre released throughout the year. Blizzard Entertainment faced criticism due to their involvement in the Blitzchung controversy, which began after they had banned a Hearthstone player for making comments during a tournament regarding the 2019–20 Hong Kong protests.
Amplitude is a 2016 rhythm video game developed and published by Harmonix for the PlayStation 4. It was also released for the PlayStation 3 the same year. A sequel to Amplitude (2003), it was licensed by Sony Computer Entertainment, who owns the rights to Frequency and the original game. The game received generally average reviews upon release.
In the video game industry, 2020 saw the launch of the next generation of video game consoles, with both Microsoft and Sony Interactive Entertainment having released the Xbox Series X/S and PlayStation 5 consoles, respectively, in November 2020. The industry was heavily affected by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic which had begun in March and was characterized by COVID-19 lockdowns and remote work. While this caused numerous delays in software and hardware releases and the cancellation of live conferences and events in favor of virtual shows, it also created a boom for the industry as people turned to gaming as a means to pass the time. The industry also reacted to various political/cultural events.
In the video game industry, 2021 saw the release of many new titles. The numerous delays in software and hardware releases due to the continuation of the COVID-19 pandemic heavily impacted development schedules, leading to several games being delayed into 2022 or even postponed indefinitely. Additionally, computer and console hardware were impacted by the combined effects of a semiconductor shortage and a rising growth of bitcoin mining that strained the supply of critical components.
Thanks to all who attended our #HMQ20 party!
Lakeview Cabin Collection first launched for PC via Steam, Humble Store, and itch.io on March 25, 2015.
It first launched on March 26, 2015.
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