According to a Game Developer Collective survey of more than 600 developers between February and March, 39% of participants show slight concern about the sustainability of the games-as-a-service business model, while 31% are very concerned. In total, 70% of respondents have some type of concern about this monetization model, while 25% are not concerned. For the unaware, games as a service are defined by their frequent updates and in-app purchases.
What worries game-as-a-service developers? 63% are concerned that the title will lose the interest of players, while 62% fear competing projects that use the same business model. User acquisition and development costs concern 47% and 34% of developers, respectively, and 20% are concerned about competition from other forms of entertainment. It is striking that only 12% of those surveyed fear that games as a service will lose the interest of investors.
Developers' concern about games as a service is justified if we take into account that in recent months several titles have closed their servers. In addition, sometimes the development team suffers layoffs or disappears altogether.
With concerns about games as a service, there appears to be a resurgence of interest in additional content. 21% of respondents say their most recent game uses additional content as a monetization model, a percentage that rises to 30% when it comes to the next project. In this case, it is striking that the battle pass, a very common element in games as a service, has only been mentioned by 10% and 9% of developers when talking about their most recent game or next project, respectively.
