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gaminggamingauthorSeth Schiesel and Shakeel HashimNoneWant to better understand the $150 billion gaming industry? Get Shakeel Hashim's newsletter every Tuesday.03807ace1f
September 1, 2020
What next-generation gaming consoles? The real action in the $160 billion video game business is on PCs.
That was Nvidia's dismissive subtext on Tuesday as the company unveiled its first major new line of consumer graphics hardware in two years. While Sony and Microsoft are yet to reveal pricing and timing details for their new game machines expected this fall, Nvidia is getting on the all-important holiday wish lists early, with specific product announcements that will make many gamers' eyes water.
In addition to announcing a new line of powerful PC graphics cards for the fall — ranging from $500 to $1,500 — Nvidia also flaunted its tight relationships with many of the largest and most popular game developers. Nvidia and Epic Games — which is locked in a high-stakes antitrust lawsuit with Apple — announced that Fortnite, Epic's flagship franchise, would soon add support for Nvidia's ray-tracing technology, which generates more realistic and immersive lighting effects. Nvidia also revealed footage of two other highly anticipated games — Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War (from Activision Blizzard) and Cyberpunk 2077 (from CD Projekt) — that will use the same technology.
PCs are the world's most popular gaming platform with about 1.5 billion players — roughly half of the 3 billion gamers worldwide. By contrast, only about 8% of gamers globally appear to be dedicated console players. That's one reason why Nvidia, the leader in PC graphics, does not appear especially chagrined that both Microsoft and Sony opted for graphics systems from AMD for their new consoles. Dedicated PC gamers will pay more for a single graphics card than console gamers pay for their entire systems.
Wearing his trademark leather jacket and standing in his home's kitchen, Jensen Huang, Nvidia's chief executive, announced that the company's new 3070 card would be released next month starting at $499, the 3080 card would be released Sept. 17 starting at $699 and the 3090 (continuing a new trend of revealing hardware from his oven, saying "Come here, papa") would arrive Sept. 24 starting at $1,499. The company said that the 3080 — which Huang called the company's new "flagship," presumably because of what it sees as a sweet-spot positioning of price and performance — delivers up to twice the horsepower of current 2080 cards, which can cost up to $1,200.
In addition to the new cards, Nvidia also revealed new software to improve the performance of older cards; enable advanced machinima storytelling; and improve video and audio streaming quality.
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Seth Schiesel
Seth Schiesel ( @SethSchiesel) is a contributing editor for Protocol focused on the business of video games and adjacent industries. He is a former editorial writer for The Boston Globe, entrepreneur and business reporter, technology writer and video game critic for The New York Times.
Microsoft wants to replace artists with AI
Better Zoom calls, simpler email attachments, smart iPhone cases and other patents from Big Tech.
Turning your stories into images.
Image: USPTO/Microsoft
January 24, 2021
Mike Murphy ( @mcwm) is the director of special projects at Protocol, focusing on the industries being rapidly upended by technology and the companies disrupting incumbents. Previously, Mike was the technology editor at Quartz, where he frequently wrote on robotics, artificial intelligence, and consumer electronics.
January 24, 2021
Hello and welcome to 2021! The Big Tech patent roundup is back, after a short vacation and … all the things … that happened between the start of the year and now. It seems the tradition of tech companies filing weird and wonderful patents has carried into the new year; there are some real gems from the last few weeks. Microsoft is trying to outsource all creative endeavors to AI; Apple wants to make seat belts less annoying; and Amazon wants to cut down on some of the recyclable waste that its own success has inevitably created.
And remember: The big tech companies file all kinds of crazy patents for things, and though most never amount to anything, some end up defining the future.
<h3>Alphabet</h3><p><a href="https://pdfpiw.uspto.gov/.piw?PageNum=0&docid=10887548&IDKey=EEF3B7984CE3%0D%0A&HomeUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fpatft.uspto.gov%2Fnetacgi%2Fnph-Parser%3FSect1%3DPTO2%2526Sect2%3DHITOFF%2526u%3D%25252Fnetahtml%25252FPTO%25252Fsearch-adv.htm%2526r%3D81%2526f%3DG%2526l%3D50%2526d%3DPTXT%2526s1%3Dgoogle.ASNM.%2526p%3D2%2526OS%3DAN%2Fgoogle%2526RS%3DAN%2Fgoogle" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><u>Making Zoom meetings a little nicer</u></a></p><p>Even after nearly a year at home, some people have still not figured out the best way to set up their digital meetings. They're either too close to the camera or so far away they might as well not be there. Part of the problem lies in the cameras they have available, as many webcams are too wide-angled: No one needs to see what's 8 feet to either side of you on a Zoom call. But this recent Google patent might help; it involves the meeting platform being able to gauge how far you are from the camera (by measuring the proportions of your face) and zooming in on you when you're speaking, hopefully making everyone look a little more uniform. The patent also included this wonderful diagram to explain it, which appears to have been made in Microsoft Paint: </p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="1">
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</div></p><p><img src="https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/2ZK0yTSkP4yE0nf5UBKwHsNu3eoS1BfhMPzivzm43jOAQ7jtOLKAMRV0MJzA9MZzH-cyVGVUsQGTlxpJwHV3kDhw3oKJB2OElrO38NikIae6v-IBnyo1sWXGs7pB8S_Qzc84eMzK"></p><h3>Amazon</h3><p><a href="https://pdfpiw.uspto.gov/.piw?PageNum=0&docid=10891879&IDKey=9A6594CF1637%0D%0A&HomeUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fpatft.uspto.gov%2Fnetacgi%2Fnph-Parser%3FSect1%3DPTO2%2526Sect2%3DHITOFF%2526p%3D1%2526u%3D%25252Fnetahtml%25252FPTO%25252Fsearch-bool.html%2526r%3D45%2526f%3DG%2526l%3D50%2526co1%3DAND%2526d%3DPTXT%2526s1%3Damazon.ASNM.%2526OS%3DAN%2Famazon%2526RS%3DAN%2Famazon" target="_blank"><u>Reusing Amazon boxes</u></a><br></p><p>Everyone is shopping online far more than ever before, meaning ever-more cardboard boxes are littering our homes and recycling facilities. Amazon's new patent aims to help rectify this by creating a system that allows customers to easily reuse boxes that products come in. It's trying to remove all the steps usually found in shipping — such as weighing your package, getting a price to ship and bringing the package to a shipping facility — and replacing them with software. You'd scan the box you have and what you're trying to send, and Amazon's app would recognize what it is and estimate how much it'll cost to ship. You then pack it up and a courier comes to retrieve it. Now your friends and loved ones will never be without their Bad Monkeys.</p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="2">
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<img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNTUxNjQ3MC9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY2MDI2ODY5M30.EkwGsay63N-lFWpfMh7KInjiCf9ev5vsL_htdvnjk1g/img.png?width=980" id="ddd43" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="174cb26e99641a035a7e3e603522692a" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image">
</p><p><br></p><p><a href="http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-bool.html&r=49&f=G&l=50&co1=AND&d=PTXT&s1=amazon.ASNM.&OS=AN/amazon&RS=AN/amazon" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><u>Choosing music based on BPM</u></a></p><p>If you're making a playlist to work out — or perhaps you're a spin class instructor looking for songs with specific tempos — this idea might be for you. Amazon's patent suggests creating a way to search music to download based on songs' beats per minute. If you want a mix of slow songs to cool down with and uptempo ones to rock out, this could be useful (and is similar to something Pandora offers today). Or if you want a playlist that includes the fastest music ever to help you write faster, this could help. Or maybe that's just me. </p><h3>Apple</h3><p><a href="https://pdfpiw.uspto.gov/.piw?PageNum=0&docid=10887260&IDKey=F5990016F873%0D%0A&HomeUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fpatft.uspto.gov%2Fnetacgi%2Fnph-Parser%3FSect1%3DPTO2%2526Sect2%3DHITOFF%2526u%3D%25252Fnetahtml%25252FPTO%25252Fsearch-adv.htm%2526r%3D86%2526f%3DG%2526l%3D50%2526d%3DPTXT%2526s1%3D%252522Apple%252BInc%252522.ASNM.%2526p%3D2%2526OS%3DAN%2F%252522Apple%252BInc%252522%2526RS%3DAN%2F%252522Apple%252BInc%252522" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><u>Auto-returning attachments</u></a></p><p>Have you ever been sent a PDF that you're supposed to download, print, sign, rescan and email back, and then you lost the file in your downloads, opened up an old version and had to hunt down for the right one before you sent it back? Maybe you're not as scatterbrained as me, but Apple's new idea for a system that allows you to just interact with an attachment that needs to be sent back to your correspondent without leaving the email program sounds like a dream. A better dream, though, would probably be to get rid of random attachments altogether. </p><p><a href="https://pdfpiw.uspto.gov/.piw?PageNum=0&docid=10889261&IDKey=0F2DEC21FBE3%0D%0A&HomeUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fpatft.uspto.gov%2Fnetacgi%2Fnph-Parser%3FSect1%3DPTO2%2526Sect2%3DHITOFF%2526u%3D%25252Fnetahtml%25252FPTO%25252Fsearch-adv.htm%2526r%3D73%2526f%3DG%2526l%3D50%2526d%3DPTXT%2526s1%3D%252522Apple%252BInc%252522.ASNM.%2526p%3D2%2526OS%3DAN%2F%252522Apple%252BInc%252522%2526RS%3DAN%2F%252522Apple%252BInc%252522" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><u>Seat belts that move based on where you sit</u></a></p><p>If you've ever been the third person on a road trip and wanted to sit in the middle seat in the back, you've probably gotten stuck with a seatbelt that's a bit too small; the middle seat isn't <em>quite</em> as large as the other two. This new design from Apple would essentially recognize where you sit in the backseat and move the entire seat belt machinery along so that you would be comfortably strapped in wherever you're sitting. It would also automatically reveal the buckle, so you wouldn't have to spend time hunting for where it's gone. This all sounds like it would make losing out when someone calls "shotgun" a little more bearable.</p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="3">
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</div></p><p><img src="https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/1ljUJhG2G4iQ-v0kSWKki6Z4wg7E_fFCQ03urRM92hO9IbjnRZwUeiqar4l3VLf0tpDYKwpmyU--A-gFUDmYyTRJUPZOcLln-syyOm6vka2a71oqTvcQDgtwi-3O6WJ7e1Qklyqn"></p><p><a href="https://pdfpiw.uspto.gov/.piw?PageNum=0&docid=10892625&IDKey=A689AD279428&HomeUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fpatft.uspto.gov%2Fnetacgi%2Fnph-Parser%3FSect1%3DPTO2%2526Sect2%3DHITOFF%2526p%3D1%2526u%3D%25252Fnetahtml%25252FPTO%25252Fsearch-bool.html%2526r%3D49%2526f%3DG%2526l%3D50%2526co1%3DAND%2526d%3DPTXT%2526s1%3D%252522Apple%252BInc%252522.ASNM.%2526OS%3DAN%2F%252522Apple%252BInc%252522%2526RS%3DAN%2F%252522Apple%252BInc%252522" target="_blank"><u>Cases for your AirPods, stylus and iPhone </u></a></p><p>Apple hasn't been without Jony Ive for very long, but it seems it's going ham on truly zany design concepts in his absence. In this patent, Apple explores various ways to combine a holder for AirPods and a stylus into a folio-style case for an iPhone that could also charge your peripherals and potentially display messages on the exterior. If Apple could pull this off in a way that didn't lead to a giant lumpy mess in my pocket, I'd potentially be interested, but the drawings in the patent are … less than promising: </p><p><img src="https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/0fbpPZ0ZDVCff0oNBktt-yaJYXoqyEz1rqXRPPbaaS1pHp5KSeO5LZm3vG8FsmdBu9Ms5s6QihhQVTWadTfWvGNn5h01dv2y1yiFfcVuRgHNvWteHNcRYb_rBPmAz03PctjwU4_A"></p><h3>Facebook</h3><p><a href="https://pdfpiw.uspto.gov/.piw?PageNum=0&docid=10885693&IDKey=D4DB683187A2%0D%0A&HomeUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fpatft.uspto.gov%2Fnetacgi%2Fnph-Parser%3FSect1%3DPTO2%2526Sect2%3DHITOFF%2526p%3D1%2526u%3D%25252Fnetahtml%25252FPTO%25252Fsearch-bool.html%2526r%3D48%2526f%3DG%2526l%3D50%2526co1%3DAND%2526d%3DPTXT%2526s1%3Dfacebook.ASNM.%2526OS%3DAN%2Ffacebook%2526RS%3DAN%2Ffacebook" target="_blank"><u>Animating digital avatars with VR headsets</u></a></p><p>Facebook is still pushing hard to make interacting in VR the future of … interacting … and this patent might help things feel a bit more natural. It suggests using cameras mounted on a VR headset pointed back at you to map real human facial expressions onto your digital avatar. Most VR programs with avatars either have faces that don't move when you're speaking or they just flap their mouths wildly; a system like this could make talking to someone dressed as a wizard or an elf or whatever else they've chosen to represent themselves online feel at least a little more normal. </p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="4">
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</div></p><h3>Microsoft</h3><p><a href="https://pdfpiw.uspto.gov/.piw?PageNum=0&docid=10896455&IDKey=507447D630AA%0D%0A&HomeUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fpatft.uspto.gov%2Fnetacgi%2Fnph-Parser%3FSect1%3DPTO2%2526Sect2%3DHITOFF%2526u%3D%25252Fnetahtml%25252FPTO%25252Fsearch-adv.htm%2526r%3D14%2526f%3DG%2526l%3D50%2526d%3DPTXT%2526s1%3Dmicrosoft.ASNM.%2526p%3D1%2526OS%3DAN%2Fmicrosoft%2526RS%3DAN%2Fmicrosoft" target="_blank"><u>Cortana for your car</u></a></p><p>Microsoft is apparently looking into application-specific virtual assistants, such as one designed for use in a car. It's a Car-tana, if you will. The assistant would be designed to provide specific insights about driving and how you could be saving money. That would include things like preemptively letting you know when a part might need servicing, how many miles it's been since you last fueled up or that your electric car's charge is low and chargers are nearby. It could announce these things over the car's stereo system, allowing you to keep your eyes on the road.</p><p><a href="https://pdfpiw.uspto.gov/.piw?PageNum=0&docid=10891928&IDKey=28C797030461%0D%0A&HomeUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fpatft.uspto.gov%2Fnetacgi%2Fnph-Parser%3FSect1%3DPTO2%2526Sect2%3DHITOFF%2526u%3D%25252Fnetahtml%25252FPTO%25252Fsearch-adv.htm%2526r%3D50%2526f%3DG%2526l%3D50%2526d%3DPTXT%2526s1%3Dmicrosoft.ASNM.%2526p%3D1%2526OS%3DAN%2Fmicrosoft%2526RS%3DAN%2Fmicrosoft" target="_blank"><u>Computer-generated songs</u></a></p><p>Who needs musicians? Microsoft's new patent seems to want to make them obsolete. It suggests a system that can take an input, like a picture or some text, and turn it into a song. It can identify elements in the input, like the sentiment of the words or aspects of the image (like if people are outside or in a crowd) and build a melody and lyrics off of that. Sadly, as this is just a written document, there are no examples of this concept's potential output, if Microsoft has even built something like this. But if it does prove to be possible, I've got <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOck0kPtlfk" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><u>the perfect robot</u></a> to perform this system's songs. </p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="5">
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</div></p><p><a href="https://pdfpiw.uspto.gov/.piw?PageNum=0&docid=10891969&IDKey=2B298D9FF592%0D%0A&HomeUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fpatft.uspto.gov%2Fnetacgi%2Fnph-Parser%3FSect1%3DPTO2%2526Sect2%3DHITOFF%2526u%3D%25252Fnetahtml%25252FPTO%25252Fsearch-adv.htm%2526r%3D48%2526f%3DG%2526l%3D50%2526d%3DPTXT%2526s1%3Dmicrosoft.ASNM.%2526p%3D1%2526OS%3DAN%2Fmicrosoft%2526RS%3DAN%2Fmicrosoft" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><u>Turning speech into images</u></a></p><p>Microsoft is really on the art-generating bandwagon this week. This patent outlines a similar idea to the last one, envisioning a system that can take what someone is saying and turn it into images. The system could even string together generated images into a sort-of picture book: You could narrate a day you've had to the AI, and it generates something like a series of Instagram Stories based on what you say to it. Though it'd probably just be easier to actually take photos of what happened, honestly. <img src="https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/YiHWGhgP3yGoWZ_QImFlegpqjzeVfS3SxBB2LcXH0Ap5oMwIMtDJdzzw4iPRsFgYlGPT2v4Jl5o3ueTFWJcQlw4nMwehlG7Y2jytW7QDFNq1fzPJUScU69UflhoMV-GJbdWNSezS"></p>
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Mike Murphy ( @mcwm) is the director of special projects at Protocol, focusing on the industries being rapidly upended by technology and the companies disrupting incumbents. Previously, Mike was the technology editor at Quartz, where he frequently wrote on robotics, artificial intelligence, and consumer electronics.
Power
Everything you need to know about the Roblox direct listing
The company is expected to go public via direct listing on the New York Stock Exchange in February.
Roblox CEO David Baszucki is taking the company public.
Photo: Ian Tuttle/Getty Images
January 22, 2021
Hirsh Chitkara (@ChitkaraHirsh) is a researcher at Protocol, based out of New York City. Before joining Protocol, he worked for Business Insider Intelligence, where he wrote about Big Tech, telecoms, workplace privacy, smart cities, and geopolitics. He also worked on the Strategy & Analytics team at the Cleveland Indians.
January 21, 2021
Roblox is a video game platform, though it describes itself alternatively as a "metaverse," "human co-experience platform" and "new category of human interaction." It's expected to go public via direct listing on the New York Stock Exchange in February.
In simpler terms, Roblox enables developers to build games within the Roblox virtual world, which looks like a crossover between Minecraft and Lego. Developers publish and distribute their games through Roblox to an audience of some 31.1 million daily active users.
<p>Here's everything you need to know about the company and its direct listing.</p>
What Does Roblox Do?
<p>Many of the core Roblox experiences are free, but the virtual currency, Robux, can be used to customize player avatars, unlock premium games and purchase in-game perks. Roblox makes money by charging users for Robux and through its <a href="https://www.roblox.com/premium/membership" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">subscription service</a>, Roblox Premium, which offers discounts and access to exclusive content. Developers keep <a href="https://developer.roblox.com/en-us/articles/developer-economics#:~:text=When%20you%20start%20developing%20on,via%20our%20virtual%20currency%20Robux" target="_blank">a portion</a> of the Robux generated through their games, and can cash out through the <a href="https://en.help.roblox.com/hc/en-us/articles/203314100-Developer-Exchange-DevEx-FAQs" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Developer Exchange Program</a>. </p><p>An active Roblox developer community means content is always changing. On my homepage, for instance, Roblox gives me the option to play a <a href="https://www.roblox.com/games/4996049426/UPDATE-All-Star-Tower-Defense?refPageId=7098b58b-fcbf-42bd-86a0-fcd00216ed05" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">tower defense game</a>, <a href="https://www.roblox.com/games/166986752/Plane-Crazy?refPageId=7098b58b-fcbf-42bd-86a0-fcd00216ed05" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">flight simulator</a>, <a href="https://www.roblox.com/games/364802243/Freeze-Tag-NEW-MAP?refPageId=7098b58b-fcbf-42bd-86a0-fcd00216ed05" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">freeze tag simulator</a>, a <a href="https://www.roblox.com/games/920587237/Adopt-Me?refPageId=7098b58b-fcbf-42bd-86a0-fcd00216ed05" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">pet game</a> reminiscent of Nintendogs and a <a href="https://www.roblox.com/games/5596703547/Weight-Lifting-Simulator-5?refPageId=7098b58b-fcbf-42bd-86a0-fcd00216ed05" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">weight-lifting simulator</a>. Developers have created more than 18 million games/experiences for the Roblox platform, though users <a href="https://venturebeat.com/2019/12/09/robloxs-10-biggest-games-of-all-time-each-with-more-than-a-billion-plays/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">tend to gravitate</a> to a much smaller subset of the available content. Flexibility in gameplay is critical to Roblox's long-term value proposition, since it hopes to avoid the boom-and-bust cycle of a typical standalone game. </p><p>If you feel old reading any of the above, it's probably because over half of Roblox users were born after 2006. But what the community lacks in life experience, it makes up for with enthusiasm: Roblox <a href="https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1315098/000119312520298230/d87104ds1.htm#INDEX" target="_blank">users spent a total</a> of 22.2 billion hours on the platform for the nine months ended Sept. 30, 2020, which comes out to 2.6 hours per day for each active user. With children locked out of other social activities during the pandemic, Roblox experienced a massive uptick in usage; total time spent on the platform <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/16/technology/roblox-tweens-videogame-coronavirus.html" target="_blank">doubled between February and July 2020</a>.</p>Roblox's Financials
<p>Roblox isn't yet profitable, but it has managed to grow revenue at an impressive clip. According to the company's S-1, Roblox generated $588.7 million in revenue for the nine months ended Sept. 30, 2020, representing a 68% jump from the same period in 2019. Costs grew even faster than revenue, however, so Roblox posted a $205.9 million consolidated net loss in the 2020 period, down from the $46.3 million consolidated net loss in the first nine months of 2019.</p><p>Roblox's highest expense is developer exchange fees, which accounted for roughly 26% of total expenses in the first nine months of 2020. Other significant costs include server fees, consumer safety (Roblox contracts out some 1,700 agents to monitor its platform to uphold community standards), research and development investment and the 30% fee owed to Apple and Google for mobile OS purchases. </p>What Could Go Wrong?
<p>Three themes stand out from Roblox's S-1: loss of user interest, access to distribution channels and user safety.</p> <p><strong>Children's attention is notoriously fickle, </strong>and Roblox is asking investors to bet billions on its ability to remain relevant for years to come. For every Lego or Nintendo that has defined multiple generations of childhoods, there's a Club Penguin, Neopets or Webkinz that quickly went from all the rage to irrelevant.</p><ul><li>"The multitude of other entertainment options, online gaming, and other interactive experiences is high, making it difficult to retain users who are dissatisfied with our platform and seek other entertainment options," Roblox writes. "Moreover, the majority of our users are under the age of 13. This demographic may be less brand loyal and more likely to follow trends, including viral trends, than other demographics."</li><li>Another concern is that Roblox won't be able to sustain its boost in user activity after the pandemic subsides. The company writes: "The COVID-19 pandemic and resulting social distancing, shelter-in-place and similar restrictions led to increased developer and creator and user engagement on our platform relative to our quarterly forecast and historic trends. These increases in user activity are almost certainly not indicative of our financial and operating results in future periods."</li></ul> <p><strong>Roblox's access to distribution channels is contingent </strong>upon external partnerships.</p><ul><li>In December 2020, Roblox <a href="https://www.scmp.com/tech/apps-social/article/3112379/us-gaming-platform-roblox-licensed-release-china-company-plans-go" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">gained approval</a> to operate in China through a joint venture with Tencent. This could be an enormous revenue opportunity, but it comes with uncertainty given the <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2020/10/23/21531154/judge-denies-trump-administration-ban-wechat-tencent-china" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">tense relations</a> between the U.S. and China.</li><li>Apple and Google also have significant leverage over Roblox. "For the nine months ended September 30, 2020, 34% of our revenue was attributable to Robux sales through the Apple App Store and 18% of our revenue was attributable to Robux sales through the Google Play Store, and during the same period 68% of our engagement hours on the platform were from users who signed up through the Apple App Store and Google Play Store," the company writes. Roblox raises the possibility that Apple or Google could damage their profitability by changing fee structures or data policies. </li></ul> <p><strong>Roblox needs to uphold high safety standards</strong> since so many children are on the platform; failing to do so would damage their reputation. </p><ul><li>The company writes: "We have faced allegations that our platform has been used by criminal offenders to identify and communicate with children and to possibly entice them to interact off-platform, outside of the restrictions of our chat, content blockers, and other on-platform safety measures. While we devote considerable resources to prevent this from occurring, we are unable to prevent all such interactions from taking place." </li><li>Roblox also brings up the possibility that developers make content that the community considers "illicit, explicit, profane, or otherwise objectionable." The company bans such content, but with millions of experiences available, some could slip through the cracks. </li></ul>Who Gets Rich?
<p>Investors in Roblox saw the company's valuation grow seven times over the past year. In February 2020, Roblox raised $150 million in a series G round that valued it at $4 billion. Then in January 2021, Roblox closed a $520 million series H round that generated an astounding $29.5 billion valuation.</p><p>This valuation may seem absurd to some. Is a children's video game (OK, "platform") worth <a href="https://www.barrons.com/articles/ford-has-a-hidden-asset-just-like-gm-its-stock-could-rise-soon-too-51611159634" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">nearly as much as Ford</a>? Whether Roblox can justify its valuation in the long run, here's who stands to gain from a stellar IPO, based on shareholder disclosures from the <a href="https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1315098/000119312520298230/d87104ds1.htm#rom87104_3" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">S-1 filing</a> on Nov. 19, 2020:</p><ul><li>Altos Ventures <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/11/19/roblox-s-1-ipo-filing-released.html#:~:text=Altos%20Ventures%20is%20Roblox's%20largest,and%20Tiger%20Global%20owns%207.3%25." target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">owned</a> 21% of shares.</li><li>Meritech Capital owned 10% of shares. </li><li>Roblox founder, president and CEO David Baszucki owned 12% of outstanding shares.</li><li>Index Ventures owned 9.9% of shares. </li></ul>What People Are Saying
<p><strong>"The S-1 makes plain exactly how big Roblox's ambitions are: It's trying to build an entire new world, with a new economy, a new currency, a new everything, and not just for kids. The company wants to be thought of like a tech giant, not a game developer."</strong> —Protocol's David Pierce <a href="https://www.protocol.com/newsletters/sourcecode/the-metaverse-goes-public-roblox-s1-ipo?rebelltitem=1#rebelltitem1" target="_self">wrote in Source Code</a> after Roblox filed its S-1.</p><p><strong>"Roblox could be to Facebook what Shopify is to Amazon, the non-social media social media firm. Just as hospitals, doctors offices, headquarters, shopping malls, and campuses are being bypassed and shifting hundreds of billions in stakeholder value, Roblox could disrupt the kid attention economy. Roblox is set to go public this month, and will create meaningful shareholder value. Prediction: stock trades up 70% or more on first trade. More important, Roblox could be the first social media firm whose shareholder value isn't designed to extract value from the least powerful stakeholder, kids."</strong> —NYU Professor Scott Galloway in his <a href="https://www.profgalloway.com/roblox-and-the-dispersal-of-creativity" target="_blank">No Mercy / No Malice newsletter</a>.</p>
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Hirsh Chitkara (@ChitkaraHirsh) is a researcher at Protocol, based out of New York City. Before joining Protocol, he worked for Business Insider Intelligence, where he wrote about Big Tech, telecoms, workplace privacy, smart cities, and geopolitics. He also worked on the Strategy & Analytics team at the Cleveland Indians.
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Meet the man behind The Game Awards
He doesn't make games or invest in them, but he founded one of gaming's biggest events.
Geoff Keighley created, produced and hosts The Game Awards.
Photo: JC Olivera/Getty Images
December 10, 2020
Seth Schiesel ( @SethSchiesel) is a contributing editor for Protocol focused on the business of video games and adjacent industries. He is a former editorial writer for The Boston Globe, entrepreneur and business reporter, technology writer and video game critic for The New York Times.
December 8, 2020
A few weeks ago, a somewhat-serious Twitter thread considered, "Who is the face of video games?"
According to an extremely unscientific skim of the more than 4,000 responses, No. 1 was clearly Nintendo's iconic character Mario. No. 2, and the leading real person, was Phil Spencer, Microsoft's head of Xbox. Neither should surprise you.
<p>But third place just might. It appeared to go to Geoff Keighley, a 42-year-old Canadian transplant to Los Angeles who does not make games, star in games, invest in games, stream games or even review games. All he does is create, produce and host what have become perhaps the most influential and powerful marketing and news events in the yearly video game calendar.</p><p>Keighley's annual <a href="https://thegameawards.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">The Game Awards</a>, which he founded in 2014, returns to streaming services everywhere Thursday. Last year's live broadcast from the Microsoft Theater in LA reached almost 50 million viewers. That is more than twice the audience for the most recent Oscars broadcast on ABC, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/10/business/media/2020-oscars-broadcast-hits-a-new-ratings-low.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">according to Nielsen</a>, which collapsed to 23.6 million from more than 40 million as recently as six years ago. By some measures, The Game Awards reach more people than the Grammys (18.7 million) and Emmys (6.9 million) <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/14/oscars-2020-nielsen-data-show-audiences-are-tired-of-award-shows.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">combined</a>. </p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="1">
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</div></p><p>"My high goal is to make The Game Awards the biggest award show in the world," Keighley said in an interview last week. "The Oscars are held in such high acclaim, and games are actually bigger and more powerful than any other form of entertainment, but aren't necessarily accepted that way. The wider world has never really accepted the power of this medium and has misunderstood it, so our opportunity is to demonstrate and showcase gaming in a way that not only has meaning for core gamers but also represents the best of gaming as a global community."</p><p>For that goal, traditional broadcast and cable television are now largely irrelevant. The show will appear live on <a href="https://thegameawards.com/watch" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">more than 45 streaming platforms</a> around the world, including almost 20 different services in China, seven in India and four in Japan. With such range, The Game Awards may be available online, live and free to more people than just about any event this side of the Olympics or World Cup.</p><p>And here's the beautiful twist, as both a business and promotional opportunity: Very little of the roughly three-hour show is actually about the awards, which mostly recognize the best games of the year in various categories. Many viewers don't actually care much about the awards. Most of the winners are big blockbusters, anyway, though the awards can have a huge sales impact when they go to small, independent games.</p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="2">
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</div></p><p>Instead, The Game Awards are about showcasing premiere announcements and demonstrations for major games, products and services coming next year. In that sense, The Game Awards are fundamentally different from the Oscars, Tonys or any other traditional awards show: They're forward-looking, not backward-looking. The fans won't tune in mainly to celebrate the games of 2020; they'll watch to learn about the games of 2021. For example, six years after launching its previous major game console, Microsoft chose last year's Game Awards <a href="https://youtu.be/jxAihuiYxuU?t=3543" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">to unveil its new Xbox Series X</a>, complete with a live stage appearance by Spencer.</p><p>Of course, the myriad special appearances and world premieres that viewers will see on Thursday aren't free. Keighley owns 100% of The Game Awards, sells the promotional inventory to major publishers, negotiates the global carriage deals, oversees production — which this year will involve more than 400 people, including <a href="https://www.abbeyroad.com/news/london-philharmonic-orchestra-to-perform-from-abbey-road-studios-for-the-game-awards-2020-2861" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">the London Philharmonic Orchestra performing live</a> from Abbey Road Studios — and then hosts the show itself on camera. Keighley isn't interested in exclusive carriage deals because he wants to sell the most possible eyeballs around the world to the game giants who pay to provide the show's most important content. </p><p>And those ads are not a distraction from the program. The ads <em>are </em>the program (mostly) and are exactly what most viewers are tuning in for. Keighley said that his production budget this year is less than $10 million and that the operation is profitable. While the lion's share of revenue comes from sponsors and advertisers, the show also makes some money on the streaming services themselves, as would any other content producer. </p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="3">
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</div></p><p>With the legendary E3 gaming show on COVID-induced hiatus, Keighley's show will almost certainly be the game industry's most important promotional extravaganza of 2020. And with its forward-looking focus, the show will play a big part in setting the stage for the industry's 2021.</p><p>As for the awards themselves, 90% of the result is determined by voting among a <a href="https://thegameawards.com/voting-jury" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">global panel of media outlets</a> that cover gaming and also reflect 10% public fan voting (<em>Full disclosure: I administer the official Protocol ballot</em>). The composition of the media panel is overseen by <a href="https://thegameawards.com/about" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">an advisory board</a> that includes just about all of the world's biggest gaming companies. </p><p>For him, The Game Awards are just the crown jewel of a flourishing game promotion empire. (He said the show's full-time staff is about six people.) This year he also created and produced <a href="https://www.summergamefest.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Summer Game Fest,</a> an entire series of online game events, and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UyJvxDHpQIs&ab_channel=GameSpotTrailers" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">hosted the opening night of Gamescom</a>, the big European game show.</p><p>It's all part of a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geoff_Keighley" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">lifelong journey in video game media</a> that began when he was 13 years old and started writing for the magazine Computer Games Strategy Plus. By 14, he was writing celebrity lines for the first broadcast game awards, Cybermania '94. (He grew up in Toronto in a professional media family; his parents were early executives at IMAX and remain <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G8TOpYMn8aE&ab_channel=IMAX" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">that company's "chief quality gurus</a>.") </p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="4">
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</div></p><p>In a wide-ranging conversation last week, Keighley discussed the awards show, the game industry and the broader entertainment and media industries.</p><p><em>This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity. </em></p><p><strong>How does your show fit into the broader entertainment landscape?</strong></p><p>Well it's great that the game industry is doing so well this year. All these other award shows are struggling. I don't even know if they can have the Oscars. Like, is there enough product released? But the gaming industry has really had a banner year. Developers are still making games, things are shipping and it's all happening in this industry. Games have really brought people together in 2020.</p><p><strong>Are awards shows especially important in the video game industry, compared with other media?</strong></p><p>The gaming community is unique compared to other entertainment because players are such a part of the experience. It's participatory, and we have awards that recognize players. You never find that at the Grammys or the Oscars. You're not going to have, you know, a Moviegoer of the Year. It's just the difference of a participatory medium. So I think that leads to how people experience and celebrate games. They want to do it together. And it's more important in gaming because I don't think there are that many other points in time for gamers to rally around the art form, the passion point.</p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="5">
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</div></p><p><strong>In the old days, reaching the broadest possible audience would have meant being on normal television, and online was the niche. Now, the opposite is true, especially when we talk about the international global aspect. It's not about the Nielsen numbers anymore and it's not about being on network television, correct?</strong></p><p>Yeah we turn that stuff down. And I came out of a television world. I worked at MTV for 10 years, and you're right. It was very much about your domestic Nielsen rating and now, to be on a domestic U.S. cable network — it's just not what it's about anymore. </p><p>It's been really eye-opening how global the content is now. I used to be a little naive a decade ago where I thought people played different games in different countries. And now it's all the same stuff. Like in India, for example, PlayStation and Xbox are not necessarily big there, but they're aspirational. And everyone there respects the medium. I focus so much more now on the international, global aspect of this show.</p><p><strong>It's also incredibly efficient to be able to produce one form of content and then distribute everywhere without having to build from the ground up. How much localization are you doing?</strong></p><p>We do a Mandarin version for China. There's a Hindi version for India. And then a lot is done through co-streaming. On Twitch I think about 5,000 creators co-stream us. What we find is that we can do the United Nations, like a lot of official translation, but people actually would rather experience it with the eyes of their favorite creator in, say, Brazil.</p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="6">
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</div></p><p><strong>And you're cool with all those people redistributing the show live?</strong></p><p>Yup. I've been completely open to distributing. I learned a lot of this from when the NBA first went into China. They said, "Hey, we're just going to give this away for free. We just want to have distribution there." And that was my view. We've had lots of offers of being exclusive on one platform or another. And we just really want the widest possible audience because all the game companies that support the show and are on our advisory board want to get games in front of as many people as possible. So yeah, the philosophy is: Let's distribute this as widely as possible. Everyone can take the show, and that includes streaming.</p><p>Also, our show lends itself to co-streaming because people want to react to the announcements. They want to predict what they think is going to win. And like last year when we revealed the new Xbox, part of the fun was watching back the co-stream reactions, to surprising people. Because no one knew it was happening. So you see all these people around the world freaking out on camera. And Phil Spencer loves that stuff. It's just super fun.</p><p><strong>Tell me about the revenue model for you, in terms of the split.</strong></p><p>Honestly it's almost 100% the sponsorships. And then yeah we make money off Twitter clips, YouTube ad revenue and things like that. But mostly it's the sponsors of the show, which are a combination of the game companies and then the non-endemic brands like Verizon or Netflix, people that come in and want to market to this audience. </p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="7">
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</div></p><p><strong>What are you thinking about game television generally these days? We have the new startup Venn and also G4 is on the way back. </strong></p><p>It's exciting that more and more people want to do video game programming. I do think the landscape has changed significantly from when I was doing traditional video game television. And the thing I don't know is the concept of a network. I wonder if that still applies in 2020 the way it used to. I think everyone is so bite-size and so creator-focused that G4 and Venn face a challenge in figuring out how to work that into a network model. I think a lot of people now just consume individual creators and surf around. That's the challenge there. But the opportunity for them is this business is so global now. I think the first one that can really be a truly global network has the biggest opportunity.</p><p><strong>What's your sense of the future of E3?</strong></p><p>What E3 represents is really important: the whole industry coming together. But I think E3 is going to continue to face challenges. They can't rally all the major game publishers and platforms to participate. So that's sort of on them. That's one of the reasons I decided not to work on it this year, before they canceled. They didn't seem to have a path to get everyone involved.</p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="8">
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</div></p><p><strong>Coming back to your show: You mention your core group of about a half-dozen people, but how much of all this do you do yourself?</strong></p><p>I sell the show. I do all the business development. I do all of the content stuff. I do all the talent booking. I do all the distribution deals. That's all me personally.</p><p><strong>And this year, without renting theaters, it's cheaper?</strong></p><p>No, it's actually more expensive. This will be the most expensive Game Awards we've done. My COVID-testing budget is massive. Also, we're doing three cities: Los Angeles, London and Tokyo. We have the London Philharmonic from Abbey Road Studios. And then all the nominees are coming in via Zoom. It's a very complicated technical project.</p><p><strong>How do you feel about becoming one of the most recognizable faces of gaming?</strong></p><p>If I am a face or an ambassador for gaming, that's meaningful to me. We're all passionate about the power of gaming to bring people together and we've hopefully built a show that is super authentic to what this industry is. So playing some part in celebrating gaming and bringing it to the world is certainly gratifying.</p>
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Seth Schiesel ( @SethSchiesel) is a contributing editor for Protocol focused on the business of video games and adjacent industries. He is a former editorial writer for The Boston Globe, entrepreneur and business reporter, technology writer and video game critic for The New York Times.
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This startup wants to upend cloud entertainment
Genvid CEO Jacob Navok thinks Google, Amazon and Microsoft have cloud gaming all wrong.
Rival Peak is a Facebook Originals animated reality show running over a 12-week season. Think "Lost" meets "Fantasy Island" meets "Survivor."
Image: Facebook
December 1, 2020
Seth Schiesel ( @SethSchiesel) is a contributing editor for Protocol focused on the business of video games and adjacent industries. He is a former editorial writer for The Boston Globe, entrepreneur and business reporter, technology writer and video game critic for The New York Times.
December 1, 2020
Imagine yelling at live television and the characters actually hear you and respond in real time. Imagine watching a live streamer and affecting the content of the game they're playing — while they're playing — just by clicking or tapping the stream itself. Imagine online worlds you can explore with other real people simply through an interactive video stream, no downloads of any kind required.
Totally new forms of entertainment don't come along too often. Yet the path toward those innovative scenarios may become real on Wednesday as Facebook and Genvid Technologies release a genre-defying online experience called Rival Peak.
<p>Trying to succinctly describe Rival Peak in traditional terms quickly descends into buzzword purgatory. It is an interactive live reality show. It is also a massively multiplayer, AI-powered cloud streaming game.</p><p>Whatever you call it, Rival Peak feels like a window into one future of interactive entertainment. It is also the public debut for Genvid and Jacob Navok, the 38-year-old New Yorker and former Square Enix executive who, as Genvid's CEO, has emerged as a leader of a fresh approach to cloud gaming, one based on new forms of engagement rather than just porting existing games to server farms. </p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="1">
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</div></p><p>For example, here's how Rival Peak works: Rival Peak is a Facebook Originals animated reality show running over a 12-week season. The dozen contestants are digital characters from around the world who have been dropped in a forest in the Pacific Northwest at the base of mysterious Mount Pneuma. They are competing for the opportunity to have one of their deepest wishes fulfilled. Of course, every week one of the contestants will be eliminated and the real narrative emerges from the "unscripted" drama that erupts among them. In Hollywood parlance, think "Lost" meets "Fantasy Island" meets "Survivor."</p><p>The difference from traditional television is that every single one of the millions of people who "watch" the show anywhere on Facebook will be able to direct the characters in real time and so shape the eventual narrative that emerges truly unscripted. Any time 24/7, anyone can tune in to a separate stream for each of the characters on the show and help decide what that character will do next, whether search for a secret treasure or socialize with another contestant. Each virtual character is run by advanced AI algorithms that incorporate the collective input and choices of the human audience. </p><p>And then everything is wrapped up each week with a live action video episode hosted by actor and author Wil Wheaton.</p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="2">
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</div></p><p>Matthew Henick, Facebook's vice president of content planning and strategy, said he greenlit Rival Peak because it fundamentally erodes the barrier between viewer and participant.</p><p>"When you think about the spectrum between passive video and gaming, there's always been this belief that they're going to merge somehow into some sort of new format, but so much of the innovation that's happened in the entertainment space has really been about business models more than anything," Henick said. "We haven't really seen a partner or an industry take the technological advances we've made in terms of the social internet and cloud, and use that to build an experience that actually puts people at the center. So when Jacob and Genvid threw out this project, light bulbs started going off for me in terms of this was an experiment we wanted to get on board with."</p><p>While the adventurers are exploring the forest, the level of human engagement with each character determines which contestant gets eliminated each week. So as a viewer you are also a player (tapping the fishbowl) or you can just watch the fish. As you engage with your favorite characters, you are recognized for your level of contribution to those characters' fate. </p><p>It all combines to break down the traditional barrier between static, noninteractive media (where you are merely watching or consuming something created somewhere else by someone else, be it a book, a film, a website or a painting) and interactive entertainment (generally called a game) where you make active decisions that affect the narrative. And whether you play or just watch, Rival Peak is delivered through what appears to be a normal Facebook video stream without any special software.</p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="3">
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<small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="Add Photo Caption...">People who "watch" the show anywhere on Facebook will be able to direct the characters in real time and so shape the eventual narrative that emerges truly unscripted.</small><small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="Add Photo Credit...">Image: Facebook</small></p><p>But of course this new kind of experience requires a tremendous amount of special software behind the scenes. Most of the magic behind Rival Peak that enables real-time interactive streaming comes from Genvid. The company has raised $53 million from investors including March Capital Partners, Makers Fund and entities controlled by Tencent, NTT DoCoMo, Samsung and Li Ka-shing, the legendary Hong Kong magnate. Rival Peak is the first of several innovative interactive experiences Genvid is creating for large multinational technology and media companies. (For Rival Peak, Genvid enlisted Pipeworks Studios and dj2 Entertainment for help with game and content development.)<br></p><p>Rival Peak is built in Unity, a popular game engine, but Genvid's technology also supports Epic's Unreal Engine. Genvid has developed software to timecode gameplay and video streams and then synchronize them. Genvid also developed a web interface and a full cloud gaming backend supported by Amazon Web Services instances. It all allows video streams to become truly interactive (click the stream and things happen within the underlying content, be it a video game or a sports statistic.). </p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="4">
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</div></p><p>The technologies can help make traditional streams more interactive, but can also enable fundamentally new sorts of interactive experience that exist only within a stream and are optimized for allowing many people to engage simultaneously. In that sense, Genvid's approach — now embraced by Facebook — is a prod and challenge to the cloud gaming strategies adopted by tech powerhouses including Google (Stadia), Microsoft (xCloud), Amazon (Luna) and Nvidia (GeForce Now). </p><p>Though there are differences among them, each of those four companies' cloud gaming strategies focuses for now on using cloud as a delivery mechanism for games originally created for other platforms. It's about delivering existing PC and console games without the PC or console. </p><p>In fairness, that is more than challenging enough. The fact that each of those Big Tech gaming services delivers adequate responsiveness and gameplay at all is impressive. But Navok's question is: Can't cloud and interactive streaming be harnessed to deliver brand-new sorts of entertainment?</p><p>"The opportunity for cloud gaming has been framed wrong," Navok said in an interview last week. "It's been framed from the perspective of finding a new audience by not having to buy consoles anymore. But I think that new audiences will come not from a focus on playing games but from a focus on interacting with content in new ways. And that is what's different about Rival Peak."</p><p>Count <a href="https://www.matthewball.vc/about" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Matthew Ball</a> among the believers. Navok first met the much-followed media investor and analyst in 2018, and within months Ball signed up as a Genvid adviser and dealmaker.</p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="5">
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</div></p><p>"There is a very long history of new technology creating entirely new genres and formats," Ball said. "Our perspective is that there is an emergent opportunity to bring together the best of broadcast, Hollywood, traditional long-form storytelling with the richly interactive experiences associated with video games and that mixing them through technology can produce a new category of entertainment."</p><p>"The idea with Genvid and Rival Peak is we can tap into the tribalism of sports fans, the audience engagement of 'American Idol,' the sense of agency of 'Bandersnatch' and new types of community-based storytelling like Twitch Plays Pokemon," Ball said.</p><p>Last year, Ball pitched Genvid's vision and a Rival Peak prototype to Henick, who joined Facebook <a href="https://variety.com/2018/digital/news/facebook-matthew-henick-buzzfeed-media-partnerships-1202718564/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">from BuzzFeed in 2018</a>. Henick saw that the true innovation in Genvid's approach is in reducing user barriers to interactivity, and even perhaps in liberating interactivity from the notion of "gaming" altogether.</p><p>"It's funny; my first instinct was to be protective of it," Henick said. "I don't want this to become just a gaming product. Even just calling it a game will turn people off potentially because they think it requires a controller or some kind of learning curve or there's a heavy download for it. And so I wanted to make sure that the top of the funnel is as big as possible and as many people could bump up against it. And you can imagine that there's other partners where it would become more of an endemic gaming product than some kind of new entertainment experience."</p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="6">
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</div></p><p>Genvid now has around 80 employees. Navok's interest in cloud entertainment dates back a decade, when he was working in Tokyo on strategic planning directly for Yoichi Wada, then-CEO of Square Enix, the famed Japanese video game company. At the time, Square Enix was being pitched by cloud gaming pioneers OnLive and Gaikai. Wada directed Navok to figure out the cloud gaming puzzle.</p><p>Navok's investigation became a Square Enix cloud subsidiary called Shinra Technologies (named after the fictional Shinra corporation in the company's Final Fantasy series). While Navok was helping run Shinra, Twitch emerged as perhaps the important new force in gaming in years. </p><p>"Wada-san and I watched <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twitch_Plays_Pok%C3%A9mon" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Twitch Plays Pokemon</a>, and I remember saying to him: 'Here is a million people, playing a stream, together. This is effectively a cloud game, but one we hadn't thought of,'" Navok recalled.</p><p>Navok and Wada left Square Enix on the same day in 2016, shortly after <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2016/1/6/10722442/square-enix-closes-shinra-technologies-cloud-gaming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Shinra closed</a>. Shortly afterward, Navok co-founded Genvid with Square Enix and Shinra alumni and Wada as an adviser.</p><p>"Jacob is the perfect founder for this, from his technology expertise, his temperament with the team and his ability to shepherd a vision," Ball said. "These new and diverse sorts of entertainment experiences you're starting to see with Rival Peak are a result of a decade-long journey for him." </p><p>Even as Genvid delivers its first mass product in Rival Peak, a big question facing the company is how much to focus on building core technology tools to license to other developers versus concentrating on making its own games and products for distributors like Facebook and others. With powerful Asian conglomerates behind it, Genvid is swimming among potential partners and rivals from YouTube and Stadia to Twitch, Unity and Epic, not to mention Microsoft.</p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="7">
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</div></p><p>"We're working on future projects that use our technology to go even deeper than Rival Peak," Navok said. "Rival Peak is very simple and easy to use. But for other platforms it could look very different. For example, we're working on a horror prototype now where viewers solve simple puzzles like Among Us. We're working on live sports projects and other projects we can't talk about yet. We're just excited to keep delivering new kinds of experiences." </p>
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Seth Schiesel ( @SethSchiesel) is a contributing editor for Protocol focused on the business of video games and adjacent industries. He is a former editorial writer for The Boston Globe, entrepreneur and business reporter, technology writer and video game critic for The New York Times.
Power
For Microsoft and Sony, it’s all about the games again
The Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 deliver superb, but different, entertainment experiences.
Astro's Playroom, which comes with the PS5, is a game about exploring the inside of a game console.
Image: Sony
November 9, 2020
Seth Schiesel ( @SethSchiesel) is a contributing editor for Protocol focused on the business of video games and adjacent industries. He is a former editorial writer for The Boston Globe, entrepreneur and business reporter, technology writer and video game critic for The New York Times.
November 9, 2020
You know you've got a problem when you have a song about a graphics chip stuck in your head. A high-class, next-generation problem, that is.
But that's me, mentally trapped in the lush green GPU Jungle level of Astro's Playroom, the delightful platforming game (lots of jumping) included with Sony's new PlayStation 5.
<p>"Look at the light, it falls just right/My shadows they please, beneath the trees," <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pi3VHqSVtAg" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">so croons the earworm</a> as you, the player, steer plucky little Astro from Renderforest through Teraflop Treetops, Raytrace Ruins and finally to the summit of Mt. Motherboard. "GPUuuuuu, tell me what to dooooooo, and I'll do it for you/I'm your GPUuuuuuu." </p><p>Yes, Sony's wonderful new video game machine comes with a video game about exploring the inside of a video game machine. How meta.</p><p>That's the PS5, to be released on Thursday, and that's Sony's approach to the next generation of interactive entertainment: self-referential, meticulously designed and proud of its distinctive brand. When you use the PS5 or play a Sony game, it often feels like the product is calling attention to itself even as you're using it. (And I'm not even talking about the PS5 enclosure's physical design.)</p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="1">
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</div></p><p>That's usually innovative and fantastic — for example, the new Sony controller doesn't just buzz generically in your hands; it shimmies, wiggles and throbs (known as <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haptic_technology" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">haptics</a>) with what can only be called personality — and perfectly reflects Sony's broader business strategy. After losing out in so many areas of consumer electronics and entertainment in recent decades — from mass-market televisions to portable music to smartphones — the last thing Sony wants is for video game systems to become commoditized. </p><p>I recently likened Sony's PlayStation strategy to <a href="https://www.protocol.com/sony-playstation-premium-experience" target="_self">an irascible hamburger shack</a> that only does things one way: their way. I'll admit I worried that Sony executives would resent the comparison. In fact, they loved it, because they agreed with the point: When you use a Sony product, you're <em>supposed </em>to notice and appreciate the company it came from. As you swing from skyscraper to treetop in Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales, Sony's big PS5 launch game, you're supposed to think, "Only on PS5," and probably will. </p><p>This strategy of distinction makes sense for Sony because the home console market is pretty much the company's entire video game business. Sony has very little presence in PC gaming, not to mention <a href="https://newzoo.com/insights/articles/newzoo-games-market-numbers-revenues-and-audience-2020-2023/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">the far larger and more lucrative mobile games</a> segment. Even Kenichiro Yoshida, Sony's CEO, <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/sony-ceo-is-a-fortnite-fan-and-not-just-for-the-profits-11600603200" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">recently described</a> PlayStation's focus on "targeting core gamers with immersive console games" as "something of a niche." Sony's goal is to make that niche as attractive and profitable as it can, and the PlayStation 5 seems well-positioned to do that.</p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="2">
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<a href="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNDc1Mzg2Ny9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYzMzQ1ODY1N30.MY5sCqMrSvSNuFLqIQi3RgAk7LTtuMRvq9t4Wpp2Kg8/img.jpg?width=980" target="_blank"><img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNDc1Mzg2Ny9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYzMzQ1ODY1N30.MY5sCqMrSvSNuFLqIQi3RgAk7LTtuMRvq9t4Wpp2Kg8/img.jpg?width=980" id="553b1" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="31d5c466ae3f6bf4f8929a88786dba64" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image"></a>
<small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="Add Photo Caption...">The PS5 controller shimmies and wiggles in your hand.</small>
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Photo: Sony
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</p><p>Meanwhile, it has <a href="https://www.protocol.com/microsoft-xbox-series-s-subscriptions" target="_self">been clear for a while</a> that Microsoft's approach to the next generation of gaming is fundamentally different. That difference comes through in the Xbox Series X experience, opening to the public on Tuesday. Unlike the PS5, the new Xbox never calls attention to itself. It just works. It works so well, so seamlessly, so powerfully, that at its best it just seems to disappear altogether. What's left is the game.<br></p><p>My touchstone Series X moment also involved music. After all, the dank beats kept thumping even as we careened across that damp moonlit hillside Saturday night.</p><p>I'll admit we had a couple drinks before I pulled out in the Audi TTS as the sun went down. An election will do that to you. And sure enough, I lost control in the dew coming over a crest and spun out across the field's clover. </p><p>At first I wanted to get back on the road right away. But sitting there a moment, watching the moon illuminate the translucent clouds over the valley and the hot air balloons lingering over the fairgrounds beneath, the stars and the music changed our minds. "Wait a minute," my friend said from the passenger seat, touching my arm.</p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="3">
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</div></p><p>So we just sat in the coupe on the hillside with A Tribe Called Quest, watching the cars below traverse the moonlight.</p><p style="margin-left: 40px;"><em>We on award tour with Muhammad my man</em></p><p style="margin-left: 40px;"><em>Going each and every place with the mic in their hand</em></p><p style="margin-left: 40px;"><em>Chinatown, Spokane, London, Tokyo</em></p><p>In reality, of course, there was no luxury ride and there were no balloons. I was not surveying a fog-shrouded valley. I was just sitting on a couch, looking at a $350 Toshiba 4K television, holding a video game controller. But the music was real. The feeling was real. The friend was real. The moment was real, thanks to the gorgeous new high-resolution sheen the Series X gives Forza Horizon 4, originally released two years ago.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
<img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNDc1NjE4My9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY3MjkyOTk0OH0.3NQ9MDzJYTVDptbqA3ytgaozf7LTthHBpziwxDZA0NY/img.png?width=980" id="3728a" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="e4a0c563e0dfd84f498d0266f02ce248" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image">
<small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="Add Photo Caption...">Forza Horizon 4 on the Xbox Series X</small><small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="Add Photo Credit...">Image: Seth Schiesel</small></p><p>Microsoft has deservedly taken some flak for not shipping an exclusive new game alongside the Series X and its less-powerful and expensive sibling, the Series S. I hardly noticed because what the Series X does on a 4K television with newly enhanced games like <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RUWlsnzMuY" target="_blank">Forza</a>, Gears 5, Sea of Thieves and Ori and the Will of the Wisps felt entirely fresh and engaging. I am a PC gamer by natural predisposition, but I play none of those games regularly on Windows. On the Series X and my cheap 4K TV, however, I am enjoying each of them immensely.<br></p><p>When I use the PS5, I feel like I'm buying into Sony's particular aesthetic of gameplay, which is disproportionately heavy on single-player, narrative-driven experiences. From Sony's first-party development slate to <a href="https://blog.playstation.com/2020/10/28/playstation-plus-collection-details-revealed--your-november-playstation-plus-games/" target="_blank">the collection of PS4 games</a> Sony included in its PlayStation Plus subscription for PS5 users, you see a ton of third-person platformers and action-adventure games and not a lot of shooters, strategy games, predominantly online games, simulations or other genres.<br></p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="4">
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</div></p><p>Even Astro's Playroom, which is meant to introduce and show off the PS5's new controller, is built around a very traditional, old-school notion of gameplay. Some folks have likened Astro's to Wii Sports, the motion-sensitive cornerstone of Nintendo's Wii, but the two games are deeply different in intent. Wii Sports succeeded brilliantly by making itself <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/24/arts/getting-everybody-back-in-the-game.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">immediately accessible to anyone who could swing a virtual bowling ball</a> — meaning the whole family. Astro's, however, is quite self-consciously a dexterity-dependent platformer that requires quite a bit of gamer reflexes, eye-hand coordination and muscle memory. Grandma at Thanksgiving is not going to be having fun with Astro's Playroom, and it's not meant for her. </p><p>By contrast, the new Xbox offers a broader range of experiences more easily and affordably. That's partly by virtue of the expansive Game Pass subscription plan, which includes hundreds of games, but also rests on the creative breadth of Microsoft's first-party development (<a href="https://news.microsoft.com/2020/09/21/microsoft-to-acquire-zenimax-media-and-its-game-publisher-bethesda-softworks/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">and acquisitions)</a> and the company's commitment to updating older Xbox games so they play better than ever on the new system.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
<a href="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNDc1NDI2My9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY2NjIwODEwMn0.LY5eRePvf5JQEFs7KQ3cUFImXox19X5cyshiOlw_7tM/img.png?width=980" target="_blank"><img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNDc1NDI2My9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY2NjIwODEwMn0.LY5eRePvf5JQEFs7KQ3cUFImXox19X5cyshiOlw_7tM/img.png?width=980" id="5b630" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="cdbc1436f0b8556e10ed08759fbaaf52" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image"></a>
<small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="Add Photo Caption...">Microsoft's approach to the next generation of gaming is fundamentally different from Sony's.</small>
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Image: Microsoft
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</div></p><p>It would be an oversimplification to call PlayStation a bespoke destination gaming experience while Xbox feels like a more powerful if generic gaming service layer, but not by much. (And it must be said that the petite Xbox Series S, which does not support 4K, definitely wins the new console Cutie Pie award.) While Sony polishes its vision of console gaming like a jewel, Microsoft is leveraging technology and cash to extend its vision of gaming across consoles, PC and mobile devices (via cloud).<br></p><p>At the start of the last console generation seven years ago, it felt like Microsoft tripped over itself before even reaching the starting gate, allowing Sony to coast by on Xbox's mistakes. The generation before that, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/20/arts/a-weekend-full-of-quality-time-with-playstation-3.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">the PlayStation 3 initially felt hobbled</a> by its own overambitious technical design and a subpar online service. </p><p>This time, both the new PlayStations and Xboxes feel like highly refined and carefully executed expressions of the brands, consumer approaches and business strategies of the companies behind them. They each deliver superb, but different, entertainment experiences. Most important, you can tell that the teams behind both platforms fully believe that the fundamental interactivity of gaming allows games to convey emotion in a fashion unmatched by other media, whether that means humming a GPU ditty or sitting on a hillside watching the moon.</p><p>And you can't ask any more of technology than to serve basic human emotion. Everything else is just efficiency.</p><div class="horizontal-rule"></div><p><strong>Full Astro's Playroom GPU Jungle lyrics (courtesy of Sony)</strong></p><p>Composer: <a href="https://www.kennyyoung.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Kenny Young</a></p><p><div class="ad-tag"><div class="ad-place-holder" data-pos="6">
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</div></p><p><em>GPU Jungle</em></p><p><em>Look at the light, it falls just right,</em></p><p><em>My shadows they please, beneath the trees.</em></p><p><em>But none of these things, happen for free,</em></p><p><em>Yeah all that you see, rendered by me.</em></p><p><em>I synthesize and rasterize immaterial things that I fabricate for you. For you.</em></p><p><em>Yes I tessellate and animate these dancing sprites and sun-lit skies for you.</em></p><p><em>I do it for you. I'm your GPU.</em></p><p><em>GPU. Tell me what to do and I'll do it for you.</em></p><p><em>GPU. Tell me what to do and I'll do it for you.</em></p><p><em>You've never wondered why, I catch your eye,</em></p><p><em>It's coz you overlook, all the choices I took.</em></p><p><em>I spend all of my time, deceiving and misleading you,</em></p><p><em>I like to surprise, with my virtual lies.</em></p><p><em>I synthesize and rasterize immaterial things that I fabricate for you. For you.</em></p><p><em>Yes I tessellate and animate these dancing sprites and sun-lit skies for you.</em></p><p><em>I do it for you. I'm your GPU.</em></p><p><em>[solo]</em></p><p><em>Yeah, I'm your GPU.</em></p><p><em>GPU. Tell me what to do and I'll do it for you.</em></p><p><em>GPU. Tell me what to do. Yes I do it all for you.</em></p>
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Seth Schiesel ( @SethSchiesel) is a contributing editor for Protocol focused on the business of video games and adjacent industries. He is a former editorial writer for The Boston Globe, entrepreneur and business reporter, technology writer and video game critic for The New York Times.
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