Indian gaming industry has finally come of age, thanks to the advanced gaming hardware, increasing penetration of high-speed Internet and casual gamers turning into serious gamers in the country.
The Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) feels that the gaming industry in India grew at a healthy pace over the past few years on account of increasing ‘adoption of advanced gaming technologies, rising income levels, changing game preferences among consumers, growing demand for mobile gaming and rising individual escapism.’ A 2017 report by TechSci Research for the CII on ‘Emerging Trends in India Gaming Industry’ says that economic growth has resulted in a scenario of unprecedented prominence for entertainment and digital content, driven by growing penetration of Internet and smart phones.
The gaming industry was valued at $543.08 million in 2016 and is projected to grow at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 6.61% in value terms over the next five years. Still, India accounted for only 0.55% of the global gaming industry. Increasing focus of gaming companies towards Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR)-related games in the country is expected to boost India gaming market further in coming five years.
The report says that India is becoming a popular outsourcing destination for gaming companies, on the back of abundant availability of skilled game developers and rapid surge in the country’s gaming market. With the emergence and growing adoption of 3G/4G network mobile services, coupled with increasing production of games, the gaming industry in the country is anticipated to grow significantly during the forecast period and reach $801 million by 2022. Rapid changes are expected to offer new opportunities for developers, publishers as well as technology partners in the future.
Evolving gaming consumers’ landscape along with increasing adoption of advanced gaming technologies are major characteristics of the gaming industry in the country. Console gaming accounted for the second largest share of 35.51% and computer gaming segment accounted for a share of 15.54% in India’s gaming market in 2016. Core gamers who do not intend to move to console gaming and make additional investments are driving the computer gaming industry in the country.
The highest preference in the country is for strategy games and it accounted for 16.30% of the India gaming market in 2016, followed by casual, action, sports and simulation games. Rising youth population base coupled with growing awareness about different strategy games among the audiences are boosting demand for strategy games market in India and the same trend is expected to continue during the forecast period as well.
Casual games too have not been far behind, it accounting for 14.82% share in the India gaming market in 2016. With increasing number of casual gamers in the country, the market share of these games in India is projected to reach 14.92% by 2022. Action games accounted for a share of 13.73% and sports and simulation games had a share of 8.52% and 6.33% respectively owing to low popularity of these games. Other key game types played in India include adventure, arcade, board, card, casino, educational, puzzle, all these together accounting for a substantive 40.30% share in the India gaming market in 2016.
