The video game industry had quite a year in 2007.
The Wii continued to shatter sales records - and a lot of expectations. PlayStation 3 continued to sell poorly - surprising no one. "Halo 3" was released, and it was the biggest opening weekend of all time. "World of Warcraft" got an expansion and increased its subscriber base into the 9 million range. "Portal" came out of left field and created a whole new way of playing a first-person shooter.
The average gamer would say that 2007 was the year gaming finally broke into the mainstream. The success of "Halo 3" lends a bit of credence to that theory. So far, it is still the top-grossing video game of all time. In its opening weekend, it brought in $170 million - making it the best opening weekend in entertainment history.
By the end of the first week, that figure rose to an even $300 million.
That's real money, even by Hollywood standards. If this trend continues, the pendulum may shift entirely, and the video game industry will outperform Hollywood.
It might not be this year - it might not even be this decade - but change is in the air, and the leaders of the entertainment industry know it.
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This is good and bad news for the game-playing public. With the budgets increasing, the quality of games will increase in general. The length of a game will suffer. The day of 40-hour epic games has nearly run its course.
Likewise, smaller studios will suffer. Either they will be forced to allow themselves to be bought up, or they can go into the self-imposed exile of flash-based puzzle games. Worst case scenario: They simply disappear, all of their developers spread out amongst the big three game developers.
On the subject of game developers, what once was a field full of smaller development houses has been pared down to three with merger of Activision Inc. and Vivendi Games. The new Activision Blizzard - so named after Blizzard Entertainment, easily the most recognizable of Vivendi's many development houses - has joined Electronic Arts and Ubisoft in a new triumvirate of game publishing.
The field shrunk even further with EA's acquisition of Canadian developer BioWare. While the console manufacturers still have a big stake in the software-development side of things, this shrinking of the field of competition could have a big effect on how even Microsoft and Sony do business. Nintendo is a bit more insulated from this, as much of their success is based on in-house game development.
Despite this, 2008 could be as big a year for gaming as 2007. The first real competition for "World of Warcraft" should come out this year, when EA's "Warhammer Online" finally hits the street. Blizzard plans to counter by releasing their second expansion, "Wrath of the Lich King."
"Soul Calibur 4" is coming out this year, with cameo appearances by Darth Vader and Yoda, not to mention online play. LucasArts will be releasing "Star Wars: The Force Unleashed," where gamers will get to fill the shoes of Darth Vader's apprentice.
Finally, the holy grail of role-playing games should hit the shelves sometime this year, when the long-anticipated "Fallout 3" is released.
It should be a good year.
