NEW YORK: Amazon.com Inc had long struggled to make a good video game. Now that it finally has a hit release, the company is predicting a bright future for that business.
Games could end up being the largest entertainment category over the long haul, Andy Jassy, the chief executive officer, said at a technology conference.
It’s a bold pronouncement for a company with almost a decade of failures in gaming and one that just renewed its commitment to the movie business in the form of an US$8.45bil (RM35.31bil) acquisition of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
A week ago, Amazon released New World, an online computer game where archers and axe wielders colonise a mythical land.
Jassy said it’s off to a “great start” and has a couple million active players a day.
Interest from gamers and from viewers on Amazon’s livestreaming website Twitch has sustained over the last week, and the first four online reviews were generally positive, with an average score of 81% on the aggregator website Metacritic.
Even before Jassy became CEO in July, he oversaw Amazon’s effort to break into video games.
The division, which debuted in 2012, faced years of turmoil.
“There were a lot of articles written, people saying things like, Amazon knows how to build everything but games, why can’t they build games?” Jassy said at the event hosted by the Seattle tech news site GeekWire.
“It takes a few before you find a hit, or several, but they didn’t lose their resolve.”
Amazon released its first major video game title Crucible in May 2020. It was met with scathing reviews, and the company quickly retreated. It scrapped Crucible entirely a year ago and gave customers refunds. “You’re going to have some games fail spectacularly,” Jassy said. — Bloomberg
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