It’s a new ice age — for game-industry deals

The first nine months of 2015 were brutal for games deal makers, with total deal value (in dollars) across investments, mergers and acquisitions (M&As), and IPOs down 82 percent from last year. Of that decline, games investments fell the least at 35 percent below last year; games M&As deals dropped 74 percent, and the games IPO market evaporated.

These figures actually sound a little better than last quarter, when deals were down 89 percent, but the new numbers include two Chinese games companies that went private and delisted from NASDAQ this year. Exclude them, and the market is actually down 90 percent. The total market for game exits (selling companies or going IPO) was down 93 percent without the take-privates.