The DeanBeat: How to achieve total world domination and make a trillion dollars in games

Every year, the naysayers warn about a financial bubble in the game business. They sit on the sidelines and wait for the world to fall apart. But it still looks like they’re missing out. The game business is still on track to grow from $70 billion now to $100 billion by 2017.

Venture investors have put about $472 million into game startups in the first half of this year, according to boutique investment bank Digi-Capital. But exits are already running past $10 billion so far this year, thanks to the most recent $960 million acquisition of the social game assets of FunPlus. That’s already more than double the number of acquisition dollars in 2013. Most of the buyers are Asian game companies acquiring players in other territories, but the biggest deal here reflected a tech titan moving into gaming: Amazon’s $970 million purchase of gameplay livestreaming firm Twitch. With big companies like game engine and services firm Unity Technologies up for sale, it’s easy to see how the record year could get even bigger.