The DeanBeat: Thankful for gaming’s bubble and those who warn about it

I had a wonderful Thanksgiving and I hope you did too. Thank you for reading GamesBeat, VentureBeat, and my DeanBeat columns. Thanks also for participating in our community through our various events in mobile, games, and growth topics. I fully realize that we wouldn’t be in business if there wasn’t a vibrant startup industry in Silicon Valley, a strong game business as gaming goes global, and a lot of interest in must-attend events. We hope you’ll keep coming back, and we hope to keep offering the best straight talk on games and tech.

In gaming, I believe we should be thankful that the entire industry is thriving. The consoles are thriving thanks to red-hot competition between Sony’s PlayStation 4 and Microsoft’s Xbox One. The PC market is strong with free-to-play online games such as League of Legends and the rise of e-sports. Mobile games can now reach an audience of more than a billion people around the globe. And even Nintendo is showing signs of life with good games for the Wii U and Nintendo 3DS systems. Indie game developers have had a shot at the big time ever since Apple launched the App Store in 2008, allowing them to publish mobile games to a global market. Several market researchers believe gaming will grow from $70 billion in 2014 to $100 billion by 2017.