According to the Wall Street firm KeyBanc Capital Market, players are overreacting to the EA Star Wars Battlefront II controversy.
“We view the negative reaction to Star Wars Battlefront 2 (and industry trading sympathy) as an opportunity to add to Electronic Arts, Take-Two, and Activision Blizzard positions. The handling of the SWBF2 launch by EA has been poor; despite this, we view the suspension of MTX [micro-transactions] in the near term as a transitory risk.”
Wingren continued by saying that despite the reaction, video game players aren’t overcharged, they’re undercharged, and that the contention and blowback were a result of a “perfect storm for overreaction” given the parties involved included EA, the Star Wars franchise, Reddit, and “purist gaming journalists/outlets” who disapprove of micro-transactions.
Since the Star Wars controversy, EA stocks have dropped 9 per cent, with the main being culprit being micro-transactions according to Wall Street experts. Taking a look at the metrics of game data sales, the average $60 game plus an additional $20 for micro-transactions is about 40 cents for 2.5 hours of gameplay a day. Watching television is an estimated 60 to 65 cents per hour, or 80 cents per hour for a movie rental.
“If you take a step back and look at the data, an hour of video game content is still one of the cheapest forms of entertainment,” he wrote. “Quantitative analysis shows that video game publishers are actually charging gamers at a relatively inexpensive rate, and should probably raise prices.”
“Despite its inconvenience to the popular press narrative, if you like Star Wars and play video games at an average rate, you’re far better off skipping the movie and playing the game to get the most bang for your buck,” Wingren added.
Wingren did not comment on the even more controversial “loot box” uproar, but following the report Activision Blizzard shares dropped 0.8 per cent Monday, Electronic Arts declined 1.4 per cent, and Take-Two fell 0.5 per cent.
