Despite making records amount of money in 2025, the games industry is still somehow struggling, as physical games continue to slowly die out.
As much as some people continue to try and always buy physical media, the truth is that it has been getting less popular with every passing year, especially in terms of video games.
It’s why retailer GAME felt the need to pivot more into being a general toy shop… not that that helped as it’s since entered administration (again) and closed most of its stores.
Things are no better in the US, with a recent report revealing that spending on new physical games in all 2025 dropped by 11% compared to 2024 and only made a collective $1.5 billion (£1.12 billion).
That may sound like a lot of money but, according to Circana analyst Mat Piscatella, that’s the lowest recorded figure since 1995, when records began. The only upside is that the 11% decline isn’t as bad as the 28% drop in spending the previous year.
Even then, Piscatella attributes this to the launch of the Nintendo Switch 2 and the fact that ‘we’re nearing the bottom,’ adding that, ‘The peak for US new physical video game spending was 2008, at $11.6 billion. New physical video game spending has declined every year since.’
Expert, exclusive gaming analysis
Sign up to the GameCentral newsletter for a unique take on the week in gaming, alongside the latest reviews and more. Delivered to your inbox every Saturday morning.
There have been reports of younger generations turning to older forms of physical media, with a lot of British zoomers owning retro game consoles, but the reality is that these are still the overwhelming minority.
Piscatella’s comment about ‘nearing the bottom’ is also reflected in a recent industry report by Matthew Ball, CEO of analytics firm Epyllion, which detailed how the games industry is having to compete with other forms of digital entertainment, like gambling and pornography.
It was all rather bleak and Ball has since updated his report with even more depressing news; namely that despite what the figures might suggest, the games industry saw zero growth in 2025.
Last year, worldwide consumer spending grew to almost $10 billion (about £7.5 billion) – an all-time high 0 but that’s entirely down to Chinese publishers and platforms, services like PlayStation Plus, and Roblox.
‘The core thesis of that section is that headline growth rates cover up what has really been a shrinking revenue pool for most developers and publishers over the last six years,’ Ball explains in an interview with Game File.
In case it wasn’t already apparent, the lack of growth has publishers spooked, so they’re trying to make up for it in other areas. It’s a contributing factor to why the prices of games and consoles have gone up and why there’s ever more reliance on microtransactions – and the type of live service games that promotes them.
This isn’t even an entirely new phenomenon though, with Microsoft in particular worrying at the launch of the Xbox One that it needed to attract billions of players, not just millions. As such, publishers have long been squeezing more money out of consumers through microtransactions, pre-order DLC, and special editions. We’re just finally reaching the peak of it all.
Don’t miss Gaming news! Add us as a Preferred Source
As a loyal GameCentral reader, we want to make sure you never miss our articles when searching for gaming stories. We have all the latest video games news, reviews, previews, and interviews, with a vibrant community of highly engaged readers.
Click here and tick Metro.co.uk to ensure you see stories from us first in Google Search.
Since companies are struggling to reach new customers with their games, what’s likely to happen now is that they’ll double down on nickel and diming the customers they do have.
Aside from further price hikes, the next generation of consoles are expected to be especially expensive and despite how many live service games have met an early end recently the industry is unlikely to give up on the possibility of making the next Fortnite.
Just recently it was reported that Sony is stepping away from porting its games to PC, which suggests it’s focusing on making the PlayStation 5 and PlayStation 6 more enticing with major exclusives and thus drive up hardware sales, as well as placating existing fans unhappy with how things have worked out this generation.
Although the PC market has enjoyed far more growth than consoles in recent years, its future is looking dicey too, with ongoing memory shortages making gaming PCs increasingly costly.
Email gamecentral@metro.co.uk, leave a comment below, follow us on Twitter.
To submit Inbox letters and Reader’s Features more easily, without the need to send an email, just use our Submit Stuff page here.
For more stories like this, check our Gaming page.
