Here is why gaming is going to come down to a few mega-platforms with subscription for all the AAA and indie gaming you want.

First of all, for a HUGE swath of gamers who grew up on mobile, they expect games for free.

The phone market shows gaming can be free and beat out PC gaming and edge out console for market share and $$$.

You literally don't have to charge a dime upfront and you can generate enough revenue to dwarf PC gaming in size.

Normies will pay and keep pumping quarters into games they like through in-app purchases.

Next, content is consolidating. Look at Microsoft buying up every studio in sight. Classic big names like Sega are rumored to be up for sale.

Why? Because distribution is becoming centralized again. This is happening in all industries, not just gaming.

As @adamscrabble points out, it's all headed towards centralization and cartels. Gaming is no exception. This is why Amazon is in it too.

But these content networks need... content... and lots of it.

Amazon already sells as many books that can be made. Kindle unlimited is a subscription service that lets you read a lot of books for free.

This demanded that writers produce more and more books and also created a thriving indie writers scene. (cont)

Indie writers found that the more books they could make to feed the Amazon machine, the higher their ranking and the more they sold. This worked really well initially, as anyone early to the game was able to build up a brand and a pipeline.

The books were free but they earned money from pageviews and then, audible sales per unit.

But just like mobile, this advantage went to the early movers.

Eventually, just like mobile, it got crowded. More had to be spend on marketing.

Gaming has one big thing that indie books didn't...ongoing monetization.

Games on these mega-platforms (Gameflix), are going to feature a lot of in-game purchases. This is how they will make the money back. A game takes millions to make vs a book. But it's a similar play.

Many consumers, and an aging gamer population with families, are going to gravitate towards monthly sub "all you can game plans." When you have kids and a gaming spouse, I know I'm not eager to pay $60 x 3-5 copies just so the whole family can game together.

Younger gamers will see no problem with this either. They are used to games being totally free on mobile. 5-8 bucks a month to play all the latest games is going to be much more manageable for young gamers without much cashflow.

Streaming games is going to work for a lot of games too, but as a feature, not a product.

Streaming games is a convenience to be able to continue playing your fav game away from your PC or console. It won't take over, but it will be an expected feature for any Gameflix platform

While concern about digital rights and the risk of losing your games through bans, sub cancellation, etc. is very, very valid...

time and again we've seen that the vast majority of people just don't care. Convenient and easy and mostly free always wins.

If you aren't convinced that people choose convenience and "free" over anything else, just look at how many people don't give a crap about their data being harvested when they use free services like Facebook.

Nobody care, unfortunately.

So I do see these sub models as inevitable and highly profitable.

I also see a great, early opportunity for indie devs to get into this.

If they can make enough content (either through game updates or multiple, smaller games) they will win big.

But later on the window will close and Indies will find it much harder on these platforms. They too, will eventually solidify around the biggest indie makers, and new entrants will have to spend a lot of marketing $$$ or get boosted in order to sell.

Xbox is making the smartest play here with the Xbox gaming pass and hardware combined. Long term, unless Sony adopts a similar aggressive plan and vision like this, Xbox will be the dominant platform of this next generation of consoles.