Worldwide digital games market: October 2017

Digital games revenue grows 15% worldwide in October. Players spent $8.5 billion across console, mobile and PC in October, up from $7.4 billion in the same month last year. Growth was underpinned by a 28% jump in premium PC thanks to Destiny 2’s successful BattleNet launch, and the continued blockbuster hit of PLAYERUNKNOWN’S Battlegrounds. Gains were also strong in mobile (19%) with the continued rise of major games like Honour of Kings.

Subscribers to the SuperData Arcade have access to detailed performance data on the world’s most popular digital games across PC, console and mobile.

• PLAYERUNKNOWN’s Battlegrounds sells another 5 million units. PUBG had its biggest month ever on the back of a seemingly unstoppable hype train. But has it met its match in Fortnite
• Destiny 2 has a solid release on PC. Destiny 2’s much-anticipated Blizzard Battle.net PC launch proves very successful. High attach rates for deluxe editions drove the average selling price up.
• Super Mario Odyssey launches on Switch. Mario sold 191,000 digital units in October, making it the biggest digital launch on Switch to date. However, digital download rates continue to lag those found on the Xbox and PlayStation consoles.

Single player games still have legs. While multiplayer-centric genres (FPS, MOBA, and Battle Royale) are in the spotlight, there is still room on the stage for single-player focused games. In October, South Park: The Fractured but Whole, Middle Earth: Shadow of War, and Assassin’s Creed: Origins collectively generated over $160M through digital full game sales. However, we don’t expect these games to have as much success in the long run, compared to the multiplayer genres, as it is generally harder to monetize through microtransactions in a single-player focused title.

Battle of the Battle Royales: PUBG vs Fortnite. While Fortnite has seen a higher out-of-the-gate active user base thanks to its F2P status, the game’s long-term success vs. its major and earlier-released rival is uncertain.

Epic is a veteran game development company and PLAYERUNKNOWN’s Battlegrounds’ first major—but certainly not last—competitor. Fortnite: Battle Royale’s MAU has grown larger than PUBG’s in the month of October across PC and console. Still, Fortnite’s total revenue is a fraction of PUBG’s due to the former being a free-to-play title compared to PUBG’s $30 price point. But Fortnite has a leg up on the additional content front, having already introduced cosmetic microtransactions through an in-game cash shop late in October. The challenge will be converting its higher user base into spenders.

December will be an important month for both games; PUBG will be releasing exclusively on XB1 on December 12th and will be leaving Steam Early Access on Steam in “late December” with a new map. Fortnite will, presumably, leverage their cash shop and introduce Christmas-themed cosmetics and will have to fight PUBG for user’s attention on XB1.

• Top 10 games by Platform:

PC:

1. League of Legends
2. PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds
3. Fantasy Westward Journey Online II
4. Destiny 2
5. Dungeon Fighter Online
6. Crossfire
7. World of Warcraft
8. World of Tanks
9. Middle-Earth: Shadow of War
10. ROBLOX

Console:

1. FIFA 18
2. Middle-Earth: Shadow of War
3. Destiny 2
4. Grand Theft Auto V
5. Assassin’s Creed Origins
6. NBA 2k18
7. Forza Motorsport 7
8. South Park: The Fractured But Whole
9. Madden NFL 18
10. Gran Tourismo Sport

Mobile:

1. Honour of Kings
2. Fantasy Westward Journey
3. Lineage M
4. Clash of Clans
5. Monster Strike
6. Lineage 2 Revolution
7. Fate/Grand Order
8. Clash Royale
9. Candy Crush Saga
10. King of Chaos

Where to bet on esports

There’s plenty to bet on this week but not all sites have every tournament and esport listed. Even if they do, it’s worth shopping around to see what good value esports betting odds are on offer. Here’s a rundown of what the esports bookies are up to this week.

Betway

So far this week, Betway has only listed odds for CS:GO, League of Legends and StarCraft 2. I’m sure they will release some more of their special bets, especially for the CS:GO DreamHack Malmotournament, as it’s clear they are big fans of the game.

Bet365

Bet365 has been pushing boundaries again this week by being the first major bookmaker to release odds for a Playerunknown’s Battlegrounds (PUBG) event, namely the PUBG Gamescom Invitational. Team SoloMid is currently the favorite at odds of 5/1 (6.00) with Cloud 9 and Team Liquid at 11/2 (6.50).

The majority of odds listed on Bet365’s site are League of Legends (LoL) games as they have a variety of markets for each event. As an example, for the LCK Regional Qualifiers alone, there are 20 different bet types.

SkyBet

SkyBet has a healthy selection of LoL games on offer as well as odds for the CS:GO Pro League, Dota 2 Pro Dota Cup, StarCraft 2 – Global League and Hearthstone LB Brawl. Although its odds aren’t always the most competitive, SkyBet does have some markets available that many other bookmakers don’t.

Pinnacle

Pinnacle has similar esports available to SkyBet this week but with the addition of some markets for the Warcraft 3 – Golden Championship Series. There is a variety of CS:GO tournaments on offer at Pinnacle but as usual, very few betting markets to choose from. Interestingly, its only CS:GO matches are of the Star Challenge tournament, despite there being multiple better options to choose from.

Unikrn

At the time of writing, Unikrn has markets for CS:GO, StarCraft 2 and LoL. I would expect more from an esports-specific bookmaker but fingers crossed Unikrn adds some more odds to the site throughout the week.

Betspawn

Betspawn is certainly one of my favorites again this week, with great odds and a ton of esports tournaments to choose from. There are odds for eight different CS:GO tournaments listed on the site already, as well as odds for Dota 2, LoL, Hearthstone, StarCraft 2, Heroes of the Storm, Warcraft and Crossfire. It is a seriously underrated bookmaker and always worth looking at when deciding whom to bet with.

GG.bet

GG.bet seems to be releasing its PUBG odds a little later in the week, perhaps taking notes from Bet365, which was the first to list odds for the event. Elsewhere on the site, there’s plenty to choose from in multiple esports, despite missing a few decent tournaments from the list.

Unibet

I mentioned last week that Unibet was worth keeping an eye on when comparing odds, and that’s still sound advice. Its odds will move regularly and sometimes you can pick up some great value on top esports matches. For this week so far, it has listed odds for CS:GO, StarCraft 2 and LoL.

In British Columbia Canada ?

You can check out our local BCLC site : https://www.playnow.com/ for wagering on all your esports action.

How eSports betting works

• Learn how a bookmaker works
• How to compare eSports odds & payouts
• Why payouts are the key to profit

How does a bookmaker work?

Bookmakers work out the probability – the chance – of popular events occurring, like the English Premier more obscure stuff like betting on Brexit or who’ll win eSports matches. They turn that probability into odds which punters can place eSports bets on, but crucially bookmakers offer slightly poorer odds than the real probability of either side winning.

Bookmakers work by offering slightly poorer eSports odds than the real probability of either side winning.

Say CS:GO Team A are playing CS:GO Team B. They have played 10 times recently, with Team A winning six times and losing four times.

Keeping it really simply and assuming conditions are the same, basic probability would suggest that Team A has a 60% chance of winning (6 / 10 * 100), while Team B has a 40% chance.

Bookmakers wants to make a profit so rather than offering odds that reflect the probability (based on the form) they exaggerate each team’s chances. So bookmaker odds for the matchup may suggest a 62% chance of Team A winning and 42% for Team B.

This is how that looks with Decimal odds (which most European bookmakers use).

Fair Assessment

• Team A
• 6 wins / 10 matches
• 60% Chance
• Decimal Odds of 1.66
• Team B
• 4 wins from 10 matches
• 40% Chance
• Decimal odds of 2.50

Bookmaker Assessment

• Team A
• 6.2 wins / 10 matches
• 62% Chance
• Decimal Odds of 1.61
• Team B
• 4.2 wins from 10 matches
• 42% Chance
• Decimal odds of 2.38

Now you might think ‘If I bet on Team A and they win I am still quids in!’ That is true, but because you aren’t getting paid out in true proportion to the riskiness of your bet, if you keep placing more bets over time the bookmaker’s edge will eventually mean that you will lose.

Imagine flipping a coin with a friend that is slightly biased towards heads. The coin would land on both sides, but heads would show up slightly more than chance, and if you kept flipping you would eventually lose your shirt.

The cost of placing a bet

That amount that the odds are tweaked – the edge the bookmaker has in their favour – is called the margin. That is the cost to the bettor of placing a bet.

If you go back to the example above the sum of the Fair Assessment of the chances of Team A and Team B is 100%. But in the Bookmaker Assessment the total chances are 104%. The margin is therefore 4% in the bookmaker’s favour. So long as they take bets on both sides in proportion to the odds they will make 4% of the total sum of bets.

This should ring some bells with anyone who has used skin-betting sites because they are doing a very similar thing by a change a commission on bets.

Why payouts are so crucial

When you look at the eSports odds comparison tables on Beo we display the Payout for each matchup, rather than Margin. The higher the Payout the better the value. Margin shows the odds from the bookmaker perspective – what they take – whereas the Payout is what you, the bettor, gets. Payout is the inverse of Margin, so a 4% margin means a 96% payout.

What this means is that if you bet £100 across both sides, in proportion to the odds, (not advisable) you would only get £96 back. The Payout is the only way to compare eSports odds, so you should pay close attention to it when you choose where to place your eSports bets. It isn’t the only consideration, but it is one of the most important.

CS:GO ODDS

eSports Betting - CSGO, LOL Dota 2 Best Betting Site - Pinnacle Sports

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