Hot Games for the Holidays

As we hit the holiday season of 2004 in full stride, every game developer and distributor is gearing up for the video game industry’s biggest quarter of the year.  Last year, the video game industry out-paced the movie industry by almost a billion dollars.  Half of the $10.5 billion sold in video games were purchased in the fourth quarter during the holiday season.  This year, expectations are high and several massive releases are culminating into what could be the record-breaking fourth quarter to end all quarters.

So far, we’ve already seen several highly successful franchises release their latest incarnations upon the world.  For the Xbox, Halo 2 has broken all sales records for a single entertainment release.  Figures have not come out for Grand Theft Auto’s latest sequel: San Andreas, though many industry experts are expecting that sales will trump Halo 2’s figures in the end.

On the PC horizon, the long wait is over as a whole slew of great games are about to get unleashed.  Fans have been waiting for over 6 years now in what is slated as the most highly anticipated PC release of all time: Half-Life 2.  Back in 1998, this FPS title by Valve smashed all sorts of records and dominated the entire year of PC game sales.  So far, over 8 million people have purchased a copy and it is currently the most popular multiplayer game of all time with an average of 100,000 users online simultaneously 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.