Unlike the broader PC market, which continues shrinking, gaming PC sales are projected to increase over the next couple of years. According to NVIDIA, PC gaming accounts for nearly 40% of the overall gaming business. This percentage is higher than those for consoles, phones, tablets, phones, or any other individual gaming fragment. PC gaming has seen a renaissance, partly thanks to superior graphics and processing but also the meteoric rise of the eSports scene and free-to-play games. Jon Peddie, president of Jon Peddie Research (JPR), notes that “NVIDIA, Intel, and AMD have enthusiast CPUs and GPUs that are so powerful, when combined with SSD’s and fast memory they absolutely trounce the computing power and gaming capabilities of the newest console generation.” Gaming has become one of the cornerstones of the entire home and personal PC market. $1000 video cards are flying off the shelves, exciting and demanding new technologies like 4K and VR are on the horizon, and gamers are upgrading in accordance. As major companies evaluate their marketing and R&D budgets, JPR is seeing more investment in gaming oriented designs, and more money spent advertising to this group of consumers. JPR estimated that the gaming hardware market is expected to grow to $30 billion by 2018. Now, the PC industry is betting BIG on gamers and core gamers are expected to drive recorded growth for PC games. In this report, I hope you can learn how eSports are saving the PC industry and how PC hardware vendors can take advantage of this growing opportunity.

1. PC Gaming Market & eSports Industry
- The only BIG thing in the PC industry now
Prepared by Kevin Huang
Oct 30, 2015

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“Games are art”
is action, not belief.

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Worldwide PC Shipments Decline Again in Q3 2015
Source: Gartner (October 2015)

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Jon Peddie, president of Jon Peddie Research (JPR), notes that
“NVIDIA, Intel, and AMD have enthusiast CPUs and GPUs that are
so powerful, when combined with SSD’s and fast memory they
absolutely trounce the computing power and gaming capabilities
of the newest console generation.”
“Being able to drive 3840 × 2160
(4K) at acceptable frame rates is
already a reality for the highest
end configurations and the mass
market is now able to push 2560
× 1440. PC Gamers with good
displays are able to enjoy millions
and millions of pixels more than
console gamers get on HDTVs.
This translates into being able to
see more and a better gaming
experience.”

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Intel Said

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Intel Said

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Intel Said

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NVIDIA Said

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NVIDIA Said

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PC – The Most Important Gaming Platform
http://goo.gl/w3qKDj

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"
is considered the gold
standard in PC gaming and
many prefer even faster
speeds, at least twice that
number if VR is involved. “ -
Jon Peddie, President of JPR
Gaming In 4K: The Future Is Now

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Gaming Hardware Market to Grow to $30B by 2018
http://goo.gl/gDAxf2

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PC Gaming Market Landscape in 2017 by Segment
Gaming Hardware Market to Grow to $30B by 2018
(continued)
(numbers in millions)

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Gaming PCs – So Cool & Beautifully Designed

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Basic Parts of A Gaming PC

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Gaming PC Accessories

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Immerse Yourself In the Action with These
Best Gaming Monitors
THE NEXT BIG THING
IN GAMING

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Impressive PC Case Mods – Beyond Your Imagination

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Major US Custom PC Builders

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The PC Industry Is Betting Big on Gamers
http://goo.gl/mjlKRP
“That will be comforting to Acer, Asus, and
Lenovo in the near term, but eventually
they'll all need to make the transition to
having mobile PC lineups at least as strong
as their desktop and laptop ranges — either
that or they too might be swallowed up by
the same profit black hole that already
consumed Sony's PC division.”

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Core Gamers are Expected to Drive Record Growth
for PC Games
https://goo.gl/VZB2Xw
“The recipe that keeps PC gaming on
top is simple: the platform is accessible
to all markets, and especially so with
the free-to-play and freemium content;
the hardware continues to evolve with
gamers’ lifestyles, offering more choice
and freedom; and, due to the ubiquity of
PC’s globally, it’s easier to share,
communicate and be more sociable with
friends and family. These same factors,
in part, also help explain the meteoric
rise of eSports.”
“Much of the growth is driven by pure demographics. We continue to identify
a core group of consumers for whom playing on the PC is a major pastime,”
said DFC analyst David Cole. “This is, in fact, a fairly new demographic that
skews highly male and is only increasing in buying power.”

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“
, which has become
the only way to play some of the best-looking and
most popular games in the industry and to enjoy
some of the most cutting-edge features online
gaming has to offer. And later this year, that will
also be the only way to play high-quality virtual
reality games, offering players the opportunity to
strap on a headset and transport themselves to all
manner of imaginary worlds.”
There's another thing going the PC's way: A trend
called -- competitive gaming between
highly trained professional gamers -- has become
an international phenomenon grabbing the
attention of tens of millions of people. The top
competitive games are available only on a PC:
Riot's League of Legends and Valve's Dota 2.
Playing Games on the PC Is Making a
Comeback

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How eSports Are Saving the PC Industry
http://goo.gl/Kqt9wi
PC gaming has been hounded by an
ominous narrative for almost as
long as it's existed: it's dying, soon
to be replaced by smaller, more
convenient, more consumer-
oriented gaming devices, or even
phones. Recently, this idea has
completely gone out the window:
“A handful of games are driving this enormous resurgence: Defense of the Ancients 2
(1,262,612 daily players), Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (819,902 players), and of
course, the massive League of Legends which boasts an astounding 27 million daily
players. Most of these games are MOBA (Multiplayer Online Battle Arena) style games.
MOBAs are fast-paced, competitive, team-based action games that follow different
(mostly free) business models and content delivery mechanisms. That free-to-play, pay
for extras model keeps people hooked.”

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Resistance Is Futile: eSports Is Massive ... and Growing
http://goo.gl/Zro0so
SO HOW BIG is this gaming thing? Let's start with this:
, according to market
research firm Newzoo -- meaning that if the eSports nation were actually a
nation, it would be the fifth largest in the world. (They're coming for you
next, Indonesia!) And while eSports have long been biggest in Asia,
especially gaming-mad Korea, North America and Europe now claim 28
million eSports fans and the number is growing by 21 percent a year.

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TWITCH, a video-streaming site that boasts 55 million users, is
arguably the most important contributor to eSports' recent growth.
Offering streams of games and tourneys and access to gaming's
stars, it's also where the next generation of would-be gamers post
their own streams. And apparently someone's watching.

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THE GAMER STEREOTYPE? Young, single, male ... and living
in some sort of basement. In actuality, according to Newzoo, more than
half of American eSports fans are employed full time, 44 percent are
parents and, perhaps most surprising, 38 percent are women (another
study puts it at 44 percent). One part of the stereotype does ring true,
though: eSports fans do tend to be young. Just 28 percent are over 35-
which, of course, is a selling point to advertisers looking to reach the
next generation of consumers.

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PEOPLE WATCH this thing? Well, in a word, yes. When Major
League Gaming launched in the early 2000s, its tournaments played out
in hotel ballrooms before ... dozens of fans. Today, eSports' biggest
tournaments rival practically any sporting event. The League of Legends
Championship sold out Staples Center in 2013, then sold out the
40,000-seat World Cup Stadium in Seoul a year later while drawing an
online audience of 27 million -- more than the TV viewership for the
final round of the Masters.

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PRESENTED WITHOUT comment: as an overall category,
gaming has more YouTube followers than news, movies and
education combined.

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MAMAS, DO let your babies grow up to be eGamers. These five, all
members of team Newbee, totaled $5.03M for winning the 2014 Dota 2
title. The prize pool has increased by more than 580 percent since 2012.

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Top 20 Core PC Games I Sept 2015
Based on number of unique game sessions in North America and Europe*

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Who Is the Core PC/MMO Gamer?

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eSports Revenues to Hit $465M in 2017
Newzoo expects market to
more than double, compares
audience size to NFL
The eSports market, already worth $194
million per year, is set to more than double
in size by 2017 according to a "conservative
scenario" from research firm Newzoo,
which pins a predicted value of $465
million on the sector within two years.
http://goo.gl/NeIUap

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-

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A Map of the eSports Market
https://goo.gl/5TguaP

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eSports Expand Into the Mainstream, and
Sponsorship Dollars Follow
The Coca-Cola Co. in 2014 is titling
the Coke Zero Challenger Series, a
new development series for the
League of Legends Championship
Series. The partnership supports
the brand’s tie-in with video games
and related platforms.
http://goo.gl/OdrF58

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Corporate Interest in eSports Is Largely Driven
by Three Factors
Access to a hard-to-reach demographic. Competitive gaming provides
access to young adult males, a demographic that does not traditionally watch TV.
Sixty-nine percent of PC/MMO gamers are men, with 21 percent between 26 and 30
years of age, according to Newzoo, a market research and consulting firm that
specializes in the gaming community.
A large participant base. The size of the electronic sports community is
staggering. Case in point: 32 million people play League of Legends each month.
Global reach. Electronic sports tournaments can provide sponsors global reach
through live video streams of both online and off-line tournaments.
Most tournaments stream competitions through their own web sites or Twitch.TV, a
streaming platform dedicated to the gaming market. And viewership of live games is
growing: The Electronic Sports League recorded 81.3 million view sessions on Twitch
in 2013, up from 5.4 million in 2009.
Electronic sports properties also can provide reach through social media. World of
Warcraft has 5.3 million Facebook likes, League of Legends has 4.1 million likes
while Dota 2 has 1.4 million likes.

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Future of Gaming: 5 Exciting Emerging Trends
http://goo.gl/Owwif
1. Immersive Gaming: The Return of Virtual Reality (VR)
2. Secondary Screens for Gaming

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3. Open-Source Gaming

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4. Augmented Reality (AR)
Eventually we may even have a gaming
session with wearable UI like Google
Glass where you don’t even need to hold
up a console or device, and playing a
game almost feels like you’re on the
ground in the gaming realm.

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5. Cloud Gaming
With Cloud Gaming, we need not wait
forever to get updates to high-quality
games. It’s all in the cloud and all we have
to do is connect to it with a stable Internet
connection and play to our heart’s content.
Games will also be cheaper and more
easily accessible via computers and even
tablets. How much longer need we wait for
this? In August 2012, Sony has purchased
Gaikai the world’s largest and most
widespread cloud gaming service for $380
million and is incorporated it into
PlayStation 4.

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Appendix

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At the Oculus Connect developer
summit in Los Angeles, Oculus VP of
product Nate Mitchell gave attendees a
number of product updates. Most
notable was the “Oculus Ready”
program, which will help PC
manufacturers denote which models
will be able to deliver a satisfying VR
experience when used with the Rift
headset. Asus, Dell, and Alienware will
all be releasing Oculus Ready
configurations at what Mitchell
termed “varying price points”—but
notably, all three will have rigs for less
than $1,000, and all three will have
options as bundling options for Rift
purchasers when the headset becomes
available in the first quarter of 2016.
'Oculus Ready' PC Program Offers VR-ready Rigs
for Less Than $1,000
http://goo.gl/wgan6M

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Acer to Attack Gaming Market with Predator Line
of PC Products
http://goo.gl/62R4BS

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HP – Let the Games Begin
HP Returning to PC Gaming Hardware Market with Omen
http://goo.gl/JvUwy3
HP dropped out of the gaming market years ago,
but their new notebook marks a shift in the
companies goals.
The Omen is a 15.6″ laptop with an Intel Core i7
CPU, GeForce 860M graphics, 8GB of RAM, a
128GB SDD and a 1920 x 1080 display. Nothing
overly fancy or innovative there, but it’s certainly
going to pack enough performance punch to run
high-end PC games.
It’s milled from a solid piece of aluminum, with
tapered edges and a speaker grill down each side.
The keyboard features red LED backlighting and
six programmable function keys. The whole unit is
just 20mm thick and weighs 4.68 pounds (2.1kg).
The Omen will be available from the 4th
of November online and in retail stores a
few weeks afterwards. Prices are
expected to be $1,499 for the base model.
It certainly looks gorgeous, but we’ll wait
and see how it performs in benchmarks.

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Lenovo Eyes Up PC Gaming Market with New
Y Series
Crafted for the growing population of working gamers who now demand a powerful and
stylish machine that can move with them through their life from day to play. The family
of new Y series devices and accessories have been built to serve mature gamers in their
professional and social life, says Lenovo.

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The Alienware Steam Machine Was Born Out of a
Desire to Evolve the Gaming Ecosystem
http://goo.gl/X52MJG

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Steam Reportedly Raked in $1.5bn in Revenue
in 2014
http://goo.gl/5Ah3A1
According to market data firm SuperData, they recently released numbers to The Know in
which it was revealed that in 2014 alone, Valve managed to pull in about $1.5 billion in
revenue from Steam. SuperData revealed that about $400 million alone was brought in by
Valve’s own games such as DotA 2, Team Fortress 2, and Counter-Strike Global Offensive.
Also given that Steam, just like most app stores, takes a 30% cut from sales of other
games by other developers, it has been estimated that these royalties are around the
$330 million mark. It’s interesting that despite the fact that games like DotA 2 are free,
they still manage to pull in quite a bit of money, largely thanks to its in-game purchases
for vanity items.
Of course at the moment the king of MOBAs is still Riot Games’ League of Legends,
which last we heard raked in a very cool $1 billion in 2014 alone, which is two-thirds of
what Valve made on Steam overall.
Multiplayer Online Battle Arena (MOBA)
Massively Multiplayer Online (MMO)

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Amazon Enters PC Gaming Market, Seeks
Game Developers
http://goo.gl/nWKT3V

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Downloadable Titles Make Up 92% of PC Games Market
http://goo.gl/Aql5XJ
Up from 48 percent of the market in 2010, thanks in large part to free-to-play.
A full 92 percent of PC game sales in 2013 came from digital downloads, as DFC Intelligence recently
told British tech site PCR…….. it lines up with other numbers reported throughout the industry. Last
year (2013), Payday 2 publisher Starbreeze announced that 80 percent of its 1.58 million first-month
sales came from downloads, for instance. And let's not forget the scores of PC games that are totally
ignoring retail sales for 100 percent downloadable releases these days, from Dota 2 to Day Z.
Download-dominated PC gaming is a newer phenomenon than some gamers might realize. As recently
as 2010, analyst firm NPD was estimating that downloads made up only 48 percent of all PC game
sales.
One possible reason for the sharp increase over the last four years is money brought in from newly
ascendant free-to-play and microtransaction-driven PC games. In April, a DFC report on the PC games
market found that free-to-play games, especially MOBAs like League of Legends and Dota 2, were
driving heavy increases in overall PC game spending, pushing it above overall console game spending
for the first time in recent memory.
The market for game downloads looks very different in the console space, where analyst firm EEDAR
estimates that downloads make up less than 20 percent of game sales (though the group sees that
proportion growing to 50 percent by 2018). Last month, EA revealed that "full game downloads" make
up only 10 to 15 percent of its console game business.
Despite the download's victory on PC, few gamers seem to have given up disc-based games entirely
across the industry. An NPD survey earlier this year found that only 16 percent of US gamers played
downloadable games exclusively across consoles, PC, and mobile.

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“The future of gaming isn’t mobile any more than the future of
gaming is console or PC: the future of gaming is gaming.
Devices that are getting increasingly good at talking to each other
and developer tools that work across different platforms are only
going to further unify what currently feel like disparate markets, and
the games will follow. The companies that truly reap the benefits
from that shift are going to be the ones that use their skill and
knowledge of game design to figure out new experiences that gamers
want, regardless of the platform — look at Minecraft, which is neither
a mobile game nor a console game nor a PC game: it’s all three.”
Mobile Isn't the Future of Gaming
(And Consoles Aren't Either)
http://goo.gl/6KLgaF