Gaming may have endured a difficult 2024, but it remains the single biggest entertainment market in the world, worth approximately US$500 billion a year. Malaysia alone has a market of approximately US$2 billion a year and has one of the most active and developed mobile gaming markets around.

2024 did see the continued emergence of P2E gaming, as well as experiments with in-platform advertising. 2025 will see these trends, along with the use of AI, continue, along with the turn to live service games and VR.

1. Crypto And P2E Games Will Become More Immersive

The gaming market includes mobile, PC, and console gaming. It also incorporates iGaming at online casinos. Casino sites and apps have seen similar development to mainstream video games, with sites embracing technologies like cryptocurrency and blockchain (source: https://casinobeats.com/online-casinos/malaysia/). According to casino expert Wilna van Wyk, currencies like Bitcoin, USDT, and Ether have become popular thanks to their instant deposits and withdrawals. And cryptocurrency’s use isn’t reserved solely for the gambling sub-section of the gaming market.

Play-to-earn (P2E) games are built on blockchain and reward gamers with cryptocurrency or other blockchain-based assets for time spent playing a game or for reaching certain milestones. The games themselves are improving, with greater immersion and more enjoyable gameplay now featuring, and this will continue in 2025, while cryptocurrency will also become a more important payment method for game subscriptions and online games.

2. AI Will Continue To Take Center Stage

AI is used widely across the entertainment industry. There has been a lot of controversy surrounding its use in games.

On the one hand, generative AI can be used to quickly and cheaply produce in-game assets including artwork, audio, and even voiceovers. It is also widely used in marketing, and AI chatbots offer the same cost- and time-saving benefits as in media production.

On the other hand, critics say that the way generative AI gathers information and learns is tantamount to intellectual theft, and a lot of creatives fear for their careers.

Whichever side of the debate you fall on, the fact is that AI can save companies a lot of money and enable rapid deployment of games. This combination means that we will see AI’s continued use in game development, and it will see deployment in gaming businesses.  

3. VR And AR Emergence

Immersion is key to the success of most games. Immersive games draw players in and encourage them to spend longer playing the games themselves. Achieving immersion in traditional gaming can be difficult, requiring the use of high-quality audio, believable visuals, and exceptional gameplay.

Modern technologies can be used to further enhance immersion and one area where this is especially evident is in the offering of Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) experiences.

VR has taken a while to really take off with gamers, but the launch of new headsets from companies including Sony and Apple, as well as the continued development of new VR games means it is beginning to enjoy traction. 2025 will likely see the launch and porting of more games to VR, and it will emerge as a desirable trend in iGaming.

4. Expect More Live Service Games

Dragon Age: Veilguard enjoyed a relatively modest reception on launch, and it would be fair to say it has underperformed for makers EA. Head of the gaming company, Andrew Wilson, has said he believes the reason for its underperformance was that it did not include live service features. A live service game is updated with new content like challenges and maps on the fly rather than through periodical DLC.

Whether players really do want more live service games remains questionable, but it is clear that some game makers, albeit not all, think that’s what gamers want. This means we can expect yet more games to launch with live service, and we may also see game makers attempting to bolt live service elements onto existing games. Especially if they haven’t performed as well as the company originally hoped.

5. In-Platform Advertising Will Become More Prominent

Xbox and PlayStation owners may have noticed the gradual introduction of in-platform ads over the past year. Both Microsoft and Sony are looking for ways to further enhance their earnings, and one method they have identified is through increased advertising.

Expect, in 2025, to see more advertisements on your gaming platform home screen and on the home screen of services like Steam and more. If done well and unobtrusively, most gamers won’t have too much of a problem with this, although there will be those who believe paying nearly $1,000 for new hardware and hundreds of dollars a year for an ongoing live service subscription should mean they don’t have to face any additional advertising.