HA1 Task 1 - The Value Chain

1st Party Publishers
The corporate big hitters, the people who are connected directly to the industries best, Nintendo, Sony & Microsoft. A great example of one of these are EA, Sega & Microsoft studios, these companys are the big helpers, if theres a game they feel will be successfull they will undergo check and get a team of developers to make it more than just an idea. These companies are also included in the big fancial side of games marketing.

3rd Party Publishers
These gaming companys are the ones that work very close to the 1st party publishers like EA, an example of this is DICE, The company behind the Battlefield series, owned by EA and supported by the company a great deal with development and finance which results in a success of the games produced.

Developers
A video game developer is made up of either a group of people a whole business or at times a single individual, Most of the more develloped games are created by a business with a considerable ammount of workers. Some games developers specialise in one genre or platform an example of this is Game Freak the business behind pokemon which is exclusivly for nintendo consoles, another example is DICE, a company which specialise in first person shooters across platforms.Once the devellopers have a fair idea of the game and some tests have been worked on they will ask puplishers such as EA or Nintendo for support on releasing it.

Distribution & Retail
Distribution, One of the key aspects of marketing, distribution is the procedure of creating something and making it available to business using direct use of negotiation.
Retail is where the game is sold and how it gets there, an example of a retail games company is HMV, they do not specialise in just games but the majority of there profit is from customers buying games. HMV is given a stock of games from companys such as microsoft, nintendo and sony for them to sell and profit from the process.

Apps
Apps short for applications is a bundle of software not specific in anyway used across all platforms in all different ways, some are a bite size version of the real thing such as the BBC I Player available on mainly every platform, whilst a great deal of apps are used on mobile devices though such as the android apps from the google play store & the app store for a mixture of prices, there isnt a specific target audience for apps in general, an app can be many things from a cooking guide all the way to a place to socialise with friends or a heavily develloped & detailed game.

Press & Media

The press and media mainly consist of  magazines, radio , TV presenters and vlogs, as well as being very frustrating and a nuisance at times, the press review can also help with the development of a game or bug fixes which help the game get better. Because most of the gaming public by these magazines and comunicate with the video games press in some way, the devellopers can then reflect on what there fans think and further develop the game to make it more suited or less glitchy. An example of the video games press are IGN & OXM two companys who specialise in reviews, critisism & improvements in games.