Netflix plans to focus on mobile games first

In a letter addressed to the company’s shareholders, Netflix announced its plans to enter the videogame market by focusing on mobile games at no additional charge for subscribers.

This announcement comes after the company mentioned some months ago its intent to enter the field of interactive entertainment.

“We view gaming as another new content category for us, similar to our expansion into original films, animation and unscripted TV,” says the document. “Games will be included in members’ Netflix subscription at no additional cost similar to films and series.”

Netflix may be on its way to join companies whose primary businesses do not focus in game development, like Apple and Google, but play an important roles related to gaming. However, the streaming service giant believes now it’s the right time to offer gaming via its service starting with mobile titles.

“Initially, we’ll be primarily focused on games for mobile devices. We’re excited as ever about our movies and TV series offering and we expect a long runway of increasing investment and growth across all of our existing content categories, but since we are nearly a decade into our push into original programming, we think the time is right to learn more about how our members value games.”

It seems like Netflix wants to play safe entering into the field of gaming.

Internet giant Google abandoned game development of its own for its Stadia service, while Amazon hasn’t been able to release any title yet, though it’s close to one now. Amazon’s New World PC game is scheduled for release on August 31. Amazon has previously cancelled The Lords of the Ring MMORPG and Crucible. The company did launch Amazon Luna cloud service and it has cooperated with Microsoft to bring Android apps (including games) from the Amazon Appstore to Windows 11.

It is still unknown what kind of mobile games the company will focus on and for what audiences. Netflix did state it is still “in the early stages of further expanding into gaming.”

You can check out the Netflix Q2 2002 Earnings Interview right here, including statements by Greg Peters, Chief Product Officer at Netflix, about Netflix and gaming starting at 27 minutes into the video. “Part of that will be games that extend our IPs. We think that’s a really rich, rich space, so that’s very much part of our long-term thesis. But also, we’ll do things where we try stand-along games.” The company will also work on licensing deals.

[Source]: Netflix: Netflix Investors: Home Page – [Archive]. 2021 Quarterly Earnings: Letter to Shareholders – [Archive]; Financial Statements – [Archive].