Relationship between Performance Ratings and Sales of Video Games

Relationship between Performance Ratings and Sales of Video Games (Team Research and
Development)

Relationship between Performance Ratings and Sales of Video Games (Team Research and
Development)
Abstract
The research in this study aims at determining the relationship between the video games’ sales
and, the critic and gamer ratings of the games. The correlation analysis statistical technique is
applied in this research to obtain the strength and type of relationship between sales and the
ratings globally and in different regions across the world. The analysis in this study infer that
there is a weak directly proportional relationship between the sales and ratings of the video
games, with the relationship stronger for the case of the critic ratings both globally and in
different regions around the world. The analysis also reveal that there is a strong directly
proportional relationship between the user and gamer ratings.
Introduction
Video gaming has increasingly become a profitable industry with the spread of access to internet
and technology across the world (Laudon & Guercio, 2014). This spread has enabled video
gaming to move from single and two gamers to multi gamers irrespective of locations. The
technology has enabled huge improvements in graphics as well as the hardware for better user
experience while the internet is responsible for allowing a multi user interface in the video
games, which make it possible for players in completely different locations around the world to
play in the same video game (Pursell, 2015; Trottier, 2017). A better user experience and
global exposure of video games has resulted in increased revenues for the video gaming industry.
Revenue generating avenues within the industry such as professional gaming that attracts
advertisements, sponsorships and TV rights for airing have been the major drivers of the success
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Relationship between Performance Ratings and Sales of Video Games (Team Research and
Development)
in the industry (Pursell, 2015). This exponential growth in the industry necessitates research
into how to better the user experience and understanding the relationship between the user
experience and the revenues generated in the industry.
Background
Ian, Lennart & Regan (2011) explores the implied effect of reviews and ratings of video games
on the sales by looking at their effect on the user experience. The research applies both Mann-
Whitney Test and Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test to investigate the user experience with respect to
the reviews that ratings observed for the video game. Ian, Lennart & Regan (2011) finds that
both professional and user reviews had a significant effect on the user experience in the video
games, hence implying an impact on the sales. Christy, et al (2015) focuses on how best video
gaming companies can improve their sales for online games. The research conducts empirical
analysis on what would attract users to play more online games. Applying psychological into
developing experiences that are more attractive for gamers is an important part of customer
retention in the video gaming industry (Christy, et al., 2015). This study investigates how
ratings by critics and gamers of video games directly relates with the sales by drawing on the
research in the above studies.
Research Question
This research assesses the following research questions:
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Relationship between Performance Ratings and Sales of Video Games (Team Research and
Development)
1. Is there a relationship between global video game sales and the critic scores of the video
games?
2. Is the relationship between video game sales and the critic scores of the video games
similar in different regions?
3. Is there any relationship between video games’ critic scores and user scores?
Research Approach
The data set used for the analysis in this study was collected from (Rush, 2016). The attributes
of 16720 games were captured in the dataset on aspects such as the Name, Platform, Year of
Release and Publisher. Sales aspects were also captured including North American, European
Union Sales, Japanese Sales, sales from other regions of the world and Global Sales.
Performance and Popularity ratings aspects capture in the data set include User and Critic scores
as well as User and Critic counts. Other aspects captured in the data set were Developer and
Rating (with respect to user age). Data preprocessing involved the removal of entries containing
empty entries, resulting in 7017 entries for the analysis.
The summary of the description of the variables from the Video Games Sales data are as shown
in Table 1: Research Variables below.
Table 1: Research Variables
Name Description Measurement Scale
NA_Sales (North American
Sales)
Dependent variable, Numeric
in nature
Ratio
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