Unlike a decade ago, the lines between the gaming industry and social media are continuously getting blurrier. Of late, however, the two no longer operate as separate entities. With every dawning day, social media continues to play a huge role in shaping the gaming world.
For clarification purposes, social media refers to all the various forms of online communication channels where users discuss and share ideas about different subjects of interest. Besides being a communication medium, social media is an information superhighway of connections where users are free to express themselves freely through text, audio, and video.
Users are always discussing interesting subjects like free online slots no download among other types of gaming in chat rooms, forums, blogs, and more mainstream social sharing sites like Facebook and Twitter. Better yet, on most of these platforms, you can even start playing the games being discussed in a single click. Let’s take a closer look at how social media is transforming the gaming world today.
Effortless Collaboration
For starters, social media drives the online gaming community to accomplish certain goals that users wouldn’t have otherwise realized on their own. Let’s take an example of social media groups. The groups are the influential resources that are used by gamers to collect useful information, which often includes bonuses and promotions for tokens and loot boxes, game hacks and cheats, exclusive deals, among other player incentives.
For instance, players hooked on action-packed video games, MMO and MOBA games typically team up from social groups online to share thoughts on how to accomplish their gaming objectives. Moreover, it is possible to build stronger bonds between players through these games, bonds that are pursued in real life. A great case in point is the World of Warcraft multiplayer functionality where a lot of players have ended up finding their life partners after meeting for the first time virtually in games and chat rooms.
Sharing Information Easier than Ever
As a player, nothing is as enjoyable as sharing great news with your fellow players online. No matter what it is, whether it’s just a stage of play you’ve accomplished, a dungeon you finished successfully, or a run that you and your team excelled in- such accomplishments ought to be shared. All these are made possible via social media, and it does so pretty easily.
With in-game functionalities, players can cooperate amongst themselves on-line in chat rooms or through live video streaming. You can also take screenshots of your game achievements and post them on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter for followers. This creates a center of attention via the conversations and interaction with other players.
Additionally, getting information about the latest games and general feature updates is so much easier. You’ll find all the news you need on official social media handles of game developers, and likewise, gaming enthusiasts will also do their best to share the same updates across their social media handles.
Instant Gratification
Social media channels offer something that a lot of players don’t find in real life: instant gratification. We want what we want in half a shake. Platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram are excellent examples of instant gratification platforms where uses find pleasure in receiving likes, retweets, and comments the minute they post something.
Game developers are also using a form of instant gratification in the games they create to make them as immersive as possible. For starters, you can enjoy playing a broad array of games without downloading any software, applications, or plugins. You can get your fix in instant play HTML5 game in a simple click on both PCs and mobile devices like smartphones and tablets.
For the heavier games that require software downloads, there is also plenty of instant gratification where you unlock a range of in-game rewards for completing missions and mini-challenges throughout the game. With such features, it’s pretty easy to find yourself playing for hours and hours with no idea how fast time is flying.
Pro Gamers & Media Dynamic
Gone are the days when gamers used to be considered jobless young men who kept to themselves in basements of their parents’ homes. The popularity of gaming has grown so much bigger because of the kind of attention it has been receiving from so-called pro gamers who stream their gaming activities on social video streaming services such as Twitch and YouTube.
Live streaming of games is also pretty popular on Facebook and Instagram nowadays, and such channels get millions of views at a time. And Let’s no forget about the international pro gaming competitions that are played before live audiences and simultaneously broadcasted across all social media channels in real-time!
Final Thoughts
Currently, virtually all gamers have handles on social media platforms to share information and get information from fellow players. Gaming companies, on the other hand, have of late been more aggressively advertising via social media because they know that’s where conversions will come from. We are now on the verge of historical change in gaming, and social media is the medium piloting this new transformation.
