I checked maybe a hundred words and phrases against Google Trends (which goes back to 2004) and also checked regular Google using the time-window. I whittled the list down to 30, keeping in mind readers of Gameindustry.biz's likely areas of interest (I rejected a bunch of colorful online gaming insults, for example).
My rule of thumb was to include anything that showed a marked increase in the years since 2012. I do not claim that the words and phrases below didn't exist prior to 2012, only that they existed faintly in the world of video games, and are now used regularly. I have used brand names only when they signify broader trends
If my experience with writing list articles is any guide, I'm sure to have missed a few good 'us, so please leave suggestions in comments below. If enough words check out our criteria, we can look into including them in a follow-up article. I'm especially interested in words that have gained marked popularity in the field of game design and development.
Taken as a whole, I hope this list paints a picture of the game industry's progress in the last decade, especially in the fields of social awareness, consumer power, monetization, creative expansiveness, and technology.
Accessibility
The most welcome change in games in the past decade is the belated recognition among game developers that we're all different,
Accessibility -- game design that accounts for physical, mental, and emotive differences -- is taking off like never before. Game companies are hiring, and listening to, advisers who understand the needs of people who live with a range of challenges, desires, and preferences. The result is games with a far greater range of options than in years gone by. Accessibility allows more people to choose how they play games.
Battle Pass
Inarguably, battle passes are the biggest monetization innovation of the past decade. Taking the form of in-game "seasons" that last a few months, they provide players of an extent game new content, challenges, and rewards. Battle Pass pricing structures are often tiered so that low spending players continue to play for free, while high spenders are reaped for income, as they try to attain skins, emotes, dance moves and so on through gameplay challenges.
Battle Passes were first introduced for Mobs around 2013, but the search term exploded in 2018, when Epic launched the first battle pass for Fortnite. They are now universally used for games-as-a-service.
Battle Royale
This subgenre of insta death games, in which large numbers of players try to kill each other in a rapidly diminishing map, has dominated the shooting world in the past few years. Inspired by the Battle Royale manga franchise and the success of The Hunger Games, the format emerged from the modding world, particularly the work of Brendan Greene in Arms and Days, and finally the standalone Playerunknown's Battlegrounds in 2017.
Epic used the format to elevate Fortnite from also-ran survival co-op to global cultural touchstone. Battle Royale is now a staple mode in shooters like Call of Duty and Battlefield, and a base format for hit games like Apex Legends. Major 2020 hit Fall Guys uses a similar format on a zany assault course, rather than a shooting map.
Blockchain
A cryptocurrency technology that enables (the possible pipe dream of) consumers to actually own the in-game digital products they buy and make, which they could then sell onto other consumers. In theory, blockchain could create a new economy of digital goods (aka NFTs) that are only loosely administered by game publishers. Currently, more of a buzzword in gaming than a reality, but the dream is one that would significantly alter gaming's ecosystem, potentially at a revolutionary level. See also Metaverse.
Cloud gaming
A slowly emerging shift from games being played and saved on a local device, to one in which data is all held and streamed from remote server farms. Platforms like Xbox and PlayStation are moving towards a business model in which their primary focus becomes hosting a portfolio of games from central servers, which are then distributed to a wide array of devices, instead of seeking to sell individual devices on which to host said games. Google launched its cloud system Stadia in 2019, but it has found a largely unperceptive audience.
Compulsion loop
In the early 2010s, the concept of a compulsion loop became widely used to replace "addiction" as a way to explain the common habit of excessive or obsessive play. It describes the dopamine release that comes with pleasurable, repetitive actions, such as those found in farming games or rapid puzzlers like Tetris. Mobile and social media games are often designed around repetition and rewards, although the phrase is generally frowned upon in design circles, as derogatory.
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