Game investment and M&A deals pull ahead of 2023 at $10.38bn for Q1-Q3

The games industry's investment landscape continues to show signs of recovery, with the total value of deals so far this year tracking slightly ahead of 2023.

The latest DDM Games Investment Review shows that investments and M&As for games businesses reached $10.38 billion for the first three quarters of 2024, just surpassing the $10.36 billion recorded in the same period last year.

In fact, when you look specifically at investments, Q1-Q3 2024 has already outperformed the full-year total for 2023; $6.7 billion was invested in the first nine months of this year, compared to $4.5 billion last year.

There were 726 transactions from January 1 to September 30, 16% more than the 632 deals made in Q1-Q3 2023.

Investments have made up the bulk of all transactions at 593 deals, up 13% on the 523 investments made in the same period last year.

M&As have also increased, up 22% from 109 in 2023 to 133. However, the overall value of M&As has dropped 46% year-on-year due to the lack of a major deal like Savvy Games Group's $4.9 billion acquisition of Scopely.

While 2024 is now tracking ahead of last year overall, Q3 specifically has been the lowest quarter so far. The total deal value came in at $2.2 billion for the three months ended September 30 (down 44% compared to Q2) across 234 transactions (down 11%).

Investments saw the biggest decline quarter-on-quarter, down 54% to $1.4 billion across 186 deals (down 15%). Unsurprisingly, deals concerning artificial intelligence are on the rise, up 138% quarter-on-quarter to $195.5 million across 20 deals (down from 25).

M&As declined in value for the third consecutive quarter, down 12% to $751 million, although the number of deals rose 12% over Q2 to 48.

Despite these declines, DDM reports Q3 still saw more deals in total than any quarter from 2023.

"The last two years have been incredibly difficult for the games industry, as we've seen many of our industry colleagues close their doors, make rounds of layoffs, or pivot to 'survive til 25'," said DDM Games Investment Review manager Mitchell Reavis.

"However, last quarter I mentioned that I was optimistic about the near future. That sentiment remains true as what we've seen through our clients, network, trade show attendance, as well as the data in this report, it's evident that a recovery is getting underway."