Highlights –

  • It is anticipated that the launch of AWS for Games and other new services and solutions will help customers address high-priority workloads while leveling up the use of game analytics, live operations, and AI.
  • AWS also announced a preview of Amazon GameSparks, a fully-managed service built on AWS, simplifying the build, optimize, and scale game backend features

Headquartered in Seattle, WA, Amazon announced the launch of AWS for Games, a dedicated set of products and services from Amazon Web Services (AWS), and its partners that cater to the gaming industry. This is, perhaps, the latest initiative from AWS and its competitors to underscore the significant market opportunity gaming brings for cloud providers.

Gaming has been an important market for the e-commerce giant for quite some time now. In 2016, AWS launched the Amazon GameLift and has been offering dedicated gaming services for several years. Apart from the cloud, Amazon has Amazon Game Studio and the game-streaming service Twitch, which Amazon acquired in 2014.

Given the market trends and forecasts, it does not come as a surprise that the cloud industry is stepping up its offerings. The analytics firm NewZoo predicts the global cloud gaming market cap to surpass USD 6.5 million by 2024, up from USD 1.57 billion last year.

How will it help?

It is anticipated that the launch of AWS for Games and other new services and solutions will help customers address high-priority workloads while leveling up the use of game analytics, live operations, and Artificial Intelligence (AI).

The new launch offers gaming-specific products and services and partner support for six areas, namely, Game Servers, Game Security, Live Operations, Game Analytics, and Game AI and Machine Learning (ML). The partners in this initiative are Beamable, Databricks, AMD, AppsFlyer, Epic Games, Incredibuild, Parsec, Perforce, Slalom, Snowflake, NVIDIA, and Teradici.

Apart from the new release, AWS also announced a preview of Amazon GameSparks, a fully-managed service built on AWS, which simplifies the process to build, optimize and scale game backend features. The firm also announced the general availability of AWS GameKit, an open-source solution that allows developers to put and customize game backend features from a game engine in just a few clicks. This reduces the integration from weeks to days.

Furthermore, game developers can get new guidance for Amazon Nimble Studio, making it possible to set up a virtual game studio in an hour, scale capacity on-demand, and create content at a faster pace and cost-effectively.

On the same day that Amazon launched its new services, Microsoft announced the launch of new programs and services for independent game developers. These include the Azure Game Development Virtual Machine, a tool that lets game developers test and build games in a production-ready cloud environment.

Experts’ view

“Cloud adoption has transformed the way games are built, distributed, and played,” Bill Vass, VP of AWS Engineering, said in a statement. “Game developers continue to accelerate their cloud journey, build games faster, and run them with continuous updates while growing their player base and play engagement.”