“Ready Player One,” a nostalgia-soaked science-fiction adventure that marked a high-wire attempt by Mr. Spielberg, 71, to return to his crowd-pleasing roots, arrived to $53.2 million in ticket sales over the four-day Easter weekend in North America. Overseas audiences chipped in an additional $128 million, with Chinese ticket buyers turning out in particular force.
Those results, boosted by IMAX and other premium-priced, large-format screenings, easily make “Ready Player One” the No. 1 movie in the world. Warner Bros. and Village Roadshow spent at least $155 million to make the movie, which carried more than $100 million in global marketing costs.
Why do I post this on IP site? Because if you had read IP's PR of January 27 ago they spoke of the IR and AR market was primed for a major film to stimulate the Market for huge interest
"READY PLAYER ONE IS GOING TO TAKE VR AND AR TO THE FOREFRONT OF THE WORLD!!!
This article gives us hope for major market growth in VR,AR and MR
"All it's going to take is one popular video game, or one movie , and virtual reality headset sales will explode higher.
I'll be using 'virtual reality' (VR) as a blanket term covering virtual reality, augmented reality and mixed reality. Definitions of each are available through the link in the paragraph below.
Big research firms will usually begin touting an investment theme with a primer – a long, detailed report that weighs three kilograms when printed out that is constantly updated. Where virtual reality is concerned, Merrill Lynch published its 148 page primer in September, 2016, and it contains the following surprising possibility:
"Today, there are 3.5 billion internet users, 3.6 billion mobile phone internet users, 2.1 billion smartphone users, and 1.4 billion people with TVs. We believe that each of these screens could be displaced with a single form factor – [virtual reality, augmented reality, or mixed reality] head mounted device."
Sounds like pie-in-the-sky hype, right? That was my first reaction until I realized there's not a lot of difference between staring at our smartphones constantly and wearing a pair of glasses that does a lot of the same things.
The report also notes that adoption of VR technology headwear will likely begin with gamers and that's not difficult to envision. Video gaming has become so popular that stocks in the sector – like Take-Two Interactive Software Inc., Electronic Arts Inc. and graphics chip maker NVIDIA Corp. – have been routinely doubling in value every year.
Games designed for virtual reality headsets are already available but are a small part of the market so far. Investment in VR games is extensive, however, and eventually there will almost certainly be a 'must-have' game that spurs headset sales.
Citi analysts are also bullish on the outlook for VR technology. The research team believes the market size will increase from a 2017 level just over $6-billion (U.S.) to $80-billion in 2020 and $560-billion by 2025.
Investment options to benefit from the trend are less apparent than I'd like. Much of the related equipment and software is developed within sub-departments of tech giants Facebook Inc., Alphabet Inc. and Microsoft Corp. At these firms, even rapid growth in VR sales won't significantly add to overall profits
