GAMEHEARTS

Policy Brief 1

The GAMEHEARTS Policy Brief 1, a first-year output of a Horizon Europe project, examines the economic, social, and cultural value of the European video games sector.

• Video games have become a vital part of Europe's cultural and creative industries: 53% of the population in the five largest European consumer markets play games, yet the medium still struggles for recognition as a legitimate cultural form.
• The European games industry employed over 114,000 workers in 2023 and generated a consumer market worth more than €25 billion.
• The brief argues that games are gaining cultural legitimacy mainly through external intermediaries such as museums, curators, film festivals, awards, and journalists, a path paralleling cinema's own recognition, and that the 'is it art?' debate distracts from the more consequential question of cultural value.