[troymc]

Startup game studios are startups. Many game studios do get acquired or IPO, classic startup end-games. Game studios also satisfy your other criteria, but since when are those criteria for calling a company a startup?

For example, a single bad product/service can kill any startup, not just a game studio.

[tormeh]

Of course, but generally a startup grows to a certain size and becomes a safe corporation. A game studio is like a startup that can't succeed, only survive. The games industry is pretty unique in the software world in that there's no/little help in old successes. It's got more in common with consulting than it does with Google/Dropbox/Facebook.

[troymc]

Madden NFL is a counterexample. That game came out in 1988. Not many software companies can say they've been working on the same software series since 1988. Will Dropbox still be relevant in 2035?

Madden NFL is not the only example of a "safe", long-running game series (franchise). Wikipedia has a list:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_longest-running_video_...