There are a great number of people who believe that mobile gaming is taking over. It’s the casual mobile stuff that accounts for most of the time people spend playing games, and it’s leaving regular gaming in the doldrums. According to a study by Nielsen, the same people who monitor TV-watching habits, that’s not true. Yes, people are spending an inordinate amount of time playing mobile games…but they’re spending more time playing proper games too. In general, people are just spending a lot of time gaming.
According to their report, gamers above the age of 13 are spending more than six hours a week playing video games, which is up 12% from 5.6 hours from 2012.
50% of console gamers surveyed also played mobile games.
But those mobile games were just a fraction of their overall gaming, with PC and consoles taking the lead.
In the US at least, it seems that mobile gaming isn’t cannibalising the console and PC gaming markets – instead, it just means that people are playing games even more than the used to .
"With these 8th generation consoles still in their infancy, in addition to up-and-coming platforms such as microconsoles and cloud gaming gaining momentum, gaming time is poised to continue evolving moving forward," says Nielsen director Nicole Pike in a statement accompanying the report.
Last Updated: May 29, 2014
Alien Emperor Trevor
May 29, 2014 at 19:01
So many numbers O_O Luckily I game on PC so I can play Excel to figure it out.
Admiral Chief in Space
May 29, 2014 at 21:28
XD
fred
May 29, 2014 at 19:39
Because tv is so boring lately , and services like ps+ we have a lot of catching up to do , makes you play games you would not have otherwise tried.
Rags
May 29, 2014 at 20:08
Yes, tv is so shit these days, Wolfentein probably has more history and less fiction in it than History channel shows.
Hammersteyn
May 29, 2014 at 20:19
Mountain Men
American Restoration
Pawn Stars
American Pickers
Swamp People
Ax Men
Counting Cars
Storage Wars
This is not history and they don’t have to show WW2 or Vietnam the whole time, then again they need to compete with other channels I guess and showing real history will probably put most to sleep.
Brady miaau
May 29, 2014 at 22:10
Not me, I actually enjoyed “real” history. Just not ww2, please. too much.
Sk3tz0
May 29, 2014 at 23:01
If they have to make another WW2 FPS Game… I’ll just shake my head in a disapproving manner
Mossel
May 30, 2014 at 07:34
Yeah I was obsessed with the JFK assassination theories they showed on history channel back when the channel first aired on dstv. Probably more because it was/is a mystery.
Brady miaau
May 30, 2014 at 08:02
The cool thing was, a few years ago, was the weekend history channel was on a six or 8 hours repeat cycle. This made it easy to find a show you missed at like 2 AM the next afternoon. I enojyed that.
The cool thing was, a few years ago, was the weekend history channel was on a six or 8 hours repeat cycle
Hammersteyn
May 30, 2014 at 08:06
I enjoy it as well, not this reality shit they show now.
Brady miaau
May 30, 2014 at 08:03
Remember the history channel using Rome Total War to depict the ancient fights? That was awesome
Hammersteyn
May 29, 2014 at 20:20
Only ages 13 and up?
http://d24w6bsrhbeh9d.cloudfront.net/photo/agy5ANK_700b.jpg
Brady miaau
May 30, 2014 at 08:04
Also, sky blue, sea green and my wife angry at me.
Alex Hicks
May 30, 2014 at 09:23
Well, being the kind of guy I am, I had to verify that assumption myself. The proportion time spent is going down; even though hours are going up – so had to check that mobile was adding to, rather than cannibalising, gaming time.
Proportion of time x average weekly time gives me average weekly time per device type.
Combined gaming time on “proper gaming” (Consoles, PC, Dedicated Handhelds) has steadily increased by between 6% (2011 – 2012) and 5.5% (2012 – 2013)
On “Filthy casual gaming” (The rest, including “Other” – whatever the hell “Other” is) has grown exponentially: 32% (2011 – 2012) and 44% (2012 – 2013).
It’s not so straight forward then … maybe the growth seen in “proper gaming” would be higher if there were no filthy casual types with their smart devices and their vacant stares …
Then again, maybe not. Of course – the missing bit from this study – what % of the population is playing?
Jim Lenoir (Banana Jim)
May 30, 2014 at 09:32
So much like the Cloud, the Casual market is a myth?