p2pnet.net News:- Mobile gaming continues to rise sharply and video gaming has overtaken PC gaming for the first year ever, says the new Ziff Davis’ Digital Gaming in America Survey.

The number of US households playing cell phone games doubled to 16.3 million in 2004 versus 8.1 million a year ago, it states.

And just to rub it in, "The mobile gaming market is expecting a 6-fold growth over the next five years for downloadable games, generating 82 percent of an $8 billion market," says MobileMag here, going on:

"Mobile entertainment publishers are clearly back in vogue as the number of Java and BREW capable handsets rises from 186 million units this year to over 1 billion units in 2009. Senior Analyst, Nitesh Patel, notes, "We are beginning to see carriers and games companies announce greater levels of usage of these handsets for downloading games. For example, in the five months leading up to May 2004, Verizon Wireless customers have downloaded more than 12 million games."

The annual "Digital Gaming in America" survey of 1,000 randomly selected US households says 26% of respondents reported their TV viewing had decreased in the last year, and 20% said they expect their TV viewing to decrease in the next year.

"Not only is mobile gaming strongly on the rise, but consumers’ interest in media and advertising in general has begun tipping towards digital games and game-related channels," saysDale Strang, senior vp, Game Group.

"Gamers generally preferred magazines and websites over television for their gaming interests, citing magazines as providing credible game reviews and a relaxing experience."

Nearly 70% of video gamers own a cell phone and 50% play games on their mobile devices, says Ziff Davis, continung:

• More than a quarter (27%) of gamers, and fully 42% of core gamers (gamers who bought at least three games in the previous two months, or who bought at least two games but played 15 or more hours per week) are more likely to purchase a portable gaming system within the next year.
• 18% purchased games for their cell phones
• Spend 17 minutes per gaming session and 4.4 hours per week
• Spent an average of $19 dollars in the last 60 days on games for their cell phone
• Gamers don’t use cell phones to play video games for the following reasons:

• 50% cite screen size, cost and the difficulty of playing games on a small device
• Over 85% of gamers refer to picture quality
• 75% mention improper game controls

"More broadly, the 2004 study indicates that a significant proportion of video game purchasing now happens online, with video gamers reporting that they buy about 12% of their games online," adds the survey.

"Used game sales are even stronger, as nearly 70% of gamers reported buying used games, including 16% through online auctions."

This entry was posted on Saturday, August 28th, 2004 at 5:03 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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