Gaming Tidbit

[Merika]

I was watching the History Channel this morning and the CEO from Viacom was being interviewed. He said more young men play games in the US than the count of all the young men who watch television around the world. (Young being between 18 and 30 something....I would suppose).

He said the next largest market was China.

I'm glad I was able to share more of my useless information. HAHA!

[Duke]

Actually I have tons of data on this.

I think the age range is between 18 and 40 but I could be wrong on that one.

- More men play video games than the number of men watching prime time television.
- The gaming industry is running neck and neck dollarwise with the movie industry.
- Software sales account for more revenue than book sales in Europe
- The Bureau of Labor predicts that the growth of software publishing, of which video game design is a part, will expand by 67.9% between 2002 and 2012.
- In 2002 256,000 people were employed in software publishing.
- the average salary was between $35,000 and $75,000. These statistics are very old and inaccurate at the low end of the scale. I believe I've read somewhere that lead designers, level builders and 3D artists can make well over $100,000 dollars per annum.

[Evil_CSM_Yu]

The only problem I have with the figures is the sales compared to books - are they talking revenue or actual copies sold? Keep in mind the average game costs twice as much as a hardcover and a little over 6 times as a paperback.

Broken down - to equal the sales of hardbacks only one half the number of games would have to be sold and 1/6th for paperbacks. I won't contend that reading has declined in the past few decades but businesses are well known for padding their figures - case in point - George Lucas released Star Wars; The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones on Wednesday under the pretense of "letting the fans see them early" when we all know he did it to pad his opening weekend box office take. Spider-man 2 did the same among countless others.

[Duke]

It's revenue based but really is the only statistic that matters. Virtually all of these statistics are based on dollar value but you can take the above argument and pit games up against movies. Dollar for dollar, software is taking over and will continue to only get larger.

Take it in another context. Seeing a movie for about 2 hours will cost you around 20 bux (avg.), purchasing a book can keep you busy for anywhere from a few hours to several months. Both scenarios are always static experiences meaning every experience is exactly the same (assuming you see the movie or read the book more than once). This is the deciding factor, and the one I believe that will make the software industry the biggest and most powerful of any in history over the next few decades. Sofware experiences not only vary from different users, but the same software can give the user different effects every time it's used. In other words, it's a much more dynamic experienc.

Of course this is all an IMO.

[dogula]

That said, a book does engage one's mind more than either a video game or a movie could hope to. Though, there are some games which I give a little more credit to than movies in that regard.

Not that this was really relevant to the thread at all.

[Duke]

lol

[Merika]

Originally Posted by Duke

I think the age range is between 18 and 40 but I could be wrong on that one.
- More men play video games than the number of men watching prime time television.

I wonder how the porn industry is taking all of this!