Game On!

From Pong to PlayStation

Photo by Sam Pak on Unsplash

Which games are you playing at the moment?

If you’re like the other 3.2 billion gamers in the world, then you regularly play some form of video game

On average, gamers around the world are playing for 8.5 hours each week! And players in most Asian countries spend even more time than this (Chinese games play for 12.4 hours per week)

But the way that players are interacting with video games is evolving (even more quickly than Call of Duty releases its next title)

What are some of the oldest video games?

The first ever video game, it is claimed, was OXO (known as noughts and crosses) released in 1952 by A.S. Douglas as part of his doctoral dissertation. Other early releases, such as Tennis for Two by William Higinbotham, were similarly not intended for mass release

The first video game console, Odyssey, was released in 1972 and despite being a commercial flop, did inspire other developers such as Atari

Atari started by supplying the world’s first Arcade games, with Pong being their first big hit. In total, they produced 35,000 arcade units of Pong across the 1970s and 1980s

They then moved into home consoles, selling 150,000 units of Home Pong in their first Christmas season in 1975, and then 30 million Atari 2600 devices over the next two decades, making it the most popular console at the time

What are the most popular consoles today?

The vast majority of console gaming today is dominated by 3 big players:

• Sony, earning $25 billion from their PlayStation division in 2021
• Microsoft, earning $16 billion from their Xbox and games releases
• Nintendo, earning $15 billion from the Nintendo Switch and various games

Despite their dominance of the console market, this is not how most gamers are interacting with their favourite titles

Nowadays, a lot more people are playing with mobile games

Mobile gaming made up 50% of the global gaming market in 2022, earning $92 billion, vs. console games (28%), downloaded or boxes computer games (21%) and browser-based computer games (1%). That’s a lot more than the big three combined

On top of this, 84% of internet users have played video games on at least one of their devices

Which are the most popular games?

First let’s look at the different types of games out on the market:

• Role Playing Games (RPGs) are the biggest market across all types of devices with sales of $20 billion in 2022
• Next highest was Strategy games, earning $16 billion
• After this, Puzzle, Casino and Shooter games were next on $9 billion, $8 billion and $5 billion, respectively

Then if we look at individual games and series, the top games have been dominated by a small handful of top titles, in some cases for decades

Minecraft is by far the most popular game, having sold 238 million copies in its first 10 years (since its 2011 release). Even now, most recent estimates suggest it has 173 million active players and is also the most watched game on YouTube with 201 billion views (as of the start of 2023)

The next closest game is Grand Theft Auto V which has sold 180 million copies. This combined with some of its other titles, such as San Andreas (27.5 million) and GTA IV (25 million) means that the series is still close to top spot

There are then some older series that also near the top of the list:

• Super Mario Brothers, originally released in 1985, has sold 58 million copies on various Nintendo devices
• Tetris, some would argue the world’s most popular game, originally sold 49 million copies when released in 1989, and a remake by EA (in 2006) has sold an additional 100 million copies

However, this type of game is being knocked from top spot by mobile games. It’s estimated that there are 700,000 mobile games across the Android and Apple app stores (although this includes duplicates across the two platforms)

The number of downloads for the top mobile games comfortably match the top sales of console games (although this is partly because they’re often free to download). The top downloads in 2022 were:

1. Subway Surfers, an action / running game (278 million downloads)
2. Stumble Guys, a battle royale game (223 million downloads)
3. Roblox, a simulation game (185 million downloads)
4. Candy Crush Saga, a puzzle game with more than 14,000 levels (165 million downloads)
5. Ludo King, a mobile board game (164 million downloads)

While mobile games can make a lot of money, having a lot of downloads doesn’t always result in a success commercially

Only two of the top five games in terms of downloads is also in the top five on revenue earned in 2022 (Candy Crush, 4th place, $1 billion revenue; Roblox, 5th place, $827 million). The top game in terms of earnings was Honor of Kings which is a MOBA (Multiplayer Online Battle Arena) game with a much lower number of downloads (only 25 million!!)

So what will be the next trend in gaming? Look out for next week’s article to find out…

Check out more GoodStats on Entertainment:

• Rollercoasters — they have their ups and downs… It’s hard to keep ‘track’ of these high speed stats!
• Our 12 Points Go To… In the words of Eurovision legend Jon Ola Sand, ‘take it away!’
• The launch of Pokémon Arceus; It’s Super Effective

Source: Web Tribunal; Statista; Statistia; History; Game Rant; Computer History; Wikipedia; Fiction Horizon; Udonis; Statista; Economist; Gamespot;