Here is a stereotype breaker. Nielsen co. did a study and discovered that PC gamers is mostly dominated by women that are 25 years or older. Talk about strange, but the other two are less of a shocker. Out of all three consoles, the Wii is the one with least activity and PS3 and Xbox 360 gamers hardly watch TV, mostly because they are busy playing.

I'll admit that as a rather fervent PC gamer who happens to be both male and under 25, the news that PC gaming was dominated by women over 25 initially caught me off guard ... until I realized that Nielsen's comprehensive "State of the Gamer" report counts anybody who uses a computer to play games - any type of game. When you look beyond BioShock and Dawn of War II to count Bejeweled, Peggle, and old classics like Snood, it's not hard to see how the demographic swings the way it does. No surprises then to see that the old standard Solitaire is the most-played PC game, with 17 million players in December 2008. My mom plays Solitaire, for cryin' out loud!

Indeed, it's trends like the broadening PC gaming demographic or the increasing penetration of new platforms like mobile phones (helloooo, iPhone!) that are making videogames recession-resilient if not quite recession-proof. Yeah, we've all heard the stories before of retirement homes and hospitals picking up Wiis ... it just turns out that they don't play them quite so often.

Linkin Park Fan via escapistmagazine.com »