NPD Group analyst Anita Frazier spoke at a DICE Summit talk this morning and dropped a number of interesting statistics about the current state of the video games industry.
According to Frazier, 58% of Americans over the age of 13 play video games. 72% of this group may be male, but women -- and here Frazier alluded to the growth of casual and family-oriented games -- account for "about half the spending in video games." With an estimated $2.3 billion in non-retail sales and $11.7 billion in retail sales, the video games industry received 27% of every American dollar spent on entertainment in 2008.
While Frazier allowed that "[t]he economy is as tumultuous as it’s ever been, and something could certainly come in and disrupt everything," she was quick to remind her audience that "over the last several years, there hasn’t been a direct relationship between the S&P 500 index compared to video game and PC sales in dollars." In point of fact, Frazier noted that despite the economy's breakneck descent "[t]he number of people gaming this year has increased 61 percent. The industry has gained an additional six million gamers over the last year."
[via Gamasutra]
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