Study Finds That "Extreme Gamers" Play 48 Hours a Week 272
An anonymous reader writes "Think you're a big gamer? According to a new study from market research firm NPD Group, to be considered among the real hardcore you'll need to play an average of 48.5 hours a week — nearly seven hours a day. This group of gamers is, on average, '29 years old, and — perhaps surprisingly — one-third of them are female. They're more likely to play on consoles than on the PC, and on average they've purchased 24 titles in the past three months — a bill that could easily run over a thousand dollars. But dedicated though they may be, the Extreme Gamers are just a small minority: a mere 4% of the US's 174-million-strong gaming public. '"
Are they employed? (Score:3, Interesting)
The article doesn't look like it says, although I only skimmed. I spent several months unemployed last year and I'd easily hit 40 hours a week playing video games, frequently more. It was shameful, but that's the way it was. When you're living hand-to-mouth for months on end, utterly sapped of any energy or confidence to do anything meaningful, video games are a way to kill time.
If they hold down a job I don't know whether to be concerned or impressed. If they're "homemakers" then it's no big deal. If they're unemployed I'm disappointed you needed a survey to figure that out.
Re:I know it's silly to ask, but... (Score:3, Interesting)
International Demographics? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Only 48 Hours? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:I know it's silly to ask, but... (Score:2, Interesting)
What exactly do you mean by life?
A hobby?
Social interaction?
As sad as it might seem to some, not everybody needs to spend several hours/evenings every week with friends "down at the pub" or whatever the kids are calling it these days.
Re:Pfft yourself! (Score:5, Interesting)
I was there too, except I was one of the idiots trying to wrangle 39 other idiots (read: guild officer). At the time I had just graduated from high school and due to a traumatic experience or two (not what you think but too long to detail) I staunchly refused to attend post-secondary or any other school-like institution. So I spent 8-12 hours a day on WoW, building my toon up and helping to run a whole guild instead. Surprisingly it was pretty good management training. In any case, we did the whole "best guild on server, #1 in MC, BWL, AQ40, Naxx, etc" thing, climbed into the top 100 NA guilds at one point, and shortly before the first expansion hit I had burnt out. I quit pretty much cold turkey and with some help from my parents and my now girlfriend, i've never been back. I feel like i've conquered the essence of that game and any new attempts would just be the same shit in a new pile. Now i've got something MUCH more challenging to worry about: University. :)
Anyways, just wanted to say that there are probably almost as many ex-WoW addicts as there are current ones. Coca^H^H^H^H WoW's a hell of a drug.
Re:I know it's silly to ask, but... (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes, this is how I can afford to be a PC gamer. I work 9 hours a day, another 1.5 hours traveling, I play between 4 and 1 hours a night depending on what else I have on (guitar practice, gym, pub). On the Weekends I can play up to 14 hours a day between other things (meals, going out, shopping, etc...). I normally get 6-8 hours a day of sleep unless a new CIV has been released in the previous 2 months.
Currently posting from Thailand, 6000 KMs from my gaming boxen and most of my games. I will spend this time drinking, eating, carousing and other stuff one does on holiday. I'll be here for another 3 weeks. My laptop is really just for banking and browing the web, it has an Intel IGM so it wont play any recent games (cant even handle CIV).
Many people find a balance. Someone who spends 4 hours gaming per night is no different to those who spend 4 hours watching TV, playing cards or working on their car.
I dont watch TV so this may be where I'm getting all this time from.
Feh to your pitiful hardcore Definition (Score:3, Interesting)
-The only time I stop playing my game is when not doing so would be to the permanent detriment to my gaming environment. This means times when Its absolutley necessary for me to go pay rent, to go get food, to go to sleep. Things that, if not taken care of, would stop me from playing.
-When i'm sleeping, i'm dreaming about my game. Often I post suggestions I dreamed up in the game's forums the next morning.
-I'm obsessed. When I physically cant play the game, I research the game, and do the math to figure out what would work better how.
All in all this means I play my game about 18 hours a day. Thats right, 18 goddamn hours. I sleep for the other 6.
I'm really, really starting to think that theres something wrong with me. But this is what I am- hardcore- theres no denying that. By the way, I play anarchy online, the heroin of mmos.
Re:Pfft yourself! (Score:4, Interesting)
I don't mean to one up you, but I feel I should share a story from the top 1%.
I'm a former world first raider from EverQuest 1, and have been a top north american FPS competitor since back in the Quake 3 days until about 2 years ago in Counter-Strike:Source and 1.6. I've run 8-9 hour raids in EQ 1, and farmed things (ie. ToV key, stuipd fucking rare skeleton) for over 60 hours before straight. If 40 hours qualifies the top 4%, I'd consider myself formerly in the top 1%. Some years back (2006?) I quit EQ1 for WoW because I couldn't do it anymore. I'd gone to rehab for EQ1 and, the first day after getting out I walked nearly 2 hours in the middle of the night to a friends place (didnt have a car at the time) who was up all night to borrow his EQ 1 cds, walked home and was playing again before dawn.
It probably sounds odd to think of someone saying Molten Core and BWL (never did Naxxramas though) were "casual" for me, but that's exactly what it was. I was in the 2nd place guild on my server in Vanilla, the first on alliance in early TBC, second on server (horde) in late TBC, first (horde) in early WotLK, and now first (alliance) in late WotLK. I raid 3-5 nights a week as you say, for 4 hours of pure raid time per night, I have 5 80 alts - 4 of them ICC geared, 2 of them 2k+ rated in pvp on all 3 teams. I know this is abnormal, "extreme" but looking back on my EQ1 life I still feel casual by comparison. That shit was crazy.
Probably my favorite EQ 1 story of addiction (favorite as in the most telling, imo) was 2 wizards (husband and wife) in my guild, who were hooked on meth - started playing EverQuest 1 - and just one day completely forgot to score more meth because they couldn't leave EQ - and quit cold turkey, having completely forgotten about Meth.
The thing is - as human beings we are attracted to certain things more than anything else. When you get really into a game and start thinking about the bonding experiences of difficult situations in raids or pvp - and how you couldn't have accomplished that without them, or would be dead were it not for another gamer - that to me is comparable to a blood brother borne in a foxhole in a war. The foxhole might be a dragon raid, and the blood brother might be a virtual priest avatar - but the bond can be identical I think. At the same time, the surreal worlds where we are all so much more than mere men working 9-5 is impossible to deny the simple attraction of. Any sense of hopelessnes, weakness, loss that you might experience in the real world is caused by a tangible entity in a game world - and is usually solved by severing the head of some dragon or god - would that it be so easy in real life - perhaps games would not hold the bond that they do.
Re:I have [a] few friends (Score:3, Interesting)
I have a few friends that play games this much. On consoles. The thing is, however, that it doesnt make them good. Console players IME tend to have a lot less 'skill'; ie- twitch reflexes and battlefield awareness.
I think that has little to do with who plays what and more to do with the environment they choose to play in. A PC gaming rig is much more likely, historically speaking, to have a higher fidelity in display, audio, and input devices.
I don't need a whole hand to count the number of console games that support multiple displays, and I'd wager more people use stereo instead of positional audio with their TV. A console is more likely to be played at a lower resolution on a bigger display, sitting back on a couch in a living room with the dog or other family distractions. Some console games I don't mind playing while lying down, which certainly isn't conducive to alertness, and I'm fine with falling asleep controller-in-hand. It's entertainment.
As a controller junkie I will choose developer sanctioned auto-aim assist rather than the grubby sandbox of PC aimbot mods. So game developers are the biggest influence in what skills are required by the player. I played flight sims in the days when, if you didn't own a Thrustmaster flight stick with its own dedicated controller card, you weren't serious. Then Freelancer [microsoft.com] came out and suddenly you could pilot with a mouse and frakking beat the game. That was unsettling. Flight sims haven't been the same since, because developers went mainstream and accessible. I think the RTS is still the only genre that truly benefits from a keyboard and mouse, because they haven't perfected radial menus yet, and even MMOs are getting menu accessible.
Moral of the story, play PC games if you want to have a challenge. Consoles are fun if you like games with stories.
Uhh.. Activision, PopCap and LucasArts would like to have a word with you...
Re:Pfft yourself! (Score:4, Interesting)
It sure is. My epiphany came one day when I realized it had been 2 years since I last picked up my guitar, something I was quite serious about before I started playing WoW. I quit cold turkey too. I've been back now and then since then to chat and fool around but I'm also one of those who wants to play at the so called top or not at all. Since the top is something I know I can't do anymore, I've hardly felt the pull at all. It's quite a nice thing that getting back on that hardcore raiding horse with WoW is not that easy. You can't just call your dealer in one second if you get the urge on a tuesday night. You have to put time in to catch up gearwise from where you where when you left off. Even if you manage that on your own (they've made it easier but having to grind heroics for badges with random idiots is an experience that can cure any addict) you have to find and apply to and convince a proper raid guild to take you in. So once you manage to quit for long enough, it's not something you can pick up again on an impulse since it's not just up to you. You'll still have quite a bit of time to consider what you're doing.
Re:I have [a] few friends (Score:1, Interesting)
The technical gap you talk about is closing. Most consoles today (at least in the hardcore segment) ARE hooked up with surround sound, which every game nowadays utilizes and are played an a screen with 1920x1080 or at least 720p. The texture resolution is still a problem, though. Still: while console games DO have stuttering and inconsistent framerates, the problem is still bigger on PC (for the most part).
I play PC and Consoles, and yes i TRY to get comfy on the couch when playing PS or XBOX, but as alertness rises, i always find myself sitting on the edge of the couch :)
I completely agree with the point of developers controlling the skillrequirements. Back in the days when gaming was not THAT mainstream, games were made challenging to be a benchmark, todays games need to cater to a wider audience and its "Accessibility, accessibility, accessibility!"
http://www.hiwiller.com/2010/04/29/if-mario-was-designed-in-2010/
Re:you aren't an extreme gamer (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:24 games in the past 3 months? (Score:3, Interesting)
Don't you get it? This "study" was done by "market research firm" the "NPD Group".
You've got a marketing outfit that works for the game industry coming out with this study, which I'm sure was done under the most rigorous standards of scientific research, claiming that to be a "real" "hardcore" gamer, you have to play 48 hours a week, PLUS you have to spend over a THOUSAND DOLLARS every few months on new games.
It would be like a company that works for Nike and Gatorade coming out with a study that says to be a real basketball player, you have to buy a new pair of shoes every week and drink 19 bottles of colored water every day.
Notice that this "study" was reported via a "press release" to geek blogs and news aggregators. These fucking marketing dudes can play us like violins.
Re:Pfft yourself! (Score:3, Interesting)
8-9 hour raids.
Surely you've forgotten the cleric epics in sky fire and Fear.
We raided Fear 39 hours straight over memorial day weekend in 2003 (4?). Every 14 hours. We could predict the order the mobs would spawn in. It was a brutal, brutal break.
I left work twice and woke up sometime in the early AM once for cleric epics in Skyfire. Then there were the little casual things like the 20+ hours spent getting jboots and similar insane quests with drop rates over 12 hours. No quest step in EQ should have taken over 2 hours. Sure- make it a 96 hour quest, but make it 48 2 hour chunks. Not five 12-20 hour chunks.
I regularly played over 60 hours a week while working a full time job. I kept playing when my hands went numb and my forearms were killing me from tendonitis.
I finally went uber at the end, saw everything in the game, and then quit as my right thumb blew out with bursitis.
I learned things from the experience that benefited my career.
I was in a "casual guild." We raided 3 days a week, 6 hours a day then probably played another 18 hours a week. It drove the true uber players crazy for the lack of serious play. The play schedule drove truly casual players insane too. They just couldn't keep up but they wanted the uber rewards.
I also learned that if I get in an activity like this again- go uber from the start. It's actually less effort, less betrayal, less "we'll always be buds", etc.
It's often much easier there on the leading edge of the game. Heck, we had the dev's go back after 24 months and make a specific encounter in Uqua impossible to beat for about 3 months. It just about killed the guild. Several people gave up.
Re:Pfft yourself! (Score:2, Interesting)
Agreed. EQ1 was hardcore. I took up WoW on the weekends when I was an EQ1 raider just to have a break. Moreover, WoW lets you get away with soloing, EQ1 didn't really leave that as a viable option. There were very few places (and very few classes even then) that could solo reasonably effectively and get rewarded for it. This led to boxing. Before I finally quit I was running 4 characters at once and raiding with my main character 4-5 nights a week for 5+ hours a night. The weekends were for gaining experience (the AA system is the devil in EQ) and otherwise supporting my main character. I'm glad to have done with all of it. I've been off of EQ for over a year now and free of a WoW addiction for eight months.
WoW is to methadone as EQ is to heroin.